I am in favor of regulations that prohibit, or at least inhibit, the collection of most wild herps. Eastern hognoses in particular have an interesting situation where multiple sources have noted a decline, at least anecdotally. I say as long as hognoses are becoming more popular in the pet trade, their habitat is being continually destroyed or degraded, and until their population status is more thoroughly investigated, prohibitions on collecting wild specimens are warranted.

A similar situation happened here in Virginia. The state prohibited the possession of spotted and diamondback turtles. Keep in mind that the species do not have a threatened or endangered status, and are otherwise provided with no protection. I also raised concerns about the lack of exemptions for those already in captivity and importing individuals from out-of-state. I was informed that they would make reasonable exemptions on a case-by-case basis. I doubt you will see a situation where swat teams are crashing into every house looking for turtles. Of course this situation was much more restrictive than just collecting wild animals, here you cannot be in possession of the animals.

I find that most people have unreasonable expectations of how regulatory agencies can effectively enforce the regulations. Every bit of it comes down to funding. Pretty much every question that is asked by the public about their concerns with prohibitions can be answered with "who is going to pay for that??".

In this case,
Question
Why can't I collect a single individual from my backyard?

Answer
Who is going to fund the recordkeeping necessary to keep track of individuals and how many hognoses they collect? Who is going to fund the massive population studies to determine whether or not the removal of that single individual is sustainable for that population? Who is going to pay for the expert to determine how many hognoses can be collected in a given area? Who is going to fund training for regulatory personnel on how to properly identify a hognoses? Who is going to pay for the enforcement and oversight of the collections by individuals?

Question
Why cannot I import a captive bred hognose from out-of-state?

Answer
Who is going to pay for the verification process involved with determining whether or not the person actually bought a captive bred hognose, or merely collected the hognoses en masse and SAYS they were captive bred?

So as you can see, it becomes much easier for the government to do a broad sweep total prohibition on collecting.
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Virginia Herping
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/VaHS
Virginia Herpetological Society online store
http://www.cafepress.com/vaherpsociety

"The irrational fear of snakes is the only excuse a grown man has... to act like a complete sissy" - Colchicine

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• NEW PA Law - langly2112, Mon Nov 27 00:48:15 2006
• RE: WC hogs banned - Colchicine, Mon Nov 27 10:01:54 2006
• RE: WC hogs banned - Langly2112, Mon Nov 27 13:54:05 2006