Gardena, CA Animal Ordinances: Exotic Pets (2026)

Gardena Municipal Code Section 6.02.010 adopts Title 10, Animals, of the Los Angeles County Code, as amended through Ordinance 2016-0040 passed on October 6, 2016, wholesale as the rules, regulations and provisions of and for the city relating to animal control, with all references to county read as city of Gardena. The Gardena chief of police serves as poundmaster and both city and county personnel can enforce the regulations under Section 6.02.005. Within that adopted Title 10, Section 10.28.060 provides that a person, including a new owner of an existing business, cannot conduct or operate an animal facility or keep a wild animal within the Department's jurisdiction without first obtaining a license from the Department and any other applicable agency, and makes failure to obtain that license a misdemeanor.

The section carves out a narrow exemption: no license is required to keep birds, domestic rodents such as pet mice, rats, guinea pigs, hamsters, and chinchillas, fish, non-venomous reptiles under six feet long, or rabbits as pets. Beyond licensing, Section 10.32.080 requires anyone who owns a wild animal or runs a wild animal facility to properly confine it on the premises and bars taking it anywhere it would endanger a person, again as a misdemeanor. Section 6.02.020 separately adopts the county code's penalty clauses by reference under Government Code Section 50022.4, so the license and confinement misdemeanors carry through into Gardena as printed.