Bartow County, GA Animal Ordinances: Exotic Pets (2026)

Under Sec. 14-15(a), the director of animal control may grant written permission to keep an exotic or wild animal and attach reasonable confinement conditions based on the risk the species poses from attacks, bites, disease, nuisance, noise or odor; any permitted animal must also meet the minimum distance requirements of the separate Bartow County Zoning Ordinance, Appendix A. If it is unclear whether an animal is domestic or exotic, the animal control director makes that determination. Sec. 14-15(b) then removes the permission option entirely for wild carnivores, naming tigers, cheetahs, pumas, leopards, jaguars, lynx, bobcats, mountain lions, wolves, foxes, bears, raccoons, weasels, badgers, skunks, mongooses and hyenas, none of which may be kept as pets or for any other purpose county-wide.

Sec. 14-13 defines "wild animal" broadly to include monkeys, nonhuman primates, raccoons, skunks, foxes and other warm-blooded animals normally found in the wild, while excluding hybrid domestic dogs and cats, farm animals, rodents, and captive-bred common cage birds; "wild carnivore" covers any wild, meat-eating species in the carnivora order, primates, or reptiles that eat meat as part of their normal diet.