I was working in Puerto Rico from 1995 till 2002. I was actively involved in the Puerto Rico Herp Club. We were the first club to be registered in PR. My last few years there I was the Vice President. The President was very involved in the preservation of the Puerto Rican Boa. We got involved with a project to be allowed to have legally, what we had in our collection.

The PR Natural Resources Secretary granted an amnesty period, so we could all register what we had and work on the law passed as to what, could be allowed in to PR. This took years and going to public meetings and hear what the so called profesional had to say about the many species that were already in the Island. Well I left PR and moved to Colorado in 2002 and after that the law was passed. If we had not got involved they would had banned all species that were not naturally from PR.

We held radio talk shows, we argued as to what the Doctors working for PR Natural Resorces, had to say about the different snakes and all imported wildlife. The majority of comments from them were outright wrong, and we proved them wrong with proven information. Not just hearsay.

There is also a problem in Puerto Rico with people letting go of their once small cute Burmese and Reticulated pythons, in the many lakes that are on the Island. The Green Iguana, as I can remember as a kid was never ever in the Island until some people started to bring the in to sell in the Pet Shops. In 1986 a law was passed to stop all of this. Now the Green Iguanas are everywhere and are causing problems.

I do know that whoever and whatever organization writes to the FEDS please provide fatcs and not personnal opinions!!

Sorry for the long post.
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Thomas Sierra

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