Animal House

A number of students are living with reptiles. Literally. Not fast-talking "snakes-in-the-grass," or polyester suit-clad "lounge lizards," but the real thing -- iguanas and pythons, and even an alligator. Without soft fur or a wagging tail, these pets cannot be described using the traditional definition of "cute," but their owners say they love them just the same -- fangs, forked tongues, horny skin and all. The foot-long baby alligator Wharton senior Keith Peltzman brought into his off-campus house last weekend is actually very cute -- "deceptively cute," he said. "He can do some real damage," said Peltzman, who named the reptile "Luther." Peltzman said he and his housemates purchased the animal for $80 at the Trade Winds Aquarium and Pet Center, located at 29 S. 40th Street. He added that because the salesperson told him a story about a baby alligator biting off the finger of a five year-old child, he has only dared to touch the sharp toothed pet on the top of his head with a pencil. "No one has been so bold as to kiss him yet," he said. But if Peltzman and his housemates are afraid of the alligator, the infantile reptile is just as afraid of them. "He's pretty scared -- he cowers in the corner [of his aquarium] a lot," he said. "He had a friend alligator in the pet store and now he's pretty lonely." To "ease" Luther into his new surroundings, Peltzman and his housemates gave the alligator a "tour" of the house while carrying it in the aquarium. Peltzman said, though, that when his new pet increases in size, he actually plans to take him for walks -- only, of course, with the help of a leash and a muzzle. But what happens when Luther becomes an adult? "When he starts getting bigger, he's going to have to become a pet belt or wallet," quipped Peltzman. "I don't mean to be cruel, but if he escapes, it could be like a horror movie, where he swims through the sewers and comes up peoples' toilets." For College sophomore Alex Umansky, owning a 15-inch pet iguana -- named "Bobisis" after Bob Dylan and Dylan's song "Isis" -- was a change of pace. Umansky was used to having a pet python slithering around his room when he was in high school, he said. Before that, he owned a salt water fish tank filled with exotic fish. But when Umansky came to the University, he decided to go for something different. "She was pretty wild," Umansky said of Bobisis, whom he had to give away to a friend when he travelled to California this summer. "She was a pretty strong animal, she could whip you with her tail." Although Bobisis's aggression frightened some of his friends, Umansky said he finds himself pining away for the belligerent beast. "I really miss her a lot," he said. But not all iguanas share Bobisis's mean streak, according to College freshman Devra Jaffe. Jaffe said she is sure that "Zepplin," her one year-old iguana, "loves affection," even if he can't purr. "He knows me when I'm holding him," she said. "Everyone on my floor loves holding him, but when I'm holding him he relaxes a lot more." Jaffe said she enjoys playing with Zepplin -- or just taking casual strolls with him around the Quadrangle, where she lives. "I have a leash that I walk him on," she said. "He's just a fun pet to have. He's fun to watch." But why an iguana? "I like the fact that its unusual," Jaffe said. "It's not your run-of-the-mill cat or dog." When College junior Rudy Delgado's 30-inch Florida King snake, "Sam," escaped from his High Rise South apartment where the snake was kept illegally earlier this month, many students said they were petrified of waking up and finding the non-poisonous reptile slithering around in their bed. College sophomore Michelle Hand, who until a few weeks ago shared her room with a four-foot Ball Python snake named "Judge," said her housemates shared the same fear. "I partly got rid of it out of respect for them," she said. "None of my roommates like the snake." But Hand said her friends were not in real danger. "Pythons are very docile. They don't attack you unless they think they can eat you," she said. "And they're not dumb, they realize you're too big." Still, Hand admitted that Judge -- like Delgado's Sam the Snake -- did occasionally give her friends a scare by escaping from its cage. "It was kind of funny," she said. "My snake got loose a few times in my bed. Once it crawled into my bookbag, [and] once I stayed in an apartment and it got caught in the radiator." Hand also said she frightened people at parties by appearing with the python coiled around her neck. After a year with Judge, though, Hand said she began to get bored of her pet. "After the novelty of having a snake wore off, I realized I had a snake and I didn't want to play with it," she said. "It's a snake. All they do is lay there, if they're not trying to get out of the cage. "They're just not fun-loving creatures," she added. Although reptiles seem to be the latest rage among some students, others are content to play with unusual pets of a smaller size. A hermit crab is the animal of choice according to College junior Al Kim, who keeps two of the sea creatures in a cage in High Rise North. One of the hermit crabs is named "Mariano Duncan," after the Phillies second baseman, Kim said. Mariano Duncan's companion, however, will remain nameless "until it shows some signs of life," he said. "I wanted some living animals in my room," Kim said. "It's a positive addition, but you expect them to do more and they don't." "They don't fulfill too many needs," he added. Kim said that one of the advantages of owning hermit crabs instead of reptiles is that other dorm residents are not intimidated by his pets -- as many said they were by Delgado's snake. "No one's really complained," he said. "They're not the prettiest creatures in the world but they haven't crawled into any vents." But not all reptiles are intimidating. College sophomore Kate Lester, who keeps turtles in her room, said her pets have a soothing effect. "My favorite thing about having turtles is they are really nice to share my thoughts with," Lester said. "I really like when they do high dives off my hand into their aquarium." College sophomore Ben Conrad also has owned non-reptile pets -- although his were not quite as harmless as Kim's Mariano Duncan. "Bubba the Piranha" and "Lucy the Rat" were Conrad's pets last year. Now, the animals are dead, he said. "The rat you could play with -- it was mostly friendly," he said. "Everyone in the hall [in the Quad] liked it and wasn't afraid of it." Conrad said, though, that Bubba the Piranha did not have as many admirers as his rodent companion. "Most people were disgusted at first when they saw how he ate," he said. "[But] Bubba just wanted food." Conrad said while he had fun watching Bubba mutilate and devour goldfish, he liked playing with Lucy better because "you just couldn't cuddle up" with the pet piranha. Tek Yim, a salesperson at the Trade Winds Aquarium and Pet Center where several students purchased their animals, said he thinks students opt for the more exotic creatures because they want to come across as being "tough." "It's not because of 'cute' [that they buy them]," Yim said. "It gives [the impression of] a tough attitude -- you can't be a sissy to own a scorpion."