Not Pet Material : List Of Animals You Can’t Keep As Pets In Maine
Even if an animal is cute and cuddly doesn’t mean it would make it a good house pet. There are plenty of cute and cuddly looking animals I’d like to squeeze and take home and have forever and ever…(or until the varied life spans last). However, this is just not possible. The reasons why my home isn’t filled with bears, tigers, penguins and other lovable animals are:
- I don’t have the space
- Not wanting to contract various animal borne diseases
- Wanting to keep all my limbs
- Wanting to stay out of jail
- Not wanting to die
Luckily there are laws in place anyway to help us keep us safe from our love of animals (check out the Maine law here). For some wildlife and exotic animals there are exceptions as long as a person has the prerequisites to apply for and and hold a permit. Still, there are some animals you see around Maine, but cannot have as a pet. Let’s learn about some of them!
It’s close to that season and you might think that it might be a good idea to capture one of the many wild turkeys roaming about, take it home, fatten it up and enjoy the labors of your work during the holidays. Or you just might want to have a wild turkey run around your yard or home. But turkeys are very protective and have strong legs. Wild turkeys can run up to 25 miles an hour! Male turkeys (also called Toms) don’t take care of their young at all. In fact it was the protective nature and pride that almost made the Wild Turkey the country’s bird representative instead of the American Bald Eagle.
It would be so cool to have a moose as a pet. Or if we had one in the office for our mascot, but I don’t think we could fit it through our doors (their antlers can span up to a total of six feet), or feed it (as herbivores, they eat 50-60 pounds of food a day)! They are also pretty fast, they can run 35 miles per hour for short while, and steadily go 20 miles in an hour. Baby moose, also called calfs, can out run humans when they are barely a week old!
You could potentially have a lion or a tiger as a pet (permit required) but you cannot have a bear as a pet in Maine. As cute, small and defenseless the cubs may be (a brown bear cub can be as small as 16 ounces, that’s smaller than I was when I was born!) they will soon grow to be strong, fast, intelligent omnivorous animal. That couch you like so much may not be there when you come home from work if you had a pet bear.
Even though some of these animals may seem like a cool pet to have, it’s better to let them live in their own natural environment and enjoy them from a safe distance. Unless you have a hunting permit for these you can enjoy them in taxidermy form and or in your stomach.
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