Navigating Telling Someone NOT to Own a Reptile

Well, hopefully, if they do get the tokay, it will bite the guy and escape. They are like little vice grips when they bit. Had a friend years ago who sells reptiles for a living. One of his tokays escaped in his house as a baby. He tried catching it for the first 6 months. He never could catch it, but it did live in the house for years. He would see it sometime late at night, and it was over 12" long. He ended up liking it loose in his home as it took care of all the pests / bugs in his home.

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Honestly, if I could ensure it was safe and couldn’t escape and get killed, I would love to have a gecko roomie that eats the bugs that wander in :joy:

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What on earth did I just read… I don’t have any advice, but I really hope she changes her mind. Imagine putting any reptile in a bowl.

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She’s not a terribly wonderful coworker, and I try not to base people’s entire personality on what I see at work but in this case…

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Ughhh. I’m sorry you’ve been afflicted with this coquette, @cmills. You’re such a caring person, with such strong, positive ethics. It’s heartbreaking to merely read about this situation. I wish there were a “magic sentence” which could prevent this terrible pair from ever having charge of any living thing.

I know you’ll do the best you can to try and steer them away from their gecko plan, not to mention puppies, as well as any other creature they may acquire only to discard when these people become “bored.” All I can say is that I honor your caring heart. Bless you.

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Just remember that you aren’t responsible for other people’s action. You did your best but it doesn’t sound like anything you say will change their minds. The devil on my should wants to tel them to get a wild caught adult just to teach them a lesson I wouldn’t actually do it though.

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Oh good grief. :person_facepalming::person_facepalming:

Some people just suck, and it’s not in anybody’s power to change them. Though if she neglects or abuses a dog, she’s much more likely to actually get arrested for it. Does she know animal abuse is a crime? Maybe she doesn’t care.

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You might be better off convincing them that they’re hard to care for and too expensive to replace. Something along the lines of without $300-400 in a huge enclosure and setup, plus buying expensive food (since they obviously need $10 worth of food every other day), they won’t live more than two weeks, so it’s pointless to pay for the gecko plus shipping (over $100) every couple weeks when the last one died.
I really don’t like agreeing that they’re disposable, but I think it’s better to go on their level with ethics than getting them on your level with ethics. What I mean by that is that it’s easier to provide facts with how impractical it is to keep replacing them than changing their fundamental beliefs to convince them that animals deserve respect and work. Given that you’re in central OH, I think it’s unlikely that they are going to catch WC animals, so as long as they don’t think about local sources, then this should be a safe argument. If they proceed with purchasing after knowing about the financial cost, then it would be necessary to argue the ethics of disposable animals.
At the end of the day, there’s only so much you can do, so don’t beat yourself up for their bad decisions.

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Couple things I can think of.
1, give her care, feeding, handling, and husbandry sheets so she has a chance that read what it will take to keep one.
2, ask to see the post. Then contact the seller and inform them of the situation. If they care about it, then they won’t sell it to them.

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Wow @d_y_python those are both great ideas but the “post” idea is the best! :clap::+1::wink:

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This is genius!

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Thank you all so much!
These are all fantastic ideas, and I’ll do my best!

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