Animal fancy is a hobby involving the appreciation, promotion, or breeding of pet or domestic animals.
Fancy may include ownership, showing, trialling and other competitions, breeding and judging. Hobbyists may simply collect specimens of the animal in appropriate enclosures, such as aquaria, vivaria and aviaries. Fanciers with means may keep hobby farms or private zoos. There are many animal fancy clubs and associations in the world catering for everything from pigeons to Irish Wolfhounds; members may own many animals or none at all.
There are also many animal fancying hobbies that include keeping animals considered exotic pets, such an example of a rapidly growing hobby is herpetoculture- the keeping of reptiles and amphibians.
Read more about Animal Fancy: Organizations
Famous quotes containing the words animal and/or fancy:
“‘Tis said that courage is common, but the immense esteem in which it is held proves it to be rare. Animal resistance, the instinct of the male animal when cornered, is no doubt common; but the pure article, courage with eyes, courage with conduct, self-possession at the cannon’s mouth, cheerfulness in lonely adherence to the right, is the endowment of elevated characters.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)