native pets - why not?

Discussion in 'Planting, growing, nurturing Plants' started by mereki, Jul 31, 2007.

  1. mereki

    mereki Junior Member

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    I believe living with pets is enriching but i'm just not interested in cats and dogs. Too many cats in my neighbourhood have become semidomesticated and mark their territory in my bird loving backyard.

    cats can become feral problems and unloved dogs cost money to go to the pound.

    Why is it so hard to introduce a small marsupial, or turtle, or wallaby into a family?

    The book Going Native describes how quolls have potentially the best pet-like characteristics....

    Cats and dogs will never be endangered, because they can be taken and valued within human families. Is this then not a good insurance policy for endangered or rare species? once domesticated, cats and dogs have proven that animals can become wild once more............
     
  2. Luisa

    Luisa Junior Member

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    People can't and won't take care of dogs and cats, about which we know plenty now.

    Why would they take care of native animals any better? And how much do we know about the needs of the native animals?

    Just me but I reckon the damage is better being restricted to un-endangered species.

    Once dogs and cats are being cared for by society as a whole, then I'd think about letting them lose with endangered native species.

    Luisa
     
  3. hedwig

    hedwig Junior Member

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    we don't have nearly no wildlife here and this is not only due to big roads but to all the dogs and cats in our neighbourhood.
     
  4. Alex M

    Alex M Junior Member

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    On the radio recently, I heard a naturalist who had been working with Quolls talking about his experiences with a particular animal that moved into his home. He said once you've spent a bit of time with a quoll, you'll never go back to a dog or cat. Their intelligence and playful personality are particularly endearing.

    Whatever anyone believes about our current favourite home companions, it cannot be denied that our domesticated animals, particularly sheep and cattle, are not likely to find themselves on any endangered list in the near future.

    Domesticated dogs and cats have been escaping and displacing native animals in the wild for as long as we humans have been converting natural habitats to our own ends. It would be a satisfactory irony, don't you think, if quolls began displacing cats and dogs from the domestic hearth!! :lol:
     
  5. pebble

    pebble Junior Member

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    Quolls, are they related to possums?
     
  6. mereki

    mereki Junior Member

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    i didn't say anything about letting cats and dogs out into the environment. If endangered animals are given value in homes, their numbers would increase, and "uncared for" individuals would become wild again but not invasive like cats and dogs
     
  7. mereki

    mereki Junior Member

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    also i wouldn't refer to people having pets as "damaging". i suppose only a quoll will know if its life is better in the bush or with a human family.

    couldn't tell you if quolls are related to possums, tree kangaroos, or whatever
     
  8. Michaelangelica

    Michaelangelica Junior Member

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    Re: native pets - why not?

    I agree completely
    But have been having a HUGE ARGUMENT on Care2 about Australian attitudes to Feral Cats
    Americans seem to equate them with stray urban cats and have no idea of the devastation they can cause to Australian native animals and especially the re-introduction of rare animals to a particular habitat.
    This is the miss -informed article that started the argument
    https://www.care2.com/news/member/442150667/426133
    i have tried to post some alternative views but some seem to feel cats are puurrfect (sorry could not resist)
    I could appreciate some help.

    What about australian natives as pets?
     
  9. pebble

    pebble Junior Member

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    There's alot of ignorance in that feral cat thread :?

    I just wrote a long post there only to find out that you need an account to post :cry:

    Out of interest, what does Tim Flannery say about feral cats in Oz? I can't remember, but I know he's big on allowing introduced species to fill the niche of extinct ones.
     
  10. Michaelangelica

    Michaelangelica Junior Member

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    No Tim?

    Thanks for the tip
    but could not find any TF quotes; But this was interesting:-
    https://www.scribblybum.net/16/166335.htm

    (Actually I am a cat lover!)
     
  11. Alex M

    Alex M Junior Member

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    Since they are both Marsupials, they are related, but I think the Quoll's closest relative is the only other carnivorous marsupial, the Tasmanian Devil.

    My cat thinks I don't take good enough care of her. "I'm hungry." "I'm still hungry." "You're sitting on my chair." "What are you reading?" "Stop looking at the computer screen, and look at me - what's this button do?" "Let me out." "Let me in." "Take me for a walk!" "Carry me home!" :lol:
     
  12. pebble

    pebble Junior Member

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    Your cat: "It's so hard to get good staff these days" :wink: :lol:
     
  13. Luisa

    Luisa Junior Member

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    There's an awful lot of points to be discussed re: saving endangered animals by making them pets.

    1) There's several sub points about whether taking them as pets actually "saves" the species. Have we saved the budgerigar by domesticating it?

    2) There's the one about whether people would/could take care of them anyway. If scientists with funded recovery programs have trouble getting them to breed, what chance does Joe Blow have of getting say bilbies to breed like rabbits.

    3) There's the whole "cats impact on wildlife" issue, for which there are bucketloads of info. And even without reading that thread, yeah I have some idea of the USA view on 'feral cats', it's been known for some time.

    Quolls are related to possums.

    And my cats don't think I take care of them enough either!!
     
  14. Michaelangelica

    Michaelangelica Junior Member

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    I don't understand why Australians are not able to keep nati

    I don't understand why Australians are not able to keep native animals as pets. especially those raised from babies from car accidents etc
    I believe no less a personage than Don Burke and some musuem scientists also agree with me.
    It seems to me we would learn to understand, respect and love our native animals more. We would have fewer feral Cat/dog problems
    We could still keep the micro-chipping system to gard against irresponsible pet owners/exploiters
    Farmers could sell captive bred birds& reptiles OS and make a fortune.

    I have read some funny stories about people keeping native pet animals though.
    One that really tickles me was the people with the wombat that just got too big to sleep with a couple in their bed at night (apart from stealing all the blankets) (It had become diurnal)
    So when it was banished to its' own bed it tried to dig though the bedroom door.
    Banished outside it eventually dug a wombat sized hole though the bedroom floor.!
     
  15. nibs

    nibs Junior Member

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    what about the issues of breeding?
    we (as humans) have managed to bestow all sorts of ailments, diseases and unpleasant characteristics into our pets by creating new fashionable breeds. for alot of people its not about the nature of the dog, they just want that cute one! so the nature of the industry means these animals are bred by breeders and pet shops for their looks and not put much consideration into the animals nature.

    not to mention all the problems with monitoring the animals once they are bought by people. i have two cats and two dogs that have come from animal shelters because they were taken from their homes due to poor treatmant and now they are such happy and definately loving animals.

    so maybe its better to not allow these tragedies to happen to our nitive animals. at least until everyone else can be trusted to love and respect their pets as members of a family.

    to me the best way to have a native pet (in a loose sense of the word) is to encourage habitat so that animals will feel safe enough to come into the house and co-exist with you while still leading its own life of free choice.
    i would love to have a quoll or sugar glider that came into the house at night to snooze on my lap only to go off and lead a natural and fulfilling life of its own, what harmony!

    thats my 2 cents.
     
  16. mereki

    mereki Junior Member

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    nibs your last paragraph hit the nail on the head, but the chances of a sugar glider coming and hanging with me in my sydney home are slim.

    i don't know what tim flannery reckons, but i do know that in several Indigenous communities, cats have replaced extinct marsupials, and have a place, and have their own dreaming.
     
  17. bill

    bill Junior Member

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    The reason suburban gardens don't abound with various native mammals is cats and dogs. if we never had them we would now be shareing our space with aussie animals
     
  18. disorderly

    disorderly Junior Member

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    The biggest reason not to allow native animals as pets is that if if were to occur than many people wouldnt buy them but rather catch them or shoot the mothers and raise the babies.
    This happens all the time with some sought after native plants,hence there are strict guidelines for staghorns,elkhorns,birdsnests,treeferns, some palms and orchids and other species to restrict poaching from the wild.
    Leave the native animals be!
    How would you like to be taken out of your natural habitat and effectively caged!!

    Scott
     
  19. Alex M

    Alex M Junior Member

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    Actually, one very good reason that suburban gardens don't abound with native animals is that they are suburban gardens. Many years ago, I lived in a suburban flat which was occasionally visited by a ring-tailed possum. But the inevitable happened, and the adjoining houses (all of them) and their tall trees (all of them), where demolished for more flats. No more possum. Hopefully he or she found a haven in the nearby golf course, but I think it was getting a bit crowded with refugees already. :cry:

    I have a photo of my cat and a possum almost nose to nose, both equally curious about each other. Eventually the possum decided she'd eaten enough cat food and headed for the trees (spurred on by my water pistol). My cat expects me to sort out her territorial issues!
     
  20. Jackie K

    Jackie K Junior Member

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    Native animals as pets - well they do have some very unexpected capabilities. One day, a long time ago, the bush across the road was being cleared for new housing. I spied an Echidna wandering on the road and scooped it up in a towel to relocate it before it got run over or the neighbourhood monster kids got hold of it and killed it. My kids were due home from school, so I thought to wait for them before going bush. I released the echidna onto the fully enclosed back verandah while I waited. The only thing there was a huge old lock up wardrobe that I used to store all my tools and hardware fittings, heavy as. With only half the echidnas height as clearance from the floor, I didn't think it would be a hazard. By the time the kids got home from school, a matter of an hour, the echidna had got under that wardrobe AND moved it out of position a couple of feet :shock: :shock: :shock: Not only that, it had somehow managed to get up the sheer wall to the ledge about one and half metres from the floor, and excavated all my hanging baskets :shock: :shock: I now have an even greater respect for them than I did previously. Much more to them than meets the eye. It did not want to come out from under the wardrobe, so I had to completely unpack all my tools out of the wardrobe to be able to get a neighbor to help me lift it clear so I could release it. It wasn't at all upset or threatened; didn't curl up as they do when stressed. To have them as a pet would be rather a challenge I think. It really makes my day when I come across them out in the bush, just busy excavating, totally ignoring everything around them in their pursuit of some morsel. Not the animal to keep in bars and concrete.
    Jackie K
     

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