First snake! Meet my bull snake Ragnar!

[Jlassiter]

I guess none of you know about locality breeding projects......

[infernalis]

Originally Posted by Ragnar

For me it'd be a simple dollars and cents decision to let a sickly animal go back to living out his life in the wild VS droppin mad stacks for vet bills and medications with no guarantee of recovery..

The responsible thing to do with a sickly animal is put it down. Simple as that..

Why allow it to die slow?

I see a sick critter, beyond rehabilitation, I shoot a sick critter, period.

[infernalis]

Originally Posted by Jlassiter

I guess none of you know about locality breeding projects......

I have....

But we have some unique looking Lampropeltis and Thamnophis out back.

Heck, certain specimens, I could tell you what state the originals were gathered from.

[Jlassiter]

I knew you have Wayne.....
I can do the same for MOST Lampros....

What I'm getting at is collecting locality animals from the wild and breeding them in captivity.....That's what started this hobby.
Long before mutations were popular......

I'd kill to get new, wild caught bloodlines of Mexican Kings straight from Mexico.
We haven't been able to legally since the 80s. We are dealt with the gene pool we have from a select few areas. There are many other phenotypes out there that are not in captivity. So, what is wrong with collecting THEM from the wild to introduce into captive breeding programs?

I see nothing wrong with it at all.....

What is wrong with my 10 year old going with me and finding a pair of locality L. g. splendida and breeding them in captivity. Not only will he learn how hard they are to find and the fun it was finding them, but he will also learn the value in the hard work he put into finding them and the pleasure of getting them to reproduce in captivity......

Many people forget what started this hobby...and that is what started it.
It wasn't the raping of wildlife so that one can make a quick buck by selling their wild caughts.
I don't even think that's a problem anymore......At least not here in the USA.
Africa and South America, probably still......