NAPERVILLE SUN (Illinois) 26 October 08 New city rules - and can of insecticide for your pet tarantula (Tim West)

One of the many items that currently is before the Naperville City Council is a new animal control ordinance.

The city has had regulations on animals for many, many years now, and this constituted a revision of the law concerning the licensing of household dogs and cats, increasing of fees for licenses (notice that governments never decrease fees for something), leash laws, dangerous animals, and so forth.

I'm not going to go through the law in detail because it's 17 pages, and it would take way more space than I have here.

Besides, if I did, you'd probably fall asleep long before I got to impoundment procedures.

Rather, I'll just hit a few of the highlights, or at least the provisions that were more interesting to me.

For instance, here's a list of the animals you're not allowed to have: poisonous snakes or reptiles; lions; tigers; cougars; jaguars; panthers; bobcats; mountain lions; lynx; ocelots; leopards; or any hybrid of those dangerous cats; wolves; coyotes; jackals; foxes; wild dogs; or hybrids; monkeys; gorillas; chimpanzees; ape-like primates or hybrids; or any other non-human primate.

Also banned are crocodile-like reptiles and pythons 6 feet or more in length. As I read about the latter, I thought of the news account I heard on the radio before I started to write this about the woman who was strangled by her pet python while she was trying to give it medication.

That would be a good reason right there either to not to have a python or to make sure it stays healthy.

The law also would ban "any other wild animal or exotic animal of nature not commonly found in a pet store."

OK, I've seen tarantulas in pet stores, so I guess it's all right to have those since they are not mentioned.

Whenever I look at a tarantula, even on television or in a zoo, I want to be armed with a pistol belt full of cans of industrial strength Raid. First, empty the can at the tarantula and then hit it with it.

The current law bans the staging of animal fights and/or keeping a location for such activities. The new law would go a step further and also ban attendance at animal fights.

This seems like a good idea to me, though I don't know if it would prevent Naperville from being the home to a 2012 presidential debate.

The ordinance also has a whole bunch of new regulations of dogs that have been deemed dangerous.

For instance, dangerous dogs have to get a microchip implant and are also subject to mandatory sterilization.

Actually, all pet dogs and cats should have microchips. In the event they get lost, you're a lot more likely to get the animal back if it has been chipped.

As for sterilization, given the pet overpopulation problem, unless a dog is being kept for breeding purposes, that's a good idea, too, and not just for dangerous dogs.

Unless I missed them somewhere, there were no such dangerous animal regulations for household cats.

That's probably because a cat usually isn't a danger to anyone except its owner.

Or at least that's been my experience with Job, our Siamese cat.

The next time he gives me a chomp and won't let go of my arm, I'll remind him he's just fortunate the laws in Naperville let him get away with such anti-social behavior.
New city rules

[ Show Entire Thread ]