Let me begin by saying that I have caught wild snakes and kept them as pets for a while. Yes, I also released them after a period of months. That being said:

I have seen ads on the internet for the sale of Wild Caught snakes, Black Rats particularly. I am not one to tell people not to collect snakes for personal enjoyment, but something just doesn't sit well with me when I think of someone taking 8-10 snakes from an area at one time, especially to sell them.

Is taking one for myself just as bad as taking, say, 8? Maybe. Am I living a double standard? I don't know.

The more time I spend in this hobby, the more I lean toward "There is NO reason to collect a snake with so many for sale". I am not 100% there yet, and can't say that if another Kingsnake were in my back yard that I would not take it in (and save it from the cats, garden hoes, hawks, cars, or what have you ).

Again, I don't think it is wrong to collect a snake for personal enjoyment. But I have a bad feeling when I think of taking so many at one time from one central location.

Don't know why I posted this, just wanted to discuss this with people who are actually interested (this would NOT include my wife ).

Thanks for listening.

I know a few people who have some stunning, i mean stunning ball pythons. All of which are WC. Same with retics, there are alot of beauties id like to have imported, but where they are dont allow it, I mean they are stunning.

Its like a 50?50 line here. Awesome looking WC, breed to a captive and produce awesome CBs like the WC. Helping all out and furthering the genes.

Some more common ones, corns and rats and garters. i see no need to get WCs cause they are so common in trade now. Just my 2 cents

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WC's are acceptable for lizards that need captive bred populations genetics boosted, such as things like R. Leachianus. I also support it in the case of my croc skinks, where people buying them SHOULD be breeding them to establish captive breds, to erradicate wild catching.

Things that don't do well in captivity when bred, like gold skinks, should just be abandonned by the hobby, even though they might be pretty or nice or whatever.

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Zane Neher.

The great and strong man is one who bears within his character many contradictions.
Crocodilian care.

I guess I'm not in a position to say I wouldn't collect wc herps. There's not much in my geographic that would constitute an awesome herp. But the more I read about the environment the more I realize how fragile the balance of nature is. Some areas I suppose have an abundance in numbers. But if several people were to collect from the same area. They could devastate that population as well as the balance in the food chain. We also have to be careful not to reintroduce back into the wild, herps we have kept as pets. They could easily bring disease into the wild population with them that they have no protection against.

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Mike
"Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time, and always start with the person nearest you." - Mother Teresa

Actually, I don't believe there is a delicate balance of nature. Several species have gone extinct within the last few hundred years, and nature hasn't gone out of whack. In addition, over the last several thousand years, many, many species have gone extinct.

The world has a way of continuing, regardless. The balance is not even close to being delicate. It is rugged, strong, and ongoing.

I have read that Eastern Box Turtle poulations, for example, are very seriously affected by the harvesting of even a few individuals from a given area. I'm sure that not all species have that issue.

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Amy

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Zane Neher.

The great and strong man is one who bears within his character many contradictions.
Crocodilian care.

I think I;m in your same boat there Knox. I don't approve of collecting large amounts of animals from an area for profit. That practice has decimated wild populations and nearly wiped out some species in the wild (I can name a few tarantulas). If it's a small number, or a one time thing, and it's for yourself or a friend or something, I don't have as much of a problem with it. This also depends on the species though, and how they're doing in the wild and where you got it from.

I, for example, have a black rat snake that I caught myself. They're very common here, and in the urban environment I caught her in, she stood a decent chance of being killed by a car, dog, or shovel. In situations like that I don't necessarily feel obligated to "rescue" her, even though she'll likely live longer now that she's in my care. But I also don't feel any obligation to leave her where I found her. I wanted a rat snake, now I have one. The wild population will not suffer as a result of what I've done, few or no others are collecting them from the area, and the snake will survive where previously she may not have.

Had I left her behind, she may not have been killed. She may even had gone on to breed and produce more rat snakes for the area. The point is that it doesn't really matter either way, the rat snakes here are still prevailing despite my action. Now if 50 other people in the area did the same thing as me, THEN there'd be a problem. Or if one other person were taking large amounts of snakes to sell.

I don't actively support the practice of collecting from the wild, but at the same time, I'm not completely against it in all cases, though I'll almost always recommend leaving animals where you found them. I just might not always follow my own advice. I have a tiger salamander I caught about 10 years ago and to this day you can still find healthy populations of them all over ND

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+5 bonus points to whoever finds me a job!

"Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines." - John Benfield

I second that. For me.... if I find something that I have really been looking for I will keep it for myself. I would never go out catching things to sell, i would also not just keep something for the sake of keeping it. There are also very few herps that I would take back home to keep from the field. These would mainly be a herp I desire to keep that is not being captive bred. All new species to the industry have to start somewhere. As someone stated above some species that are not widely kept and bred successfully need a fresh gene pool to make them ultimately a viable introduction into the "pet" herp scene. Also if I know I won't be able to keep a herp that I have caught in the field, i will rather not risk it and leave it be. (maybe take a photo of it and put it into an enclosure )

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Don't be jealous the voices only speak to me...

www.herprecon.org