Invasiveness is linked to greater commercial success in the global pet trade

The global pet trade may accelerate the spread of invasive species around the world, which threatens native biodiversity and impacts human economy and health. Here, using an extensive metaanalysis, we show that invasive species are strongly overrepresented across mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish traded as pets. Even in the emergent trade of ants as pets, which is too recent to be responsible for any invasions yet, we found an overrepresentation of invasive species. This indicates that the pet trade not only creates opportunities for invasions, but that it favors specifically invasive species. These findings call for the rapid implementation of strict international regulations of the trade in animals as pets.