“Her name is Juicy.”
That’s rather endearing name for a boa constrictor, I thought.
Before I could respond, her owner proceeded to hang Juicy around my neck. She was much heavier than I expected. Softer, too.
As I rubbed my hand along the length of her scaly body, I couldn’t help but fall in love with Juicy and her reptile friend, a smaller red-tail boa constrictor carried by another man. Just take a look at these beady eyes:
“Did you raise these guys as pets?” I asked, partly to make small talk, but mostly out of curiosity concerning the legality of carrying a 4 to 5 foot boa constrictor around Union Square.
“Yep, since they were babies,” one guy responded.
Who knows? They could’ve have been licensed animal handlers. Their tip bucket, however, suggested otherwise. Judging from the fact that they were charging people to take photos of their snakes, I assumed the owners were simply boa enthusiasts.
I paid them $2, largely out of respect for lugging Juicy around in a blue dog carrier (No joke. She’s heavy).
I then parted ways and headed to a café to Google “red-tail boa constrictor new york city.”
The first page of the search results confirmed my initial suspicions. According to the Department of Health’s Health Code of the City of New York, “any member, or hybrid offspring of the family Boidae” are all prohibited in NYC [rules.cityofnewyork.us].
In case you’re also wondering, here’s a more extensive list of other animals you actually CAN’T keep as pets, no matter how furry or adorable they may be.
