![]() But one of the more interesting and well-known are spiders. Some can be quite scary looking! Oregon has all sorts of different creatures and critters that live there. While they may not scare everyone, there are plenty of different types of spiders in Oregon. The organization opposes keeping any wild animal as a pet.Orkin, an extermination company in the U.S., recently found that spiders are the number one thing that people fear. "It's not necessary to pursue animals that are rare as pets," says Kate Dylewsky of Born Free USA. Is that enough to justify owning one? Animal rights activists say no. Of course, that's part of the allure - the zebras are exotic and wild, and the stripes stand out in a Disney-ish sort of way. Rosendo Ribeiro visiting patients atop a zebra in 1903. Pictures exist of Baron Walter Rothschild's zebras pulling his carriage through 19th-century London and Dr. Historical evidence of zebras as pets is rare. She posted on Instagram, "Tbt to the day that I got this little bugger and was actually nice # stripes # pet zebra # evilzebra." Evil Zebra was sold in 2012. Lila Tatar was 18 when she got her zebra, and she struggled. Inman sold Joey before she went to college - "I couldn't have taken him to Virginia Tech with me," she says - and has changed her view on zebras as pets: They shouldn't be kept in stalls, she argues. Cue the training montage: months of Inman gaining Joey's trust with carrots, slowly leading him around the field, and then the glory moment of saddling him, straddling him, and riding down the road, blond hair streaming behind her. "I thought it was going to be a piece of cake," she said ruefully. Twenty-year-old Shea Inman broke her first horse when she was 14, but Joey, the zebra she bought from a Texas ranch, severely tested her confidence. Over the years I was slowly able to do more he taught me so much, especially patience," says Sebright.Įven well-treated animals can be hard to break in, zebra owners say. He had been abused and had trust issues: "It took months of sitting with a bucket of grain for him to come up to me. Her father wouldn't buy her one, as they were too expensive, so she raised money for Rarity by working at the local stables.īut Rarity was not the tame animal she'd been promised. Sebright helps run the Rarity Acres horse ranch in Michigan, and for her, zebra ownership is a childhood dream come true. "You can train a horse in 30 days, but it took three years to train Rarity," says Timianne Sebright, 28, referring to the pet zebra she regularly rides. While a zebra might just seem an exotic substitute for a horse, most can't be ridden, unlike Panettiere's creature. We need buyers to realize they have different needs than horses." "It was an opportunity to educate them about what owning a zebra means. That's when the Hollywood movie Racing Stripes, starring Hayden Panettiere, inspired a gazillion little girls to exotify their equine fantasies. Nunke runs training sessions for novice zebra owners at her California ranch, where she practices equine acupuncture and reiki on zebras with broken bones. Then there are the zebras themselves: Beautiful as they are, horsey as they seem, they're not domesticated like horses. Zebra owners must regularly contend with anti-exotic legislation, such as a January 2014 bill in West Virginia attempting to ban exotic animal ownership. Many states don't require zebra owners to file paperwork, and neither the American Association of Equine Practitioners nor the American Veterinary Medical Association tracks zebra ownership.Īnd while the thought of zebra ownership might make you smile like that little girl in the Frozen T-shirt, it's not an easy trot. (IZZZA itself has registered about 300 zebras, 22 zonkeys - zebra-donkey hybrids - and 13 zorses - the offspring of zebras and horses.) But it's hard to say for sure how many there are. Nancy Nunke, who 10 years ago founded the International Zebra-Zorse-Zonkey Association ( IZZZA), estimates that 3,000 zebras roam, kick and graze in American backyards. Owning a zebra is perfectly legal in most of the United States. You'd be forgiven for not taking her seriously - except that we're at Raz Livestock Sales, where, at a monthly exotic animal auction, zebras regularly go for $4,000. The littlest, who wears a Frozen T-shirt emblazoned with Elsa's face, leans forward, her eyes wide, and announces to her friends: "I really want a zebra!" The crowd is mostly men, tan and weathered from working outdoors, but three little girls perch on a bench in the front. ![]() It's a hot, dry day in Kerrville, Texas, and more than a hundred people have gathered in a small circular barn. That doesn't mean buying a zebra is a good idea. And owning them is legal in more places than you might think.
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