What Animals Can Be Emotional Support Animals?

With a landlord: On HUD's list of commonly kept household animals, so the clinician's letter showing your need for it is what matters.

• Rabbits can live up to 12 years, and some have reached 15.
• They can be trained to use a litter pan.
• Usually quiet, social and playful when treated gently, and most active at dawn and dusk.

Good to know: Rabbits chew a great deal, electrical cords included, so make the room they roam safe before they roam it.

Our data: Rabbits are 24% of the animals registered with us that are neither dogs nor cats.

Sources: VCA Animal Hospitals: Rabbits as Pets · Merck Veterinary Manual: Rabbits · Merck Veterinary Manual: Providing a Home for a Rabbit

With a landlord: HUD's 2020 list names small birds and says nothing either way about large parrots.

• Cockatiels live 10 to 14 years, are gentle and generally quiet, and whistle more than they talk.
• Cockatoos live 25 to 45 years and need a great deal of attention and time out of the cage.

Good to know: Cockatoos may scream often and are not recommended for noise-sensitive people, so think about shared walls before you think about anything else.

Our data: Birds are 27% of the animals registered with us that are neither dogs nor cats, most of them parrots.

Sources: VCA Animal Hospitals: Cockatiels · VCA Animal Hospitals: Cockatoos · HUD Notice FHEO-2020-01, Part IV (Jan. 28, 2020)

With a landlord: Turtles are on HUD's common list. Every other reptile is a unique animal, so expect to show why you need that one in particular.

• Bearded dragons live about 7 to 12 years, reach 18 to 22 inches and are known for being gentle and easy to tame.
• Ball pythons grow to 5 or 6 feet, can live 10 to 20 years, and may not eat for weeks after moving to a new home.
• Turtles with shells under 4 inches have been banned from sale in the US since 1975.

Good to know: Reptiles often carry Salmonella: wash your hands after handling them. The CDC does not recommend them for homes with young children.

Our data: Reptiles are the biggest group after dogs and cats: 38% of the other animals registered with us. The bearded dragon alone is 1 in 6 of them.

Sources: VCA Animal Hospitals: Bearded Dragons · VCA Animal Hospitals: Owning a Pet Snake · CDC: Reptiles and Amphibians

With a landlord: Hamsters, gerbils and other rodents, guinea pigs included, are on HUD's common list. Ferrets are not named either way.

• Guinea pigs live 5 to 6 years on average, rarely bite, and do better with a cage mate.
• Guinea pigs need vitamin C in their food, because their bodies cannot make it.
• Hamsters usually live 18 months to 3 years, and ferrets 6 to 10 years.

Good to know: California classes ferrets as a restricted species, and its wildlife department says they cannot be kept as emotional support animals there.

Our data: Small mammals are 11% of the animals registered with us that are neither dogs nor cats.

Sources: VCA Animal Hospitals: Guinea Pigs · Merck Veterinary Manual: Hamsters · Merck Veterinary Manual: Ferrets · California Department of Fish and Wildlife: emotional support ferrets

With a landlord: On HUD's list of commonly kept household animals, so the clinician's letter showing your need for it is what matters.

• No fur, no feathers and no noise, and a tank fits a studio apartment.
• Germs from fish and tank water rarely make people sick, and washing your hands after feeding them or cleaning the tank is the habit that prevents it.

Good to know: If someone at home has a weakened immune system, the CDC suggests someone else looks after the tank when possible.

Sources: CDC: Fish · HUD Notice FHEO-2020-01, Part IV (Jan. 28, 2020)

With a landlord: HUD's notice counted barnyard animals as unique: you carry the burden of showing why you need this animal in particular, and a health care professional's letter saying so is what to bring. HUD's examples of unique circumstances included keeping the animal outdoors at a house with a fenced yard.

• The CDC's advice is to keep backyard poultry outside the house, above all away from where food is made or eaten.
• A backyard flock is company that lives outdoors: a yard, a coop and a fence come first.

Good to know: Outbreaks of Salmonella linked to backyard poultry are common, so wash your hands after handling them and save the kisses.

The emotional support chicken also lives on as a knitted toy: Annette Corsino's pattern from The Knitting Tree in Los Angeles, which nearly 11,000 knitters have posted photos of on Ravelry.

Sources: CDC: Backyard Poultry · Ironic Sans: Why is everybody knitting chickens? · HUD Notice FHEO-2020-01, Part IV (Jan. 28, 2020)

With a landlord: HUD's notice counted barnyard animals as unique: you carry the burden of showing why you need this animal in particular, and a health care professional's letter saying so is what to bring.

• A potbellied pig should stand no taller than 18 inches at the shoulder, yet a grown one in trim condition can weigh well over 100 pounds.
• They can live 8 to 25 years, and 10 to 15 is common.

Good to know: Plan your home around the grown pig, not the piglet.

Sources: Merck Veterinary Manual: Potbellied Pigs · HUD Notice FHEO-2020-01, Part IV (Jan. 28, 2020)

With a landlord: HUD's notice counted barnyard animals as unique: you carry the burden of showing why you need this animal in particular, and a health care professional's letter saying so is what to bring. HUD's notice cites a 2015 appeals case, Anderson v. City of Blue Ash, over a family keeping a miniature horse at home.

• Miniature horses generally stand 24 to 34 inches at the shoulder and weigh 70 to 100 pounds.
• The ADA gives public access only to miniature horses individually trained to do tasks, and only case by case.

Good to know: A horse kept for comfort alone has no ADA access to shops or restaurants, so think of it as a backyard companion.

Sources: ADA.gov: Service Animals · HUD Notice FHEO-2020-01, Part IV (Jan. 28, 2020)