Yes, You Can Have a Pet Monkey in Missouri, But Not Illinois

It's a good habit to not immediately believe what you see on the internet. That's especially true if you're considering having a pet monkey. One site says that it's legal in Missouri, but I figured it was wrong. It turns out that I was the one who was wrong.

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I decided to dive into this issue since the website World Population Review is a popular site. I see many of my friends refer to it when they share things on social media, so when I saw them infer that it's fine to have a pet monkey in Missouri, I thought it would be good to vet that. (No veterinarian pun intended) Just to show what they've shared, this is the "map" showing it's okie dokie to have a monkey as your friend.

You can see that Missouri really is in the "go get your monkey" because it's legal status while Illinois is clearly pink meaning "don't even think about it".

Instead of just accepting this as truth, I investigated further. Pets on Mom (a strange website name, by the way) confirms that Missouri is OK for monkeys with a permit. I found the bill that was enacted in Illinois to stop this kind of monkey business though.

Let's dig deeper. Just because you can get a monkey if you're in Missouri, should you? This monkey owner has some things to think about.

Just because you can doesn't mean you should. But, it's good to know the law and not just trust one website when/if that monkey decision comes.