Do people have pets in your communities?

unclemoishy

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:30 pm

Hi new poster here, I hope Im posting this in the correct forum.
Where I live, (in a yeshivish "out-of-town" community) its pretty common for people to have rabbits, hamsters, mice, or similar small animals. A few people even have dogs. But when I speak to people from Lakewood, they say its unheard of! Are pets common where you live?

amother

Seagreen

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:33 pm

Passaic. Plenty of people have dogs because there are many baalei teshuva here who grew up with them and now have them. Not unusual to see a lady in a tichel walking a dog.

GrowingUp

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:38 pm

unclemoishy wrote:

I grew up in Lakewood. Plenty of people have small pets, most commonly rabbits. And fish, if you consider that a pet. There are some people with cats and/or dogs but they are very few and far between. It is more common now then it was 20 years ago as Lakewood (and the surrounding towns) are becoming more diverse.

Last edited by GrowingUp on Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:38 pm; edited 1 time in total

GrowingUp

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:39 pm

Oh and I forgot to mention there are a few frum people in Lakewood with farms. Horses cows chickens goats etc.

amother

Lightcoral

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:42 pm

Small pets like rabbits, ferrets, hamsters etc in Lakewood is pretty common

There are a bunch of people with dogs (myself included)

amother

Oldlace

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 8:42 pm

People in Lakewood have fish, birds, hamsters, gerbils, guinea pigs etc.. there are even farms with cows, horses, sheep and goats and chickens. The farms all have dogs. So I don’t know who said this to you but it’s a straight up lie.

patzer

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 10:36 pm

Welcome to the club, unclemoishy! We have lots of fun here, although it can get a bit wild sometimes.
Colors

As far as your question: I live in Airmont (near Monsey) and hardly anyone I know owns pets. However, I don't really care about "social rules" and stuff...and I like animals! So for a while I kept gerbils in my house, and liked it. My last gerbil died over this past winter, so right now I'm pet-free. I do plan on getting a new pet eventually, though. Maybe more gerbils, or perhaps I'll try a hamster or mice or rats. Time will tell.

If anyone here had experience with any rodent pets, feel free to chime in with recommendations.

amother

Valerian

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 10:40 pm

I grew up not frum and my parents fostered over the years and adopted. I grew up with great danes, a boxer, dobermans, a mastiff, a few mutts... I love dogs but it definitely does not fly in my yeshivish community. Wish it did though, my kids love animals. We go to my parents to visit and my kids have a chance then to play and hug the animals. Most of my kids friends are all scared of dogs. Its a shame

amother

Clover

Tue, Mar 26 2024, 10:45 pm

Dogs are becoming more common in my frum in town community but they’re still not something you see often. Small animals like rabbits, hamsters, gerbils are very common. Birds aren’t that common maybe because they need more care and cleaning. Fish are very common but I don’t really consider them pets. The only pets I don’t see at all are cats. Personally I’m not a cat lover so I’m fine with that.

shabbatiscoming

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 12:26 am

Im in the dati leumi community in israel.
Having pets, and more specifically dogs, is very common in my community.
We have a dog as do many families in the community.

amother

Burlywood

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 12:35 am

I live in Flatbush and have a cat and a dog. Yeshivishe people don't have those, but will have fish, hamsters, and the like. JPF or BT have cats and dogs, but not too many.

#BestBubby

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 1:01 am

Frum families spend so much $$$ and time on their large families, bh.

Don't have $$$ or time to spare on pets.

That's for gentiles with 2 kids.

Simple1

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 1:13 am

It’s not unheard of to have pets in Lakewood, but not very common either. I’ve seen a few over the years I don’t have time and patience to take care of one and clean up after it. And probably many others feel the same.

amother

Candycane

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 2:25 am

#BestBubby wrote:

Frum families spend so much $$$ and time on their large families, bh.

Don't have $$$ or time to spare on pets.

That's for gentiles with 2 kids.

Bigger families = more people who want pets, more people to share the pet.

Success10

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 2:49 am

In the Chareidi community here in Jerusalem, dogs are basically unheard of. Occasionally outdoor cats, but not really. There are some hamsters, birds, fish, lizards. Not many rabbits as they need a lot of care and space and money.

I don't think there is an inyan not to have these smaller pets, just culturally the Chareidim are not so into animals. And the apartments are small and the funds are limited. But sometimes the kids really want it, or it's therapeutic for the child so the parents allow it.

zebra111

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 3:14 am

Theres also the added inyan, for sefaradim at least, of rabbanim who dont allow certain animals, the most obvious example being rav ovadia doesnt allow to keep rabbits as pets, as they are a non kosher animal widely grown as food around the world, so that also limits things

amother

Saddlebrown

Wed, Mar 27 2024, 3:30 am

I'm also DL in Israel, but in a community where everyone lives in small apartments. Most people I know like dogs, but don't have one, but it's not unusual to have a dog. Other pets are more uncommon.

I feel like most of my peers are trying to keep up with the expense of rent and cost of living, and trying to keep up with responsibility of job + kids, so even though we like pets when other people have them, we don't want to sign ourselves up for the extra cost + responsibility.

I'm grateful for the people in my community who do have dogs, that my kids get to play with them and won't grow up afraid of dogs.