yes. it is sad that some people abuse and neglect their pets.

but it can be sad when people really do care a great deal about their pets welfare but where their circumstances mean that they simply can't care for their pets adequately.

e.g., lion cubs are jolly cute and you can play with them but they need careful handling if you want to be able to handle them safely as an adult. one playful swipe from an adult and its over rover.

in some other cases it is about people not knowing much about them. some animals range over a great territory in the wild, for example. to greatly reduce the range... can result in maladaptive behaviours like chewing wood and pacing and the like... weaving and cribing are some examples of basically 'nervous disorders' that can affect horses that are kept in stables instead of somewhere they can stretch their legs. i quite often think that we don't know a great deal (generally speaking) about what animals need in order to be psychologically healthy.

but birds are kept in cages too...
and dogs and cats are often fed on processed diets rather than what they would have obtained more naturally
(though of course we have artifically selected them for domestication for many many many many generations so they are better adapted to that than wild species would be).

i dunno.

i guess i was surprised was all. i know they aren't currently high on the endangered list (they are at least risk) but i had always regarded them to be a 'wild' animal. i didn't know that there were breeding mills and i didn't know that had been both legally and illegally exported as pets to other parts of the world - i thought you could only find them in the wild here. or maybe in zoos elsewhere.

like.. the platapus or the koala or the kangaroo... but maybe peole keep them as pets these days too... who knows.