>>For those of you that have a MD Captive Reptile and Amphibian permit and breed native snakes in MD, what do you do for your breeding records? What do you have to show Natural Resources Police when they show up at your door and want to see your paperwork?
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>>The turtle people are very confused as we've never been able to legally breed turtles before, and are worried that one person's paperwork may not be good enough for NRP, resulting in the confiscation of juvenile turtles.
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>>Katrina


I really don't even breed much. For the native animals I typically have on hand I really don't need a permit at all. I only maintain the permits as a back up in case I do choose to breed my animals one year here or there, because any offspring would of course take me over the non-permit limit. But, with them new changes coming the only thing I have right now that looks to be affected would be my hog noses...sigh.

The other year, I did learn a valuable lesson about making hard copies of anything I send them after I got a letter demanding to know why I had not turned in my yearly report form. When I checked into things I saw DNR had cashed my check easily enough and my check had been stapled to my report! How they could claim I never sent a report when the check was stapled right to it is beyond me and I told them exactly that after trying to recreate the form info from memory and resending stuff. I had been trying to keep a basic copy of the permit info on my computer in a file but my computer crashed so lost a lot of stuff.

This year I got my first 'surprise' visit from NRP per the regulations for an inspection... I've had my permit for years and this was the first time they ever felt the need to check me out. I honestly don't think it had anything to do with the 'missing reports' issue as, when talking to the officer, supposedly you are to expect an inspection about once a year and the guy that had been responsible for inspections in our part of the county was no longer there and this guy was very much surprised I had never been inspected before. He never asked to see my paperwork. Just checked to make sure what I had was on the allowed list and that the setups looked reasonable. Took all of 15 minutes.

As for my documentation, all I have is what is written down on the end of year report form that goes directly to DNR. I write down when I get eggs/babies and who I sell or give any to or when any in my possession die for any reason because it affects the overall "number on hand" column and is considered "activity". There are times when I absolutely hate listing animals that are "dead/failed to thrive" because it just looks bad overall even though I've done nothing wrong. Beyond that there are no other "official" records. It all boils down to them having to just take my word for it I guess. If DNR wants anything more detailed than what they they already ask for us to fill out on the report form, then it'll be up to them to give us any additional forms. I don't read that I am required to do any more than filling out the actual forms that they provide me with each year when I renew my permit and keeping copies of any paperwork I get that involves animals that I have purchased or otherwise legally obtained that are affected by the permit. The way I see it, the current form that gets turned in to DNR is/should be documentation enough because you are already required to list how many animals you gain or lose and under what conditions. I honestly don't see where I have to go above and beyond what they ask for at this time.

"Activity column - Any time you gain or lose a reptile or amphibian you must indicate how you acquired or disposed of that individual. You also need to include how many reptiles or amphibians were involved, and the name,address, and license number (if applicable) of the person either from whom the reptiles or amphibians were obtained or to whom they were sold or traded."

Now, looking over the draft to the upcoming changes that are pending to the permits regulations, it may be that will change because they did introduce a new clause specifically covering "breeding records". But, until I hear otherwise from them on whether I need to alter how I fill out their forms, I will probably just continue on as I have been doing. If they want 'breeding records' then maybe they need to think about providing their permit holders with such forms to fill out if they want everyone consistent on what is reported to them. I kinda think having each person doing their own thing when creating a breeding record is not going to be a very stable in the long run and open to too many interpretations.







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PHWyvern

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