We inherited a lizard a while back and, in the spur of the moment, thought it would be cute if we let our then 4-year-old son name him --- we might have reconsidered if we had known that "Hairwax the Leopard Gecko" would still be a member of the family 6 years later!

I have a reef aquarium, smaller but I like anyway

Three dogs, a salt water fish tank and two large talkative parrots...used to have a bearded dragon too. Our own crazy zoo!

At the moment we have one house rabbit with one eye rescued from an idiot raising them for food in his backyard, one house rabbit taken away from his momma too soon so he has an oral fixation. (He's either licking or chewing something at any given moment.) A house chicken who lost her sister last year and has been my shadow ever since. And a one-winged bird I found when he was just a few days old laying next to his dead sibling after they both fell from their nest. He sings all day long. He's a happy little guy.

The bunnies are litter-trained and unbelievably sweet and affectionate, smart and funny. How people can keep them in cages is beyond me. Or worse, eat them. (Haven't you heard? It's very IN now, this animal cruelty.) And Melody, our chicken, is a hoot. She wants cuddles all day long. She'll peck at you until you pick her up and cuddle her up into your neck. She wants to fall asleep on your shoulder. It's the sweetest thing. ALL my babies are the sweetest and oh so adorable.

We have 4 two-story rabbit condos in the eat-in area of our kitchen. Two of them are smaller sized and have big front yard pens so Sparkie and Smokie can hop around their little front yards whenever they want. The 2 boys fight so I have to keep them apart. They can still kiss each other through the portable fence that makes their enclosure though. Lots of rugs protect the wood floor, theoretically. The large condo is for Melody. She eats and sleeps upstairs and has her nest box (a big high-back litter box filled with wood chips) on the bottom. And she goes outside whenever she wants but she mostly hangs out under my chair with Sparkie, the kissy bunny. And there's an air purifier nearby so we can all breathe happy.

The other rabbit condo for our one-winged bird gets wheeled in at night and out on the deck in the morning so he can play with all the wild birds that hang out all day. I supply tons of food for the locals. I feed the squirrels and raccoons and skunks and opossums and deer and bears and... but that was at our last house which was closer to the wood. I LOVED doing that. Animals are quite polite and gracious and they truly appreciate being seen as the sweet beings they are. When they feel safe they show you sides of them that are just unbelievable. As in you wouldn't believe it unless you experienced it. (I have stories....) I just love ALL animals SO much, I wouldn't dream of harming them, or supporting those industries that do, in ANY way. So of course this is a vegan home. :)

The photo shows the space at its dirtiest. The bunnies drag hay all over the floor and little poops mark their territory. Sparkie has chewed every single rug so it's never as pristine as I like it. At least not for long. I'll send another pic after I've cleaned. It looks cute if you coordinate the rug colors.

I wouldn't recommend having everyone near the kitchen for obvious reasons (fur and feathers for one) but I want them near me and the family room has new carpet so it's only for supervised visits. The rest of the house is off-limits. (I can only do so much cleaning.) This works out well for all of us. I change out all the rugs and litter boxes a few times a week. Clean the floors and vacuum the condos, etc. It IS a job. I won't lie. But there isn't anything I wouldn't do for these adorable little monkeys. I mean just look at that face. Sparkie in his spot under the kitchen table. Love.

We have a pot bellied pig name Millie. She comes in the house to visit but at 185 lbs she prefers to be outside. We built her a pen where she burrows in straw. She goes for walks around the neighborhood on a leash and is 8 years old. She is a southern California pig and likes to lay out by the pool.

We have a rescued, in house, Netherland dwarf bunny named Willow. She was left on the doorstep of a shelter in a tupperware container, with bagels. She had a very severe deep bone infection in her mouth, and has very crooked teeth (from lack of good diet) but she was operated on 2 years ago, and is totally infection free!! I take her to her vet every 3 weeks for regular teeth trimmings, because when they grow out, she can't pick up her food.

She has her own bedroom with a double bed in it, which I find her sitting on frequently, and a little wooden house my husband built for her, for hiding in. Her nightly ritual of fresh pumpkin, then fresh parsley, then her broken up pieces of veggie treats, cleaning her litter boxes, giving fresh pellets, and fresh water takes about 2 hours, and we even leave our white Christmas tree up all year long for her, (she lays under it, every evening). People think I am crazy with the whole nightly ritual that I go through with her, but I would do it no matter what, she is the love of my life!! My Samoyed dog ByTor is afraid of her, when she does her binkies, he is afraid of everything!! Here is a picture of her with ByTor, and one of her lounging under her Christmas tree!!

Birds, 3 currently - they require their own room(s) , places to perch/hang out with us & of course every day living revolves around them :-)

We have an Oriental Firebellied Toad that has been with us for 10.5 years! He has a surprisingly captivating personality, and what's more, he barks! Super low maintenance too, which is a plus.

LOVE YOUR TOAD!! WE HAD ONE THAT VISITED OUR GARDEN EVERY SPRING FOR SEVERAL YEARS AND RESIDED IN THE SAME AREA IT WAS ALWAYS A PLEASANT SURPRISE TO FIND HIM (USUALLY BY OUR DOG, WHO SEEMED TO GET AS MUCH OF A KICK OUT OF HIS ARRIVAL AS MY CHILDREN AND I DID.) HE DISAPPEARED AFTER FIVE YEARS AND WAS MISSED BY ALL! :)

We have a 2 bedroom apartment, and our beloved, funny, stubborn mini potbelly pig, Jerry, gets to "hog" one of the rooms. He's a generally clean and litter trained, but will get into anything and everything when bored, so we've learned to pig-proof the apartment with cupboard locks and a baby gate.

We have a dog (Sarah), 4 cats (Kismet, Sabi, Kelby, and Hoshi), 3 ferrets (Foster, Avery and Kimble), a leopard gecko (Dennis), a corn snake (Copper), a bearded dragon (Iro), a green bottle blue tarantula (Jezebel), and two koi (that fish, the other fish). :)

I forgot to mention my husband's rose hair tarantula, Charlotte. He was an arachnophobe when I married him; clearly I am a good influence! ;)

sharonroche, where do you live? Does the fox really live inside?

I have 2 sugar gliders whose 5'6" high cage is a part of our family room. Although they stay on me and go places with me during the day, they are social at night when they play all night.
These small marsupials can make some interesting sounds. They 'crab' when they are irritated, will 'purr' when happy, and 'bark' (they sound like a chihuahua) when they want my attention. Did I say that they love sweets?

@hickorysprings I have always wanted sugar gliders!!!! They are amazing

Pet is 6' 1 and 205 lbs. Has been around for about 45 years. Cuddly and cute. House broken. No maintenance at all.

I have a 6 year old grey squirrel that I hand raised since it was injured at 1 day old. I am the only momma "Snoogums" has ever known. She went to work with me in my shirt to keep her warm and for syringe feedings every 2 hours around the clock. She is the smartest pet ever. She lives in a 3 tier ferret cage but only when we are not home. She is litter box trained. She understands everything you say to her. She sits on my knees while I read before bedtime and insists on being petted continually. If I stop she chews on my book until I pet her again. I'll I do is say it's nite-nite time and she goes to the gap between my pillow space and curls up in my hand to sleep. She rides around sitting on my husbands hat. She lays with my Lab-border collie mix. She is spoiled rotten. Her favorite food is pistachio nuts and like all good Southern girls Sweet tea that she drinks from a straw. Of course, I order nutritious food especially for squirrels to keep her healthy and free of metabolic bone disease. She visits the vet every 3 months for dental work. Squirrels live up to 25 years in captivity vs. 5-6 in the wild so this is quite a commitment but she is well worth it for the joy she brings my family. I do not recommend squirrels as pets for everyone. They can do a lot of chewing damage in a house ( must be a fan of distressed furniture) and also to humans as their claws are sharp as razors. They also are very protective of their family members. Also it is illegal to have a squirrel in many states.

nlsaunde -- I once had a grey squirrel as well. I worked for a vet and someone brought it in as a tiny baby when their cat caught it and dragged it into the house. It was still needing to be milk fed -- and every two hours, at that -- so I was "volunteered" by the vet to take the baby home, as I was a known sucker for orphaned wildlife. I named the little guy "Ris" (pronounced "Reese"), which means squirrel in Japanese. I didn't really know anything about squirrels but soon discovered that Ris was very playful and affectionate. He loved to "wrestle" with my hand, similar to how a puppy would play with its littermates, but the cutest thing was that every morning, as soon as I went to brush my hair in the mirror, he would run up my leg and start "fluffing" my hair with is tiny, agile hands, as if he was helping. He would also peek at himself from under my (long) hair on one shoulder, then run around behind my neck and go peer at himself from the other shoulder. Back and forth, back and forth. This was clearly tremendous fun for him. My original plan was to release Ris into the wild when he was ready, but sadly, an accident claimed his life before he was old enough for this to happen. I often wondered what would have happened if he had been released in our yard. I imagined he would have remained around in the general area and stayed at least semi-tame, joining the scrub jay I had released a couple of years before who still hung around, joining us and helping himself to food right off our plates any time we had an outdoor meal in the back yard. That jay, by the way, was one I found on the ground on Natalie Wood's grave, just a day after she was buried. We lived near the graveyard in Westwood, CA, and I went to see her grave and found the baby bird there. I watched him until it started getting dark before deciding his mama wasn't likely coming for him, but the cats in the neighborhood likely were. He was one of countless small critters, from a sparrow hawk to a crow to a flying squirrel (not Ris) that I rehabbed and successfully released over the years.

We have a year old Labrador, his name is Beefcake and my daughter's new pet is a turtle which she named Elsie.

fish are not pets.

You have to feed fish and care for fish. They are alive and they live with you. They require time and money. Fish are pets.

The same is true for house plants, are they pets?

for 20 years I did rescue's - so I took in a lot of different kinds of animals. mini horses - dogs, cats, iguana's and pot belly pigs. So I am very very concerned with Brush in Hands comment about the mini potbelly pig that they make sure only weighs 25lbs. I don't want to start a fight on here, but working in rescue - I don't believe I have ever actually seen a healthy 25lb mini pig - they usually weigh in between 50 and 125 lbs. So please, Brush in Hand - make sure you are not starving your pig to death - which is something a lot of people do, when they purchase a pig they are told should only be 25lbs. I beg you to contact some pig rescues to insure you pig is healthy - like Vegaspigpets or Ross mill farms!

You don't buy plants at a pet store.

Of course fish are pets! My fish have names and they come when they’re called. Though I’m fond of my houseplants and I talk to them, somehow that’s not quite the same.

I've rehabbed squirrels before. One of the highlights of my life! They are the sweetest, most affectionate, entertaining and hilarious critter folk you'd ever meet. They're also WAY smarter than people know. And WAY smarter than A LOT of people I know. I have so many stories.... We kept them in a 3 story ferret cage that was 6 feet tall right by the sliding glass door. We always kept the cage door open though so they could learn to climb and explore their environment. They built a nest way on the top of my armoire in the living room out of tissues. :D :D It was amazing! They'd jump from the coffee table to the sofa back to the low bookcase to the high bookcase and then up to the top of the armoire. :D :D The bunnies thought they were pretty amusing. I did release them and they came home to sleep the first night and then after that they stayed out. I would hand feed them every day out in the backyard until one ran the other off and then he died munching an electric wire. (His name was Munchie.) I buried him in the backyard. I don't know if I ever saw Cuddles again. I would raise squirrels all day long for the rest of my life if I could. They're the best. But they do need a wing to themselves. They can do some damage. Oh but what joy. Each of them would suck one of my thumbs at bedtime. SO cute! Until they started gnawing my fingernails off. :D :D

Here's what it looks like cleaned up. I usually coordinate the colors of the rugs. Sometimes all one color, sometimes each bunny has a different color and sometimes I get all crazy. Today I'm doing laundry so I chose what's clean. It's not so bad. That room is only a breakfast room anyway and I never eat breakfast so... :) It's the bunny/chicken/birdie room. :)

I have 10 months old Czechoslovakian wolf hybrid.

I have a 10 months old Czechoslovakian wolf hybrid.

good but not in my home hard to clean

I respectfully disagree. They do not shed, have no dander, need no vaccinations, and keep themselves groomed. Changing out drop liners daily is much easier than walking a dog or vacuuming up cat hair. Washing off their cage monthly is easy for me. Wheel it outside and hose off. I am disabled and needed an easy to care for pet. They eat health fruits/veggies/ and glider chow lasts a long time along with their vitamins. So very economical.

My daughter breeds Axolotls

We have an aqua in our home, it's full of colorfull fish, our fish have names, i love them, but sometimes da smell it can be annoying !!

We have a few hens :)

aquatic frogs that were given to my daughter as tadpoles...

I have African gray name dodo.dodo is a family member

We have a flying squirrel named Pearl. She lives in our living room, in a cage during the day, but out at night until we go to bed, and she goes to bed, too. She is very smart, very playful, and and communicates very well when she doesn't like something! I don't have any good photos because she is nocturnal, and the flash is a little too bright for her big eyes.

we have a little blue budgie named Edda -- she looks like a cloudy day.

My 2012 Bentley I purchase in Perris Ca. Miniature Golden Doodle.

I have four guinea pigs - foster failures! I fostered their mum from a shelter as she was very pregnant and 3 days later so had 3 babies - 2 boys and 1 girl. So I ended up adopting all of them! Piggies are terrific pets. Houzz does some great photos and articles on incorporating the needs of dogs and cats into design - it would be terrific to find some design ideas for other pets too!

Nope just our lovable labradoodle Tagg :)

Louie, Donald, Aflack and the girls.

DO THEY RESPOND TO THEIR NAMES? HA! HA!

here are our guardian llamas…. some of which are indeed pets, others of which are more serious natured:

Yes, we have a bearded dragon named Doug and chickens, one of which is named Bantam.

many of our Highland cattle are quite tame, even bulls. One bull, Gordon, was trained so that he allowed me to ride. and i could children bull-rides also. Gentle giants they are!

I live in a small town, outside of Asheville, NC. We have white squirrels here! Several years ago, we used to feed the ones in our yard peanuts. I named them all Casper. -Patricia Peffer, Creator, KaleidoView Portals

White squirrels? Cool! I saw a black one once in my twenties and was so sorry I didn't have time to pull over and get a picture.

Fast forward to my forties, and pulling into Niagara Falls -- I spotted a black squirrel, exclaimed, "OMG a black squirrel!" and made my husband pull over. He'd been driving for hours, there was nowhere to pull off...but I'd been waiting twenty years for this shot, and there was a black squirrel darn it, so I insisted.

Got my photo, kept going, and spotted two more. Five more. Twenty-five more. You get the picture; Niagara is overrun by black squirrels and I'll never hear the end of it.

Came home and designed this for Café Press -- so that I could put it on a tee shirt for his birthday (smirk;)! http://www.cafepress.com/+the_black_squirrel_tile_coaster,177261439

Yes. The black ones are up in Canada and some come down south of the border a ways. -Patricia Peffer, Creator, KaleidoView Portals

To the lady with the orally fixated rabbit try a pacifier , it worked for our puppy. To the man that said fish aren't pets, tell that to the pet stores that sell thousands of them a year.

I have had several different pets over the decades, from a tiny rabbit that barked at the doorbell ( she was my favorite) to a red squirrel that lived in a dog kennel in my parents room. Now I am proud to be the person of a large boxer and a tiny pomeranian.