5 ms·
I've always been curious as to why squirrels have never been domesticated and bred to serve as pets. A wide variety of other rodents (mice, rats, hamsters) are
by jasonhansel 5y ago
I've always been curious as to why squirrels have never been domesticated and bred to serve as pets. A wide variety of other rodents (mice, rats, hamsters) are already available as pets, having been domesticated over many generations, and it isn't obvious why no one has ever tried this with squirrels.
Some quick research shows that a big part of the problem is diet: squirrels require a surprisingly complex and varied diet that is hard for pet owners to replicate. Getting them enough physical activity is also an issue.
(Of course, one might suspect that it would be cruel to keep squirrels in such unnatural conditions, but the same could be said of most pets.)
[edit: Apparently keeping wild, undomesticated squirrels as pets was popular at one point (https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/pet-squirrel-craze https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/pet-squirrel-craze ). That article doesn't say why the trend died out, other than...all of the obvious reasons.]
[edit 2: Would a squirrel raised indoors always think it was summer, or would they start storing and then digging up food as the year progressed even with no change in temperature? Might be relevant.]
- ascar 5y agoHaven't all large domesticated pets (i.e. those that can't be kept in a cage) been used for practical purposes for hundreds of years before they became mere pets in modern times? Like cats were used for pest control and dogs for all kinds of workloads.
- saalweachter 5y agoEven weird tiny dog breeds usually have their origin in "we wanted a dog that could chase animals into their burrows".
- BugWatch 5y agoOr to run a rotisserie. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnspit_dog https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnspit_dog
- Bayart 5y agoTerrier is quite literally French for "burrow". They still work great with rats, farmers love these dogs.
- Arrath 5y agoMy parents had a terrier when I was younger, and she loved it when it was time to mow the grass. She would be out there eating her fill of the field mice that got flushed out and just having a blast.
- jasonhansel 5y agoDomesticating rats takes about 20-30 generations. Squirrels, though, take about 9 months to mature; rats are much faster, less than 2 months, which is probably one of many reasons why we've domesticated rats but not squirrels. Still, hypothetically, it should be possible to domesticate squirrels within a few decades. In foxes, domestication only took 7 generations, so it could even be faster. Incidentally, I have a new startup idea: first you domesticate squirrels, then you produce a line of commercially packaged squirrel food and an "invisible fence" type system for "outdoor" squirrels.
- stanfordalum 5y agoPart of the reason squirrels went out of vogue was crop damage - there was a large campaign in California to hunt squirrels in the early 20th century: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/in-1918-california-drafted-children-into-a-war-on-squirrels https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/in-1918-california-dra...