Animals at the gate

Two weeks ago, in the dead of night, someone left a cardboard box outside the gates of the Franklin Park Zoo in Dorchester.

When officials opened it, they found two rare birds, a small emerald-colored lesser green broadbill and a brilliantly multicolored paradise tanager.

The same week, a crate was also left at the zoo's gates overnight. It contained a genet, a carnivorous, catlike animal from the mongoose family.

These rare creatures, indigenous to faraway places in Asia, Africa, and South America, are just a few of the many birds and animals that have inexplicably been left at the zoo's front steps. Over the years, there have also been pythons, iguanas, parrots, and cockatoos. One year, zoo officials took in a black bear, which they named Boggs after the former Red Sox star.

While it might make sense to panicked pet owners to dump their unwanted exotic animals at a zoo, Franklin Park Zoo officials fear that too many naive consumers are buying foreign and often dangerous animals from online smugglers, only to realize that they don't have the means to take care of them.

``We have no idea where these animals come from," said John Linehan, the zoo's president and chief executive. ``And in most cases, we can't find appropriate places for animals dumped on us. If people would stop buying animals illegally and animals they simply cannot take care of, it would save a lot of misery for a lot of animals."

The genet, for example, was very ill and is still under quarantine at the zoo's hospital. The brownish gray animal indigenous to Asia and parts of Africa was linked to the SARS virus outbreak in 2003 in China, Linehan said.

Even if the animal's health improves, there is no place at the zoo for it because it eats just about anything around and would require a special exhibit.

The two birds discovered earlier this month are also in quarantine so veterinarians can make sure they're not carrying any diseases. The zoo has found a home for one of them, the lesser green broadbill, at a zoo in South Carolina.

The bird, native to Asia, is rare in the United States, said Martin Vince, a bird curator at the Riverbanks Zoo and Garden in Columbia, S.C. Across the country there are only 17 pairs.

``Because of the avian flu, it is not permitted to import these birds," Vince said. ``It's illegal."

So, when the zoo's only male broadbill died of old age a few months ago, Vince held little hope of finding a mate for its female counterpart, until officials from the Franklin Park Zoo called.

``I was kind of at a loss for words," Vince said. ``Many months I'd been hunting for this bird, and then, out of the blue, they had this cardboard box left on their doorstep. It's kind of scruffy, and his feathers are not in perfect shape, but he is in pretty good shape. We've been feeding him extra good treats, like blackberries, to make up for his unfortunate life. This bird is definitely a mystery."

The other bird, the paradise tanager, is native to Brazil and Bolivia. Franklin Park Zoo officials are still trying to find it a home.

``Evidently somebody acquired it, thinking it would be a good pet," Linehan said.

But the rare animals are not the zoo's only concern. Officials receive many calls from parents who don't know what to do with their son's snake once he goes off to college or those who didn't realize how much cockatoos screech and scratch up furniture, Linehan said.

The zoo has started a ``Pet Space" exhibit filled with such animals and information for parents, so they can see if they can really care for an exotic pet before buying one.

``People don't understand that, if taken care of properly, a python or a boa can outlive a person and can grow more than 6 feet long," Linehan said.

And then there are those other cases in which people try to make a pet out of an animal that cannot be domesticated, at least not by the typical pet owner. About four years ago, the zoo was called after a police raid turned up a small black bear inside a house in Western Massachusetts.

``It was a drug dealer who had it as a pet," Linehan said.

A couple of years later, the zoo was called after authorities found an emaciated mountain lion inside another home on Cape Cod. After many months in the zoo's care, the bear was sent to a sanctuary in Oregon, and the lion was sent to another sanctuary in Florida.

``There are all kinds of weird things going on out there," Linehan said. ``The zoo isn't in a position to provide a home to all these animals."

Megan Tench can be reached at mtench@globe.com.