As Wayne said, last year they were, NOW you need a permit to legally keep any native species of Reptile or Amphibian in NY. A law was passed which regulates (actually gives DEC authority to protect) any native species.

What makes life more complicated, NY law does not distinguish between subspecies, and thus, NOW even though you may have a Costa Rican milksnake(L. t. stuarti) or Honduran(L. t. hondurensis), These ALSO, are technically regulated by NY law and require a permit. Does it make sense or will DEC come after you? Probably not, but the laws aren't written to make sense or with a lot of forethough, but merely to confuse you.

If any thought was put into the regulations, they would have limited the number of adult snakes one could own(i.e., the number over a certain length) and also the number of juveniles. This way,the regs would be enforceable if you were required to get rid of the number of captive born offspring by a certain date. HOWEVER, DEC regulations are not designed to promote captive breeding, they are designed to restrict the average Joe from being able to keep any animals. Poachers are never going to have any regard for any law whatsoever, so in that sense, its pointless to pass excess useless legislation.

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