Laurel Harris: exotics are her pet projects.

• Author: Haraldsen, Tom
• Position: Around Utah: Spotlight

Laurel Harris found her "calling" when she was just 4 years old--a love of animals and a desire to care for them. Since that time, Dr. Harris' passion has never wavered.

As owner of Wasatch Exotic Pet Care in Cottonwood Heights, Harris treats almost any kind of pet, except dogs and cats. To the surprise of many, there are lots of exotics that owners across the Wasatch Front, and across the nation, embrace in or around their homes other than canines and felines.

"People are a lot more mobile now," she says. "They are looking at smaller pets, and exotic companion animals make up the fastest-growing segment."

A native of northwestern Ohio, Harris graduated from the Ohio State University College of Veterinary Medicine in 1992, worked three years in general small animal practice and two years in an emergency clinic in Chicago, establishing exotic care programs in both. She completed a zoo internship in Alabama, became staff veterinarian at the Lee Richardson Zoo in Kansas, and moved to Utah in 2001. For four years, she was associate veterinarian at Hogle Zoo, and now provides veterinary relief coverage for Tracy Aviary.

"I became particularly interested in birds very early on," she says. And her love for exotics continued to expand--rabbits, horses, reptiles--anything other than just dogs and cats. "There needs to be different treatment for exotics--there is the misconception that what works with dogs and cats will work for them."

So in 2004, she started her practice in Cottonwood Heights, in a very small clinic. Once she focused on just treating the exotics...