End Tiger Auctions in Ohio!

If you’re like us, when you heard about the dangerous zoo animals running amok in Zanesville, Ohio your first question was, “Is it really legal to own a tiger in the Buckeye State?” The answer, apparently, is yes—but it shouldn’t be, according to the Columbus Dispatch. The paper published a somber (and slightly surreal) editorial chronicling the various attempts to regulate ownership of exotic animals in Ohio, and bemoaning their failures. It remains legal in the state to raise a pet lion from infancy, keep a wolf in the garage, and even hold “exotic-animal auctions.” With police now forced to kill dozens of rare animals—and with the global press descending on the small town to watch—Dispatch editors hope the legislature will finally take up reform. “Yes,” they write, “this has gone on long enough.”