St. Martin Parish, LA Animal Ordinances: Exotic Pets (2026)

Sec. 6-31 of the St. Martin Parish Code is a single sentence that works as a gatekeeper rather than a list: no person shall own, possess, sell, or keep an exotic animal or a wild animal within the parish except in strict compliance with any parish ordinance or federal or state law providing for the same. The sentence itself creates no permit and names no species. It defers to whatever other parish, state or federal law authorizes the animal, so the answer for any particular animal sits outside Sec. 6-31.

Sec. 6-1 supplies the definition. A wild animal is any animal, including hybrids, that is not tame by nature, that because of habit, mode of life or natural instinct is incapable of being completely domesticated, and that requires the exercise of art, force or skill to keep it in subjection. For the purposes of Chapter 6, wolves, wolf hybrids, feline species other than Felis domesticus, and hybrids of those felines are considered wild animals. The same section defines a domestic animal as any dog, cat or other animal normally not regarded as a wild animal, and it defines a cat as Felis domesticus. The chapter does not define the word exotic separately, so the wild animal definition is the operative text.

Other sections of Chapter 6 treat these animals differently from pets. Under Sec. 6-27(f), wild animals found not restrained can be impounded and disposed of in accordance with the law without the seven day impoundment requirement that protects domestic animals. Under Sec. 6-32(k), an exotic or wild animal capable of carrying rabies that has bitten a human or is suspected of being exposed to rabies is immediately euthanized and the head is sent to the appropriate health department for pathological examination. Sec. 6-36(e) exempts the lawful hunting or trapping of wild animals as provided by law from the animal neglect offense.