Pet

This page is about domestic animals. For several meanings of the acronym PET, see PET.

A pet or companion animal is a domesticated animal that is kept by humans for companionship or for the beauty of its appearance or utterances, rather than for economic reasons.

While in theory one could keep a blue whale as a pet, in practice a small number of species of mammals, especially dogs and cats, and birds have dominated the pet scene for a very long time. Fish have joined them more recently. With the exception of iguanas and non-venomous snakes, few reptiles and amphibians make good pets.

The glofish, a genetically modified zebrafish with a bright red fluorescent color is the first genetically modified (GM) animal to be engineered as a pet.

A pet can be acquired from a breeder, an animal shelter, a pet store, and sometimes from people who have too many due to births. See also Dog adoption.

Contents

1 Pet species

1.1 Mammals
1.2 Birds
1.3 Reptiles
1.4 Amphibians
1.5 Fish
1.6 Arthropods
1.7 Mollusks

2 See also

Pet species

Mammals

Horses
Dogs
Cats
Rodents, including hamsters, guinea pigs, mice, gerbils, chinchillas, degus, flying squirrels and rats
Rabbits
Ferrets
Hedgehogs
Alpacas
small pigs
Monkeys
Donkeys

Birds

Reptiles

Lizards
Iguanas
Snakes
Turtles
Crocodilians, including alligators, crocodiles, caimans, gavials (can usually only be kept as pets when they are young)

Amphibians

Frogs
Toads
Salamanders
Newts
Caecilian, a wormlike amphibian that lives underground