Sugar Gliders: Legalities, Licensing & Regulations

I was just wondering if anyone else has run into legal issues related to keeping sugar gliders. Back when the monkey pox thing started, the city of Madison (where I live) made them and a ton of other relatively harmless animals illegal. At first, we were told that it was a USDA regulation, but I couldn't find squat on the USDA's website about sugar gliders or any other small mammal for that matter.

I've personally never kept one, but I used to take care of the breeding pairs that we had at the store. We ended up having to give them away, which really stunk. To my knowledge, the city has not changed their stance on them at all. So I was also wondering if anyone has/had heard of any instances where diseases such as monkey pox were passed from sugar gliders on to humans.


Oh yeah, chinchillas, hedgehogs, Egyptian spiny mice, doormice (those are really cool), pygmy mice, degu's, duprasi's, jirds, zebra mice, and a few others that I can't think of were outlawed here too.

Originally Posted by PaulSage

Oh yeah, chinchillas, hedgehogs, Egyptian spiny mice, doormice (those are really cool), pygmy mice, degu's, duprasi's, jirds, zebra mice, and a few others that I can't think of were outlawed here too.

add Gerbils, Ferrets, and some others, and you've got CA. Sucks here, I'm surprised we can even have mice. Actually we can have chinchillas, so that's weird.
P.S. to keep on topic, since I can't keep any of that stuff, I don't know anything about what you're asking. The only thing I can offer is I think the care/sale/breeding, etc would be under USDA, though the law would be from some legislative body, so you would think they would have at least some info. Some help I was LOL.

Paul,

USDA is the federal end of it. If you sell them for profit over a predetermined amount you are required to have a USDA license and spot inspections.
Then you have the state laws that you have to check on - and lastly your local laws.

It is similar to any other set of laws wherein the next guy down the line may not contradict the big brother - but may make them more strict and a complete PIA.

The monkeypox thing was well before I was breeding them - but the migraine I found was that they are considered wildlife... and are a marsupial. Wildlife is a very general term, marsupials are typically referring to larger animals and the authorities make NO exceptions.

Good luck!

animal shows where the seller didn't have the federal permit. At our pet store we were told that : if you have more than 3 or 4 females and one single male you needed the permit and you were classified as a breeder. You could ( however ) sale one female to a person and they didn't need a permit but you still needed it. Then it went to a federal permit if the prospective buyer bought a pair from you. This was several years ago. Do a search engine and see what the laws are now. Right in some municipal, townships and or city laws has jurisdiction on even these beyond the federal law. But I don't think one ( maybe California ) state has outlawed any of the species in that other post. Now at our pet store ( Missouri ) we had to have the federal permit to have > sugar gliders, hedgehogs, chins, spiny tailed mice, and degus, ( still no permit even as now on ferrets in Mo. and Kansas ) but the customer didn't need squat at the point of sale. It was up to them to get the permit if they bred and sold. Things may be different now though........