Exotic Pets

South Florida’s sub-tropical temperate climate, crowded and highly traveled international ports, and already disrupted environment tends to make it vulnerable to the accidental and intentional introduction and spread of exotic and invasive species of animals. The smuggling of exotic animals through our airports and seaports causes a great deal of this harm, however, the release of exotic pets also lends to this harmful devastation. Although not all exotic species pose a threat to our environment, many can become invasive and take over the natural surroundings of the native species while causing harm to both the environment and human health.

The goal of our project was to stop the release of these exotic pets into our natural environment. Our strategies for doing this were to create an informational pamphlet to hand out to customers at pet stores informing them about the dangers that releasing exotic pets poses to our environment, distribute stickers with the website to be placed on animal cages with the slogan "Before You Free A Pet, Find A Home", and constructing a website as an informational resource and forum for people to meet about adopting exotic pets.

We sent e-mails to the corporate centers of multiple pet stores including PetSmart, PetCo, Pet Supermarket, Petland, and Underground Reptiles concerning our project and asking them to post information about exotic pet release on their website. We received enthusiastic responses from most and continued by contacting individual stores asking them to display our pamphlets and distribute our stickers. We gave presentations to The Lions Club of Boca Raton, The DECA Chapter of Spanish River, and the Advanced Placement Environmental Science classes at Spanish River High School. We handed out over 350 pamphlets and stickers to people around Palm Beach County. Within two weeks of being launched, our website already had nearly fifty hits, with two people making use of the forum. Based upon measurable aspects, our project has been and will continue to be a success in helping to keep exotic pets out of the Palm Beach County environment.