How Much Is that Doggie in the Window? That’s No Dog, That’s a Prairie Rodent

Scorned and poisoned in the West as a threat to crops and a hazard to livestock, the prairie dog is a hot item, at $75 a pup, in a suburban Grand Rapids pet shop.

Jack Briel already has sold 18 of the burrowing rodents, and expects another shipment from a Wisconsin breeder this spring. The little dog that isn’t a dog makes the perfect pet, says Briel.

His first specimen, Alfie, set him back $125 but has paid for herself several times over displayed in the shop’s window terrarium with the tarantulas and horned lizards.

“Everybody was really attracted to her, and I thought we might be missing something by not selling them,” Briel explained.

The prairie dog is a Western relative of the ground squirrel, or chipmunk. Early explorers gave them the name because of their vaguely bark-like cry of alarm.

Sample Is Overweight

In the wild, they grow to about the size of a fox squirrel, but Alfie is as big as a small beaver because of all the treats she gets, Briel says.

She apparently has adjusted to a solitary life, although her wild relatives live in colonies of thousands, in connected underground burrows.

“I am a little surprised to hear of someone selling them as pets,” said Ronald Chesser, a teacher of biology and veterinary science at Texas Tech University. “They have been poisoned here by the millions because they just devastate range land. They’ll eat a wheat crop, for instance, right down to the dirt.”

“Most of my work is in the genetics of social systems, so I’ve dealt with prairie dogs a lot in that capacity. They’re teaching me a lot.”

They also taught him that cute, cuddly-looking creatures aren’t always friendly.

“Well, I know they are sure adorable animals, but I’ve had occasion to have one that seemed to like my petting it, but all of a sudden bit right through my thumb with those razor-sharp incisors,” he said. “They are wild, and it’s hard to discipline a wild animal.”

Friendly, Clean Image

Briel disagrees: “They love the human touch, and they’re clean as can be . . . . They’ll never potty in the house, and they have no odor.”

He also says that prairie dogs are not prone to the diseases that befall gerbils, hamsters and guinea pigs--but Dr. William McCulloch, director of the Center for Veterinary Comparative Medicine at Texas A & M University, cautioned that they are considered carriers of bubonic plague in some Western states.

Fleas spread the plague from infected rodents to domestic animals, such as cats and dogs, and the pets sometimes pass it to their owners, he says.

“I worry about people dabbling in these exotic animals and trying to make them pets,” McCulloch said. “What looks innocent for Michigan could set something in motion that could be a public health threat.

Briel said he has state permits to import and sell the animals, and state officials acknowledge that no law prohibits Michigan people from keeping wild animals unless they of an endangered species.

Bred to Be Sold

“They class them as wild animals,” Briel said, “but these are not captured in the wild. They are raised as pets, or for zoos.”

Chesser cautions that wild animals, despite attempts at domestication, will remain independent. There is potential for rapport with humans, he says, but there are big variations from animal to animal.

“History would tell us that certain fads catch on with wild animals as pets and then quickly go away, because people are not really wanting to put up with the difficulty and responsibility. This usually works to the detriment of the animal.”