The Critter Digest

Care guides, health deep dives, pet laws, wild animal features and more.

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Today’s reads

A fresh set from the library every day

Vibrant illustration of a cuttlefish showing colorful patterns

Aquatic Life

10 Surprising Cuttlefish Facts

Cuttlefish can change their skin in milliseconds and have W-shaped pupils. Discover 10 remarkable facts about this intelligent cephalopod.

Jun 8, 20265 min

Hedgehog undergoing a wellness check with an exotic veterinarian

Small & Exotic Pets

Common Hedgehog Health Issues (And Why Wobbly Hedgehog Syndrome Isn't as Common as You've Heard)

Hedgehogs face a mix of genetic, husbandry-related, and age-related conditions, and one of them, a specific neurological disease, is worth understanding clearly since it's often misrepresented in how commonly it occurs.

Jul 19, 20267 min

Fish

Oscar Fish Tank Setup: Bigger and More Filtered Than You Expect

Oscars get large and messy, and the setup needs to reflect that from day one, not grow into it gradually.

Jul 30, 20267 min

An Argentine black and white tegu digging into deep substrate in a large enclosure

Enrichment

Tegu Enrichment: Borrowing From the Monitors, and Saying So

Nobody has published an enrichment study on tegus. The closest evidence is the monitor problem-solving work, and this guide says which parts transfer and which do not.

Sep 4, 20266 min

Fish

Common Discus Health Issues (And What Actually Prevents Them)

Discus have a real reputation for being delicate, and most of what backs that up traces to water quality and stress, just with a narrower margin for error than most fish.

Sep 8, 20267 min

All articles, newest first

American black bear standing in a clearing with its black coat, rounded ears and pale muzzle in clear view

Legal

Are Pet Black Bears Legal? The Most Restricted Animal on the Map

Thirty-five jurisdictions ban a pet black bear and not one state allows it without a permit, which makes it the most restricted animal on this map. The surprise is the other fourteen. Because the black bear is a native game animal across most of its range, the permits that exist are game-breeder and menagerie permits, and West Virginia's is two dollars.

Oct 13, 202612 min

Eastern gray squirrel sitting on a branch holding an acorn among autumn leaves

Legal

Are Pet Squirrels Legal? The Eastern Gray Is a Game Animal, State by State

The eastern gray squirrel has a hunting season in most of the states where it lives, and that is the rule that decides whether you can keep one. Read across all 52 jurisdictions it comes to 19 bans, 20 permits, six clean yeses, and a pair of open questions in Montana and Kansas that no statute answers.

Oct 13, 202612 min

White-tailed doe standing at the edge of a forest meadow with her tail raised

Legal

Is It Legal to Keep a Deer? Why No State Is a Clean Yes

A white-tailed deer is the one animal on this map with no clean legal state. It is big game everywhere it lives, and every state that allows a captive one routes it through a deer-farm license, an eight-foot fence and a chronic wasting disease program. Across all 52 jurisdictions that comes to 28 bans, 20 permits that are mostly farm registrations, one condition, two restricted lists and Indiana's open question.

Oct 13, 202612 min

Wolfdog standing in snow with a gray and cream coat, amber eyes and the long legs and narrow chest of its wolf parent

Legal

Are Wolfdogs Legal? Counted by Generation, by Percentage, or by the Word Wolf

No animal on this map splits the states five ways like the wolfdog: 12 bans, 5 permits, 8 conditional, 17 legal and 10 unclear. The reason is that statutes define the hybrid three different ways, by generation, by percentage, or by the two words 'any wolf', and the same animal is a dog in Virginia, a wild animal in Michigan, and an open question in Illinois.

Oct 13, 202612 min

Asian small-clawed otter standing on a wet rock with its short-clawed front paws together and its whiskered face toward the camera

Legal

Are Pet Otters Legal? The Mustelid Clause and the Word Otter

Every pet otter in America is an Asian small-clawed otter, and since 2019 every lawful one is domestic captive-bred, because CITES Appendix I closed the border. Inside the country the family name Mustelidae does most of the work: it bans the otter in Maine and Connecticut, licenses it in South Dakota and Virginia, and frees only the ferret. Seven states name 'otter' in a furbearer list and never say which one.

Oct 12, 202611 min

White-nosed coati walking along a fallen trunk with its long banded tail held straight up and its pale snout toward the ground

Legal

Are Coatis Legal? The Procyonid the Lists Name by Accident

The coati shares the kinkajou's map almost line for line, with three differences that come from being named. Oklahoma's exemption list and Nebraska's import list carry the word 'coatimundi' and nothing for the kinkajou, which makes the coati the freer animal in both. Texas lists the white-nosed coati as state threatened, which makes it the banned one there.

Oct 12, 20269 min

Kinkajou clinging to a branch at night with its prehensile tail wrapped around the limb and its large dark eyes toward the camera

Legal

Are Kinkajous Legal? The Procyonid the Law Reaches by Family

Almost no statute names the kinkajou. The law reaches it through the raccoon's family, Procyonidae, or through the whole order Carnivora, and where a list stops at the word raccoon the kinkajou walks past it. Read from the text, it is legal with no permit in 23 states, banned in 14 jurisdictions, and a permit animal in 11.

Oct 12, 202610 min

Two-toed sloth hanging upside down from a branch

Legal

Are Sloths Legal? Legal in 27 States, Banned by Name in a Few

A two-toed sloth needs no state permit in 27 jurisdictions, because the dangerous-animal lists never mention it and the native-wildlife rules never reach it. Eleven ban it, seven of those by naming the order, the family or the genus, twelve issue a permit, Arizona restricts the whole order, and Pennsylvania's text will not decide.

Oct 12, 202611 min

Adult tiger walking through tall grass with its head low and eyes forward

Legal

Big Cat Laws by State After the Big Cat Public Safety Act

Since 20 December 2022 no private person may acquire a tiger, lion or cougar anywhere in the United States, and the owners who registered by 18 June 2023 may keep what they had and nothing more. The state table still matters, because the states set the conditions on those animals, and because the cougar is a native cat that game law reaches on its own.

Oct 11, 202612 min

Bobcat standing on a rock with its tufted ears, spotted coat and short tail in clear view

Legal

Are Bobcats Legal? A Native Cat Caught From Both Sides

The bobcat is the one wild cat on this map that is both a felid, caught by every family-wide cat clause written for the serval, and a native furbearer, caught by the trapping chapters written for the raccoon. The surprise is the second half: twenty states issue a permit, more than for any other wild cat, because a furbearer license is a thing a keeper can hold.

Oct 11, 202611 min

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The Critter Digest

Today’s reads

10 Surprising Cuttlefish Facts

Common Hedgehog Health Issues (And Why Wobbly Hedgehog Syndrome Isn't as Common as You've Heard)

Oscar Fish Tank Setup: Bigger and More Filtered Than You Expect

Tegu Enrichment: Borrowing From the Monitors, and Saying So

Common Discus Health Issues (And What Actually Prevents Them)

All articles, newest first

Are Pet Black Bears Legal? The Most Restricted Animal on the Map

Are Pet Squirrels Legal? The Eastern Gray Is a Game Animal, State by State

Is It Legal to Keep a Deer? Why No State Is a Clean Yes

Are Wolfdogs Legal? Counted by Generation, by Percentage, or by the Word Wolf

Are Pet Otters Legal? The Mustelid Clause and the Word Otter

Are Coatis Legal? The Procyonid the Lists Name by Accident

Are Kinkajous Legal? The Procyonid the Law Reaches by Family

Are Sloths Legal? Legal in 27 States, Banned by Name in a Few

Big Cat Laws by State After the Big Cat Public Safety Act

Are Bobcats Legal? A Native Cat Caught From Both Sides

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