You could probably get a lot of support by suggesting that Hurricanes don't cause damage, but rather a lack of preparedness. The billions of dollars spent on hurricane cleanup is a waste because all houses, roads, boats, people, crops, ect... should all be made as Hurricane Proof items in the 1st place. Really, why waste our money helping an unprepared society. While you develop a strategy to stop wildlife from establishing itself in the wild, could you also fix our problems with flood, tornadoes, wild fires, mud slides and the numerous other natural phenomena we find inconvenient. Unless you can fix these problems, I don't want our grants and public funds supporting you to strap on boots and cry about newly appearing wildlife. But, at least that gives you something to do, and probably makes you feel special.



I think that's the point I was trying to make. Anyone with half a brain and 100 pythons should be able to think ahead and say "hmmm... hurricane pythons = bad idea." And that person should then think of a way to secure them or move them to a secure location. Otherwise, that person should not be keeping pythons.



My suggestions are intended to be helpful, even though my tone may not be chipper. Why not try to police yourselves so the government doesn't have to? Unfortunately (for you guys), most people do not agree that it is ok to have non-native wildlife roaming around. So you can try to prevent that or the government will do it for you. I'm not saying that I support that 100%... just that it is reality. Why not try to prevent future introductions? Seriously? You really have no right to blame the government for stepping in if you are absolutely unwilling to make a change yourself (and I'm speaking to herpetoculturists as a group (not you as an individual) when I say that).



Would it really be so hard to say, "hey, Reptile Store X, would you please fix your walls, put some real doors on your building, and keep your animals in real enclosures instead of open-topped tubs?" If you can't take that small step toward prevention then you can't complain when Big Brother steps in. Personally, I would LOVE to see this problem solved by seeing the collective pet trade policing itself instead of causing problems and practically forcing the government to react.



Mike

[ Reply To This Message ] [ Subscribe to this Thread ] [ Show Entire Thread ]