Payton Smith was not expecting to adopt a kitten the night she met Little.
Lounging at home on an early October night in 2022, Smith, a fourth-year political science student, said she noticed a GroupMe message asking if anyone could watch a kitten. Thrilled with the prospect of playing with a kitten for a few hours, she recalled racing to the provided address.
"They’re holding a tiny, tiny kitten in this dirty rag," Smith said. "They hand her to me and say, ‘Can you watch her for the night?’"
As soon as she saw the little bundle, Smith said, she immediately realized the kitten needed more than a babysitter.
"They had found her under a car in a parking garage on Gayley," Smith said. "She was dirty and tiny and malnourished – probably barely six weeks old."
Despite having roommates that claimed to hate felines and have cat allergies, Smith recalled making an immediate decision to bring the kitten home. After bathing the kitten with dish soap and serving up borrowed cat food from their neighbors, Smith and her roommates rushed the kitten to a 24-hour emergency veterinarian.
The kitten was soon given her name, Little, because of her tiny size that first night.
Smith said she did whatever it took to restore Little’s wavering health in the two months following her rescue.
"I was opening her mouth and shooting probiotics in her mouth every day. I was feeding her boiled chicken and pumpkin trying to get the diarrhea to stop and prescription cat food," she said. "This cat was bougie as hell."
Eventually, Smith said, Little’s health pulled through. A year after her adoption, Little has become a beloved feature of the apartment, frequently found munching on deli turkey slices and chirping at birds from her hammock by the living room window.
"I think she’s outgoing and sassy but a big softy," Smith said. "She’s a lover."
Yogi, a field golden retriever, was a natural service dog in training, according to Maya Siegel.
"We would go into dog-friendly areas, and he would want to work with me," she said. "He wouldn’t want to just walk and sniff at things. He was looking at me, looking for commands, looking for something to do."
Siegel, a third-year education and social transformation student, said she adopted Yogi in late July 2022 when he was just under eight weeks old. She began training him about four weeks later, drawing on her previous experience preparing service animals for training.
Siegel said she has a cardiac condition that some service dogs in training and dogs raised around owners with similar conditions can naturally alert to, and she was looking for a service dog for her own medical issues and disability.
Upon noticing signs of Yogi enjoying working as a service dog, she said they joined an owner training program accredited by Assistance Dogs International.
Despite some of the challenges of having a pet as a student, Siegel said she has enjoyed the experience of having a dog at UCLA. She said Yogi quickly grew accustomed to campus and now loves taking naps under her chair during class.
She added that students have been respectful of Yogi’s presence. She recalled a group of fraternity members helped clear a path through their event on Bruin Walk for her and Yogi.
"It was really really, really nice to ... know that the vast majority of people aren't going to interfere with him," Siegel said.
Siegel added that she and Yogi have joined the owner training program at the National Institute of Canine Service and Training owner training program. Later this year, Yogi will further hone his medical service skills at a foster home for a few months, after which she and Yogi will graduate as an official service dog team. Following that graduation, Yogi will be her permanent service dog.
Janika Nevlida said it was a natural instinct to adopt a pet in Westwood. The third-year psychology student said she had grown up with dogs, cats, hamsters and fish in an animal-loving home, so she knew she wanted a pet for the upcoming school year.
Walking into a local pet store in Fresno, California, over the summer, a little brown guinea pig with a tuft of white hair atop his head immediately caught her eye, Nevlida said.
"We picked him because he has a little top hat on his head – it looks special," Nevlida said.
She said from that moment, she knew he was the furry friend she had been looking for.
Chicken Nugget, as he was soon named, is a beloved guinea pig in her apartment, Nevlida said. She said although his name was originally Chicken Strip, everyone called him Chicken Nugget, and the moniker stuck. She added that he has learned to recognize his name and squeaks whenever she and her roommates are nearby in the living room, overcoming his initial shyness.
Nevlida said she hoped to get Chicken Nugget a friend within the next year so he would not be lonely in her apartment. She added that she planned to name the next guinea pig Waffles, so together they would be Chicken and Waffles.
Chicken Nugget has developed a taste for carrots, which she and her roommates feed him by hand, Nevlida said. She also noted that despite her efforts to comb the little white fluff on his head, it refuses to be tamed and has lent to his distinguished look.
"He’s just been kind of our mascot of this apartment, which has been nice to have around," she said.
There was a missing piece to Carrie Karchmer’s apartment last year. Despite her efforts to make her apartment in Westwood feel more familiar, she said she could never quite get past the sterile feeling it provided. This year, she said, she was determined to find the elusive, final piece to make her place feel like home.
During a trip to a Los Angeles pet store, Karchmer found a vibrant, red-orange betta fish with flowing fins that fit the bill.
Karchmer, a fourth-year human biology and society student, said she and her roommate fell in love with him and knew he was the one immediately. She added that the day they brought the fish home, they spent the whole day hanging out with him and watching him swim.
Aslan’s name came from a childhood love for the "The Chronicles of Narnia" series, Karchmer said. She said his coloration and mane-like fins made him well-suited to be named after the lion in the nostalgic film. Karchmer added that she and her roommate bonded over watching the movies in their apartment the previous year.
"He's just such a glorious-looking orange fish that Aslan made sense," she said.
According to Karchmer, one of Aslan's quirks is that he often plays dead. On one occasion soon after his adoption, she said, Aslan gave her roommate quite a scare by floating in stillness in his tank. She added that when Aslan was still adjusting to his new home, he would get frazzled at the sight of his own reflection and try to fight himself through the glass. However, Karchmer said Aslan appears to be healthy, adding that he eats well and likes to swim around his tank.
Karchmer said that over the few weeks of living in her apartment this fall, Aslan seems to already have happily adjusted to life in Westwood. His bowl now resides on a bookshelf in the living room where everyone can always see him swim.
"He seems like a pretty happy dude, in my opinion," she said.