Heeding the Call of the Wild

Los Angeles may not have an animal with as much star power as Punxsutawney Phil--the groundhog who is posing for his annual close-up today in the town of Punxsutawney, Pa., 80 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. But we do have our fair share of exotic animal sightings.

In the eight years Rose Channer has been working as senior director of the nonprofit Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals-Los Angeles rescue service, she has seen it all. “We have seen stray tortoises walking down the street, marmoset monkeys playing on the jungle gym of the McDonald’s in Hawthorne--you name it.”

The agency’s investigation and rescue department answers 200 abuse and neglect calls a month. An average of 10 are penal code violations, which range from beating an animal to starving it. Exotic animals are sometimes discovered and impounded in these cases.

“Several years ago we found a house with a shark tank. In another case, a woman called from Beverly Hills to report an alligator in her pool. We thought she was crazy, but it turned out it was a neighbor’s pet alligator which had escaped,” Channer says.

Mary Brankovic, director of public relations for the agency, remembers a rescue call that led investigators to a storage unit full of black hooded rats. “There were tons of them. We brought them in, and they were all pregnant. It was a mess. Someone was breeding them.”

Keeping exotic animals can be a cultural issue, Channer explains. “We see a lot of pigs, goats, sheep and chickens. Some people grew up with these animals around and don’t realize they are not zoned for Los Angeles. But unless there is a cruelty situation, many people get away with keeping them.”

In other cases, exotic animals are abandoned by pet owners who get in over their heads. “A lizard can grow to be 6 or 7 feet long. They need special food and light. Tortoises live for 100 years. People don’t realize this until it’s too late.”

The Wildlife Waystation, a nonprofit organization located in the Angeles National Forest, shelters many of L.A.’s unwanted exotics, including lions, tigers, bears and many hybrid wolf-dogs. “A few years ago we had a call from a gas station owner in the Valley who found a lion in the men’s room. People get frustrated because they don’t know what to do with these animals,” says Martine Collette, director of the Wildlife Waystation, which she founded in 1976.

Both Channer and Collette advise against having exotic pets. But if you do have an animal you can no longer take care of, she advises that you take it to one of the SPCA-LA’s four shelters. The agency will work with veterinarians and animal clubs to place unwanted pets. Or call the Wildlife Waystation, which takes in between 4,500 and 4,800 animals each year. Animals native to California are returned to the wild. Others are placed in zoos or live out their lives at the 160-acre sanctuary.

Both Channer and Collette recommend against advertising unwanted pets in the newspaper or on the Internet.

“There are unscrupulous people who give fake addresses [and] who are illegally selling these animals to researchers,” Channer says. If you are going to give away a pet or sell it, do your homework. “Go to the prospective owner’s home, check out the backyard, and talk to the neighbors.”

* For help, call the SPCA-LA at (323) 730-5300 or the Wildlife Waystation at (818) 899-5201.