How Many Pet Ferrets Are In California?
Published estimates for total numbers of pet ferrets in California for the last 3 decades range from 30,000 to 1,000,000, but most cluster around 100,000.
According to this reddit thread,
I'm from California... Get them in Las Vegas, not Arizona. Just got to toss a blanket over them when you drive thru agriculture checkpoint.
Someone else posted,
[I]t only takes one assh* of a warden, AC, or cop to have your ferret confiscated, deported, or possibly euthanized. It's a risk, but there are supporters out there. Good luck!
Which brings us to the case of Peanut the Squirrel:
Peanut the Squirrel, a beloved pet who was an internet sensation before New York state officials confiscated and then killed it, is drawing even more social media attention after the rodent's death.
The state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) seized Peanut and a raccoon named Fred from owner Mark Longo's home and animal sanctuary in rural Pine City, near the Pennsylvania border, earlier this week. The agency, which said it had received complaints that wildlife was being kept illegally, then euthanized the critters, to the horror of Longo and about 550,000 of Peanut's best friends. As word got out, the X memes went up.
. . . Longo told his followers that he had taken the rodent in after he witnessed the squirrel’s mother being hit by a car. The squirrel refused to return to the wild and became attached to the couple.
The legality of pet squirrels varies from state to state:
Squirrels are considered exotic animals and many Americans do enjoy keeping them as pets. In some states, you can own a pet squirrel with no paperwork or permits required. Arkansas, Idaho, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming all allow people to own pet squirrels.
Additionally, Nebraska requires that the squirrel wasn’t captured from the wild for it to be a legal pet. New Jersey allows red squirrels and flying squirrels to be kept as pets. South Dakota allows squirrels to be kept as pets as long as they were purchased from a state where they are legal. Massachusetts and Montana allow pet squirrels as long as they are flying squirrels.
Other states allow pet squirrels if a permit is obtained. These states are Delaware, Indiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Rhode Island, and South Carolina.
Florida allows for many exotic animals to be owned, but squirrels are not specifically mentioned. It is unclear if squirrels can be kept as pets in Florida.
I haven't been able to find statistics on how many squirrels are kept as pets in states that prohibit the practice. Some states, including California, are especially strict about even feeding wild animals. In San Bernardino County:
§ 32.1301 Food Left Outside for Certain Mammalian Predators. (a) No person shall feed or in any manner provide food for one or more non-domesticated mammalian predators. A non-domesticated mammalian predator shall include coyotes, raccoons, foxes, opossums, bears, mountain lions, and bobcats.
§ 32.1302 Food Left Outside for Any Animal During Certain Hours. No person shall leave or permit to be left out-of-doors food for any animal between the hours of 10:00 p.m. of any one day and 6:00 a.m. of the following day, unless the area where the food is left is not accessible to non-domesticated mammalian predators.
My wife and I, had we lived there, would have been in violation of these ordinances simply by leaving bread out for our backyard birds if a possum had happened on it, or indeed, even if a bird had found it between 10:00 PM and 6:00 AM.Most of these laws are simply unenforceable. At best, they're equivalent to the current situation with marijuana laws: even in states where marijuana is still illegal, police will usually just seize it for destruction or stamp it out on the ground unless the quantity appears to be for sale; they'll usually either issue a citation or just a verbal warning. As a practical matter, officers have fairly wide discretion, and they recognize that when it's legal in one state but still illegal in their jurisdiction, the perception of fairness is important.
So it's particularly puzzling that the New York authorities treated Mark Longo so harshly:
Mark Longo, whose pet P’nut captured the hearts of 3 million social media users, was stunned when a convoy of vehicles carrying officials from the state departments of Environmental Conservation and Health arrived at his Pine City home Wednesday.
They served him with a surprise warrant allowing them to snatch away P’nut the squirrel and Fred, a raccoon he’d taken in.
“They treated me like I was a terrorist. They treated this raid as if I was a drug dealer. They ransacked my house for five hours,” Longo told The Post Saturday.
“They asked my wife, who is of German descent, what her immigration status was. They asked if I had cameras in my house. They wouldn’t allow me to go to the bathroom without a police escort, who then checked the back of the toilet to see if I was hiding anything there.”
State laws allowing raccoons as pets vary as widely as those for squirrels. In addition, Longo was apparently working to obtain legal status for the squirrel:
State law requires people to get a license if they wish to own a wild animal. Longo has said he was working to get Peanut - also known as P'Nut or PNUT - certified as an educational animal.
Those who watch On Patrol: Live know that officers who stop motorists for registration irregularities are often lenient if the motorists can explain what they're doing to get the problem straightened out, recognizing that they need the car to get to work. I'm puzzled that the New York authorities couldn't take a similar position with Longo, considering the high public profile of the case. According to the link,
"We will make a stance on how this government and New York state utilizes their resources," Mark Longo said in a phone interview.
He declined to specify his possible next steps but said officials would hear from him soon about what happened to Peanut the squirrel and Fred, a rescued raccoon that was also confiscated and put down.
. . . Longo said Saturday that he didn't see Peanut bite anyone during what he described as an hourslong, heavy-handed search. The authorities haven't spoken with him since they left the property, he said.
. . . A request for comment was sent to the DEC on Saturday.
At best, it appears that the New York authorities displayed remarkably poor judgment, the sort of thing that could result in disciplinary problems for an ordinary police officer.