What are exotic animals?
Although rats are considered “exotic,” I disagree with this label. Most exotic animals are somewhere in the gray area between (common)domestic and wild animals. Many exotics are still simply animals taken from the wild at a young age and “tamed.” Most often, exotics are captive bred, which means that they’ve had interaction from the time they were born and possibly that the domestication process is beginning. Captive bred animals tend to be better with people but still have many of their wild instincts. I consider pet rats, mice, syrian hamsters, gerbils, and some other types of rodents as completely domesticated, because they have been selectively bred as pets for well over 100 years. They are distinct and widely different in both looks and temperament from their wild anscestors. The domestication process usually results in (or possible from…) color and body mutations, which may be used as a clue to when an animal is more domestic than wild. Dumbo rats, for instance, are often/usual
