If You Could Domesticate One Wild Species, What Would It Be?
Elizabeth Morey
Domestic animals and wild animals are both amazing for their own reasons. Pets, of course, provide companionship, love, entertainment, and sometimes protection, among other things. Wild animals give us a sense of awe and adoration from afar and remind us of the magic of the natural world.
But what if nature made a mistake? What if there was one animal out there that was always meant to be a pet, but Mother Nature made it feral instead?
As it turns out, there are a lot of people out there who think particular wild animals would actually make fantastic pets if they were properly domesticated. The type of domestication we're talking about here - the type that we've achieved with dogs, for example - is not possible for all types of animals, but we can imagine that it is just for fun.
If you could pick a wild animal to become a beloved domestic pet, which would you choose?
Redditors recently answered this question in an online thread.
Many people seemed to agree that bears would be great cuddly pets (and potentially rideable!) if they were domesticated. They'd be like real-life teddy bears! One Redditor commented, "God's most cruel joke was to make bears hug-shaped."
Another person wrote that a red panda would be their choice, to which another Redditor responded, "This is the correct answer."
And this clever commenter has some brilliant plans to save the world: "Either mosquitos or murder hornets - the former so they'd leave me alone, the latter so they'd leave bees alone."
Other ideas in the comments included raccoons, tigers, lions, other large cats, penguins, blue whales, ravens, moose, giraffes, badgers, ants, kangaroos, meerkats, octopi, squirrels, and more.
And, of course, one jokester had to add this gem: "A cat."
Which animal would you choose to domesticate? We'd love to hear your ideas in the comments!
