ppl arent gonna like this but if you let your predator and prey pets interact u shouldnt have pets. good owners don’t put their pets in life risking positions just cus its cute or whatever. respect your animals and keep them apart or dont have them
as a note for those who don’t know why heritage breeds are so good: they aren’t bred to overproduce. they’re bred for health and longevity. a production leghorn lays over 300 eggs a year and will live MAYBE three years. usually dying of some horrible reproductive illness, even in a good environment. the production meat hybrids get so meaty so quickly that they can’t physically live passed a few months, eight months is the absolute max before their legs stop being able to carry them or their heart gives out. they can’t breed on their own, they don’t live long enough.
heritage breed chickens must average over six years to be considered heritage. they’re hardy birds that lay fewer eggs, often 250 or less. there are many breeds bred for meat, but they grow slowly and breed on their own. they can live long, full lives. there are dual purpose breeds. these heritage breeds have valuable, unique genetics that not only benefit us humans, but their species as well! we have breeds that can withstand frigid winters, fight off disease thanks to breeders breeding for immunity, live far longer than junglefowl (what chickens were bred from thousands of hears ago), and all sorts of cool things. these unique genes hugely benefit science.
corperate hatcheries don’t breed for these things, they might have birds that they claim are heritage breeds, but they almost always have production mixed in. they breed on a massive, uncaring scale. by banning facebook sales, ARAs are saying a big “fuck you” to breeders who are just trying to keep a breed alive and maybe make a living doing so. although i rarely meet breeders who make more money than they pour into those birds. yes, there are bad breeders, but there are a lot of really awesome breeders. all big hatcheries are bad. the decision to ban animal sales directly benefits those bad hatcheries, and none of the breeders.
congrats to the ARAs who got facebook to ban animal sales. shortly before then, many rare heritage chicken breeds were getting much needed attention to save the breeds thanks to various agricultural facebook pages highligting them. but now, with the ban of animal sales on facebook, those heritage breeds have become damn near impossible to find again. guess what that means? the breeds will begin dying out again. people will go back to hatcheries who mass produce unhealthy chicken breeds in horrible conditions. folks will always buy chickens, but now instead of buying them from ethical breeders on facebook they’ll be supporting a terrible industry, woohoo.
hope y’all are proud.
this is happening with pigeons as well and its terrible. it was already damn near impossible to find a good pigeon breeder but now it IS impossible since all the groups are getting shut down, facebook was one of the few places you could meet some breeders, other than meeting them at exhibitions or clubs in person. it sure is significantly speeding up the decline of the already-scarce hobby of keeping pigeons, thats for sure
It’s hit the reptile and amphibian hobby hard too. We used to have a page to vet buyers/sellers. No one wants to buy a sick animal or support someone who treats their animals poorly. That page was removed, taking out years of reviews.
It’s also going to have a huge impact on genetic diversity since it limits our ability to match animals. Bearded dragons are intensely inbred; the ability to find good lines was essential to correcting this.
It’s happening in rabbits too. And I’d like to echo ALL of these points because they’re good.
Although who are we kidding? The elimination of specific breeds, and animal keeping as a whole, is 100% a goal of the ARA movement.
Sheep as well! The Florida Cracker Sheep group on there still has a lot of cool info but its damn hard to hook up with breeders except in PMs and even then … fb messaging sucks, ppls PM settings vary, and even being like “check out this sheep. PM me” is considered a Suspect Post these days
Finding reputable breeders and sellers in the aquatics department, or even just finding homes for problem fish locally, is nigh impossible now. The local breeders are moving to ebay to sell but, again, we’re losing information and groups like flies. It’s insane and a huge loss to the hobby.
Cats are not sapient creatures. Mr.Fuzzybottom does not have the thought process to weigh the consequences of his actions or to assess potential risks.
He does not care that the lizard is of an endangered species; he’s hungry and wants to eat.
Cars matter little to him, he’s grown used to the sound of them and no instinct of his is going to tell him that a thousand pound metal thing going at 20mph is not gonna stop just because he wandered out in front of it.
Cats have no concept of money either. Oh, he got taken to the vet again because he got in yet another fight? Meh; he chased the other cat off and that’s all that matters in his fuzzy little brain.
He also knows that people mean food and shelter. He doesn’t know that food could be poisoned, or that the person would sooner shoot him than let him in their home.
Maybe he does know how to avoid predators. That doesn’t stop them from being bigger, stronger, faster then him. He is not an animal built by nature, he’s a pet.
But hey, despite all that he went home and didn’t die at a depressingly young age, so you’re gonna go around telling every indoor cat advocate that their wrong despite all statistics and evidence, just because Fuzzybottom avoided so many near deaths that you had no clue about.
Something that really breaks my heart is the cruel indifference that some people have towards pets or animals that they personally don’t enjoy. Like I hear so many stories about someone losing a beloved pet snake or rat or tarantula, only for their friends to say something like “good riddance”.
My best friend does not like my gerbils at all. She jokingly calls them vermin and teases me for being the only 25 year old woman that still has pet gerbils. She came to visit me one weekend when one of my sweet babies was really sick, and unfortunately called me at work to solemnly let me know my gerbil had passed. The entire drive home I was trying not to cry because we had plans and I didn’t want to ruin the weekend with my ridiculous grief over a rodent. When I got home, my best friend was sitting in the driveway, hand painting a little coffin with my gerbil’s name on it. I immediately started sobbing. She went and got me a glass of wine, and played a Stevie Nicks song on her phone while she dug a grave. After the somber funeral in my backyard, she cancelled our evening plans and we walked to a bar, where my best friend completely un-ironically held up a glass and toasted my dead gerbil, thanking her for the joy she’d brought me.
The point of this story is, you don’t have to share or even understand your friend’s interests to show them respect and empathy in a time of loss. It’s alright if you don’t like a friend’s unconventional pet, you certainly don’t have to! However, pet loss can be incredibly painful, and I think it is always best to err on the side of kindness.
my child is only allowed to play with flash cards. if she gets them all right, we play one (1) round of go fish but I have to win to establish dominance.
Gosh, I’m doing this so wrong.
….We’re not even bringing our dog home for like 2 more months and she already has more toys than this asshole’s dogs.
Grim has earned every one of her toys simply by existing
My dog literally has a toy in her mouth or right beside her 24/7
There’s a difference between “if you can’t afford the vet don’t get pets” (which is true unfortunately) and like, someone starting a gofundme/donation post bc their pet has some sort of crazy unforeseen illness that was impossible to predict…dont be mean to ppl ebegging for their pets bc they budgeted $250 for shots and worm medicine and don’t have $2,000 laying around for feline MRI scans
People also tend to get nasty with “you should have gotten pet insurance you irresponsible idiot” but pet insurance refuses coverage for all kinds of things that an owner could not reasonably anticipate.
I say this as someone who very, very firmly believes in the adage “if you can’t afford the vet, you can’t afford the pet”: this quote is speaking about standard vet care. This quote refers to the average expected standard of care for an individual animal.
It means if you take in a healthy, young animal, you should be able to cover its yearly physical exam, its vaccinations/standard preventative treatment meds (like for example, flea/tick meds, heartworm, etc), and its spay/neuter as applicable. It means that you should have set aside anywhere from $100-300 (or pay for pet insurance) to cover if your animal gets the animal equivalent of a cold or a minor injury.
It means that if you take in an animal that needs advanced care, for example a diabetic animal, that you are prepared to pay for the standard care that particular animal will need. These costs are higher and, going into the deal, you should be aware of them and prepared to handle them.
The phrase has been passed around in short form and used to ridicule people to whom it does not apply. It should read: “If you cannot afford the standard, expected, and reasonable vet costs for your particular animal, then you can’t afford that animal.”
Because it does not mean that someone should not get a pet because something catastrophic might happen somewhere along the line that they won’t immediately have the funds to cover. As someone who has been there and done that and had to cover an unexpected, several-thousand-dollar emergency bill, I can say it’s absolutely unreasonable to demand that every person who owns an animal set aside that kind of money for something that might never actually happen.
Standard vet care you can expect- it’s standard. You know it’s coming, you can plan for it, and the money set aside for it you know is going to be used. It’s reasonable to expect that people be ready and able to cover those costs before acquiring a pet because they can know in advance what those costs are going to be and have the opportunity to assess whether or not they can do it.
Risk of injury to animal, other animals, or people
The animal might eat some dumb shit while you’re not looking (because of course people will come talk to you about the animal)
Bacterial/viral risks to animal and other animals
Health risks due to animal not being in a suitable environment
Alligators have no concept of “this is toy thank”
Any possible incident will, by the public, reflect on the reptile keeper community as a whole (because it always does)
Pros:
Get creds for claiming its educational and enriching and GET THAT YOUTUBE MONEY FROM SMALL CHILDREN HELL YEAHHHH!
Additional con:
-very high chance of violating local laws about where dangerous animals can and cannot be (and you just KNOW if somebody is taking their pet alligator to the store for youtube clicks they haven’t the foresight to check where their alligator can legally be present)
-misrepresentation of actual animal education; some yahoos taking their alligator to the pet store is not the same thing as a licensed professional doing animal demos where they’re invited to do so
Hey, if you still miss your pet that is okay. I don’t care if it is years later and you still cry because they were not there this morning to greet you in that one of a kind way they did. It isn’t trivial, it isn’t stupid, and you are not weak.
ifesbob 