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I thought I'd make this thread to see how other people have been getting along with PET_EXOTIC sapients. I know it used to be a very popular modification, and I'm not sure how representative my experiences with it in 0.42 have been. I'm hoping others have fiddled around with it and we can learn from each other's experiences.

Here's what I've noticed:

Egg-laying

Egg-laying and incubation seem to be completely borked for my wild-caught kea women. They claim nests and path to them, but unless they're locked in they immediately leave the nest, without even laying. They won't do anything but eat, drink, sleep, and run back and forth between meeting areas and their claimed nests until you force them to lay by locking them in with their nests. They won't even claim clothes until they've laid their first clutches! If you lock one in a room with her claimed nest box she'll lay; but if you lock her in after she reaches the nest box, she'll lay and then immediately leave the nest again, trying to path out. And as soon as you unlock her she's off like a shot again, even if she doesn't have any needs to fulfill.

Since the kea women won't incubate unless they have nowhere else to go, my dwarves can't get in to feed or water them, and I end up releasing them from their nest boxes to let them attend to their physical needs. I'm working up a jury-rigged solution involving a watering hole and a barrel of food dumped onto the nest box preemptively, but my hoary marmot person colony hasn't reproduced despite being of the correct orientations and bumping into each other frequently, so I suspect my efforts would be in vain unless I can get a pair of my keafolk to get married.

Relationships

Speaking of which, has anyone seen two sapients of uncivilized species become lovers, get married and/or have children? Even though my wild-caught sapients spend a lot of time together, I only notice them having relationships with my dwarves (especially the animal trainers), and not with each other.

Petitions

I've only had wild-caught sapients petition to join the fortress when I've added PET_EXOTIC after worldgen. I'm not sure if this is causal though, since it takes so long to get a petition in the best of circumstances. Has anyone had wild-caught sapients petition to join their fortress when they were marked PET_EXOTIC during worldgen?

Elf-bought Sapients

When I made them [PET_EXOTIC] in worldgen, the elves brought Tame animal people for trade, as expected. I didn't realize it at first, but they came with a set of clothing inside the cage with them! They're just forbidden at the time. You need to unforbid-all on the square the cage is at.

Unfortunately, the Tame animal people seem to have a lot less personality than the wild-caught ones I catch myself. While my wild-caught sapients eventually start reading and socializing, and in a couple of cases have even petitioned for citizenship, I've yet to see an animal person purchased from the elven caravan do anything except Eat, Drink, Sleep, and No Job.

[FantasticDorf]

Have you tried burrowing your kea-women? It should work in the latest version (40.06) in addition to rounding them up and pasturing them back into their rooms/(pitting them?) in order to keep them there.

If burrowing works on trolls, it should hopefully be fine for your own fortress. Egg collection is more of a issue of concern unless you're managing it carefully and dumping unfertilized eggs onto closed link stockpiles. Your method is somewhat interesting, im trying to experiment with harpy breeding personally for my flying crossbow squadron so this is a nice comparison.