Collecting Gravid Females.

[brain]

Feel free to disagree.

http://www.thamnophis.com/forum/gene...isturbing.html

Yes I did read this but keep quite.

Again TY for the inputs and views.

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

And there is no information on “What pathogens do I expose her and/or the environment to?”

I can kind of see your point... but... do you keep other snakes? if so, you automatically risk spreading anything your current snakes may be carrying and not showing to her just by contacting them, and then her or vice versa. So saying that you are never exposing her to anything bad would be impossible since you would need a 100% sterile environment where you never ever contact her personally to be successful in zero exposure. Bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasite eggs are all invisible to the naked eye, it's as simple as you mess around with another animal in your house (or out of it, for that matter) that happens to be carrying something and you automatically risk possibly, passing. Whether she would actually catch it, whether she fights it off, whether she carries it without showing it and then when she is released it wipes out a small population, that is all left to chance and unseen circumstances. To wonder about what real harm you are doing is perfectly okay, but to deny that there is a *posibility* of you causing it would be rather silly. Never say never!

The other major point of capturing, keeping, and then releasing a snake that people often miss is the amount of stress and confusion it puts the snak through. Stress lowers her immune system, causing her to be more susceptible to picking up things that she might normall fight off. When you set her free, she is obviously confused and even if you release her exactly where you found her, she is going to spend a good bit of time crawling around aimlessly trying to figure out what the heck is going on and that is the time where she is very likely to be eaten and thus you are in fact, reducing her chance to survive by a great deal by degradation of her immune system and mental health.

I am not saying I am for or against occasional capture and release, I am merely stating facts and offering some speculation and counterpoints to what you have brought up. Whereas Stefan probably meant everything Ihad said, he usually does not go into detail

I believe if it is a morph i.e. albino, then it would not last in the wild.

This is true in many cases but certainly not all. Every color morph animal you see, originated from an animal that 99% of the time, was collected from the wild and was actually showing that trait and not just carrying it. Some color morphs, such as anery, melanistic, hypomelanistic, and even occasionally erythristic are actually beneficial at times and you can even find established populations of these individuals. I personally own an albino animal that was collected in the wild, the albino dekay's of course, and while that was a baby my other two wild caught morph animals were not. Scott felzer owns a BUNCH of astounding morph animals from the wild, many of which were adults at the time found. My hypo eastern, which is close in coloring to a t positive albino, was already an adult and gravid when I caught her. She stuck out SO bad in the grass and yet, she made it. I saw her from almost 40 feet away crawling through tall grass. My wild caught flame has a fluorescent red stripe that is about as inconspicuous as a traffic cone... she was a juvenile and she made it as well. Morphs do make it in the wild, not always, but if they didn't, we would never see them in the hobby!

[brain]

I can kind of see your point... but... do you keep other snakes?
Yes, and most have been in separate habitats for over four years. This will be the first, for me, were I would have a community tank of 1.0 or 0.1’s. They are very rarelyhandled so I believe they don’t get stressed.
If so, you automatically risk spreading anything your current snakes may be carrying and not showing to her just by contacting them, and then her or vice versa.
As would any other hobbyist who collects wild snakes. I will ask … do you know of any concrete evident as to the demise or health issues of WC or the hobbyist’s collection of snakes by these “unknown pathogens”?
So saying that you are never exposing her to anything bad (which I never did say, I believe) would be impossible since you would need a 100% sterile environment where you never ever contact her personally to be successful in zero exposure. Bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasite eggs are all invisible to the naked eye, it's as simple as you mess around with another animal in your house (or out of it, for that matter) that happens to be carrying something and you automatically risk possibly, passing. Whether she would actually catch it, whether she fights it off, whether she carries it without showing it and then when she is released it wipes out a small population, that is all left to chance and unseen circumstances. To wonder about what real harm you are doing is perfectly okay, but to deny that there is a *posibility* of you causing it would be rather silly. Never say never!
Yes I do agree the *possibility* does exist but I never stated that. I am only asking “is there concrete evidentance to the connection where by I would be introducing an “unknown pathogens” into the snake or area.
The other major point of capturing, keeping, and then releasing a snake that people often miss is the amount of stress and confusion it puts the snak through. Stress lowers her immune system, causing her to be more susceptible to picking up things that she might normall fight off. When you set her free, she is obviously confused and even if you release her exactly where you found her, she is going to spend a good bit of time crawling around aimlessly trying to figure out what the heck is going on and that is the time where she is very likely to be eaten and thus you are in fact, reducing her chance to survive by a great deal by degradation of her immune system and mental health.
This is a well noted point, I do agree the stress level is up in the critter as they see anything above their size as a predator thus the flight or fight instinct comes in.

I am not saying I am for or against occasional capture and release; I am merely stating facts and offering some speculation and counterpoints to what you have brought up.
Ty and I agree. It’s my contingency that these critters just did not just appear in our home habitats; they had to be collected from the wild, that being said this did not just happen yesterday either. So, I have not heard of a species being decimated by the “collection” of/or “health problems from unknown pathogens”. If this was the case I would surely be against the collection. What I am most concerned about the loss of natural habitat from man.

This is true in many cases but certainly not all. Every color morph animal you see, originated from an animal that 99% of the time, was collected from the wild and was actually showing that trait and not just carrying it. Some color morphs, such as anery, melanistic, hypomelanistic, and even occasionally erythristic are actually beneficial at times and you can even find established populations of these individuals. I personally own an albino animal that was collected in the wild, the albino dekay's of course, and while that was a baby my other two wild caught morph animals were not. Scott felzer owns a BUNCH of astounding morph animals from the wild, many of which were adults at the time found. My hypo eastern, which is close in coloring to a t positive albino, was already an adult and gravid when I caught her. She stuck out SO bad in the grass and yet, she made it. I saw her from almost 40 feet away crawling through tall grass. My wild caught flame has a fluorescent red stripe that is about as inconspicuous as a traffic cone... she was a juvenile and she made it as well. Morphs do make it in the wild, not always, but if they didn't, we would never see them in the hobby!
Those wild morphs have little chance hear in the NW as we have many raptors, Eagles, and the numerous hawks. Why even rats and my cats that their fair shares.
Yes and I agree Mother Nature is constantly evolving (other wise we wouldn’t be here, sorry off subject). Those of the morph are adapting to their environment and we collect them as “pretties”. I commend those dedicated hobbyist like yourself and Scott who try to provide an alternative to our whims. The problem I see there is, “in every clutch/litter maybe one will be appealing, what happens to the other say 9 which are not”?

[brain]

I’m not trying to start a range war here I just was wondering “if” anyone can provide concrete evidences one way or another. After that it will be my own decision and live with my conscience.

This is what drives my actions. To collect or not to collect?

[Stefan-A]

What exactly are you asking for? A list of cases where released or escaped animals have introduced diseases into the environment? When it comes to diseases that affect amphibians, Chytridiomycosis would be one such case and it's one with global consequences. It's just an example of such a case and like I said, there's no way for any of us to know what you could unwittingly spread to the wild population, or bring into the captive one. We're not clairvoyant. Unknown pathogen also refers to the fact that one doesn't necessarily know of its presence in the animal that's released. It could be a virus, a bacteria, a fungus, a prion disease, a protozoa, a parasite etc. How big the risk is may vary, but it doesn't ever go away and there are countless strands and even strands of normally harmless bacteria that may be deadly to other individuals of the same species or other species. One problem is that it's usually identified only after it's spread into a population where there's no resistance to it and when it is already wreaking havoc. So what are the consequences of not taking the risk?

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

What exactly are you asking for? A list of cases where released or escaped animals have introduced diseases into the environment? When it comes to diseases that affect amphibians, Chytridiomycosis would be one such case and it's one with global consequences. It's just an example of such a case and like I said, there's no way for any of us to know what you could unwittingly spread to the wild population, or bring into the captive one. We're not clairvoyant. Unknown pathogen also refers to the fact that one doesn't necessarily know of its presence in the animal that's released. It could be a virus, a bacteria, a fungus, a prion disease, a protozoa, a parasite etc. How big the risk is may vary, but it doesn't ever go away and there are countless strands and even strands of normally harmless bacteria that may be deadly to other individuals of the same species or other species. One problem is that it's usually identified only after it's spread into a population where there's no resistance to it and when it is already wreaking havoc. So what are the consequences of not taking the risk?

Thank you, Stefan.

[snakeman]

I know somebody who caught and release spotted turtles a little ways from my house.He wound up wiping out about 75% of all the turtle there.The next year we were finding dead spotteds all over the place.They are making a comeback now,But nowhere's near the numbers they had before.

[infernalis]

I must admit that many of my views have "evolved" and changed since joining this forum, The collective reasoning of our members is responsible for that

Firstly ANY animal that I pick up and bring into the house begins a LIFELONG commitment, in other words, I am not willing to put the awesome population that surrounds me at risk by acting on a spur of the moment whim. No different than purchasing a reptile, once it enters the home, releasing is NOT an option EVER.

“in every clutch/litter maybe one will be appealing, what happens to the other say 9 which are not”?

In response to that question, there are two answers, one is "nice" the other is not, but a reality nonetheless.

#1. Cull (put down, feed them to another rep or just euthanize them) this is performed on a regular basis by many breeders even if they will not openly admit it, These "breeders" are obviously in it for the money only, yet still have enough common sense to not release them into the wild.

#2. My personal favorite, and my choice , find suitable caring homes for all of them, or assume full responsibility for ones actions and keep them.

These have not always been my views, but as I stated at the onset of this post, the collective intelligence of this group has shaped me into a "better man" when it comes to my snake collection.

A certain member of this very group had an accidental hybrid breeding occur, producing a healthy litter of "mutts", I along with several others volunteered to care for these snakes until they pass on from old age.

I enjoy my "mutt" and find him attractive, amusing and actually rather robust. His name is Muttley, and he will be a pet until his last days sucking down oxygen.

I am also not ashamed to admit, I have fed more than one snake to our Savannah monitor, It is a natural process, and I felt better inside than just killing the animal for nothing, However they were genetically defective, or the still born from litters. I have yet to just toss a healthy snake to Chomper.

However, should I find myself overwhelmed with unwanted baby snakes, Its nice to have that option rather than see the whole collection suffer due to my overwhelmed state.

Just my thoughts...

Thank you Stefan and Thank you Tom for the posts you made, both add a sound validity to the issue at hand. And thanks to James for starting this thread in the first place.

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

Wayne, I use stillborn snakes as feeders for my tiger salamander and legless lizard. I do the same with babies that I know are not going to make it. But I decapitate them first with a razor. I feel better knowing that the snake's last moments, he had no idea he was going to die. When you feed them live to a predator, their last few seconds are spent being chewed up and swallowed, and possibly they are even still a bit alive by the time they reach the stomach...and well, I am sure they feel that so I choose to end it quickly and painlessly for them.

[infernalis]

Shannon let's not lose sight of the point, some breeders have been known to flush unwanted babies down the toilet, just like some people do with unwanted goldfish.

Besides that, it has been established that decapitation leaves a living brain due to super low oxygen requirements.

It has even been documented that human heads have been observed rolling eyes, and mouths reciting prayers while the head was in the basket at the guillotine.