There are five different kinds of wild prairie dogs, but the black-tailed prairie dog is the one that is most frequently found in the exotic pet trade. Black-tailed prairie dogs are residents of these grasslands and are native to the Great Plains of the United States.
As Pet/ In Captivity
Things to Think About
It is advised that you get your animal when it is young in order for it to be properly socialized and grow up acclimated to life in captivity. This will give you the best chance of having a prairie dog as a pet. In addition, prairie dogs have a reputation for biting when provoked or mistreated. They might not be appropriate for a household with young children who might handle the pet unsupervised because of this.
Behavior and Temperament
Due to their diurnal lifestyle, prairie dogs are up during the day and asleep at night. Because they are very social animals, prairie dogs will get sick or depressed if not given adequate attention. Plan on having a large prairie dog colony or none at all if you don’t have at least six hours every day to spend with your prairie dog. Pet prairie dogs can be trained to walk on a leash (using a specific prairie dog harness) and even to come when called with the proper training.
Housing
It is important to provide a prairie dog with a natural setting where it can burrow and hunt for food at every stage of its life. They can dig several feet underground as adults and frequently build many underground chambers for various uses. If there wasn’t a large enclosure (such as a 10-foot by 10-foot concrete-bordered pit filled three feet deep with dirt to allow burrowing). Choosing a housing strategy that prevents burrowing is not recommended because it could cause anxiety from excessive stimuli exposure. Make sure to give them lots of hiding spots, like boxes, tunnels, and other structures. Also suggested is a cage that is impenetrable and secure.
Eat and Drink
The main components of a prairie dog’s natural diet are grasses, along with some brush and roots. They get a lot of their water from the prickly pear cactus, which you can cultivate in large quantities at home. Although prairie dogs are considered to be foragers and can adapt to shifting habitats while in quest of food, they may eat more subterranean roots than grasses depending on the season.
How to Buy a Prairie Dog?
In the United States, young prairie dogs are typically available from April to July. This is the period when they breed, after which the pups are gathered. Each spring and summer, thousands of prairie dog pups are vacuumed out of their burrows in an effort to reduce the population.
The rodents are frequently removed from their homes using a modified sewer truck; they are either fed to threatened wild animals like black-footed ferrets and eagles (which naturally kept the population under control until humans drove the species to the brink of extinction) or sold into the pet trade.
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