Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I had a meeting with Todd K from Harvey Hilderbran's office today.
Right now I'm way too busy to go into detail but I can offer up a short synopsis.

First, I am very encouraged by the meeting. IMO it went very well.

Todd asked a lot of questions. He is anxious to learn everything he can about who we are, what we do and why we do it. (He reads this forum, so if you want to offer a brief biography, do so. Tell him how long you've been doing it. What you look for, what you take home, what you leave in the field, what you do in real life, and those kinds of things. Don't fluff it up for him, just give him a run down).

Todd is very concerned about the safety angle. Even though we have not had a major accident or fatality in 60 years all it will take is one family of four to come around a corner and have a head on with a snake hunter's car in the middle of the road and this whole thing will blow up in our face - I agreed.

Todd is very concerned with commercial take, as we all should be. We didn't go into detail there, we just agreed that we were both concerned about it. He is also concerned about the number of gray-bands being taken from the wild. Again we didn't go into great detail but I did (try to) explain that gray-bands will be around long after the Human Race is extinct because of the habitat preference, secretive habits, and inaccessible habitat, etc.

NO conclusions were reached by by this initial meeting. There will be more meetings hopefully/probably with a TP&WD representative present in order to start working on an amicable, agreement somewhere in the middle of where we were and where we are now. Todd indicated to me that we "could" reach middle ground, a solution that will benefit all parties involved, including the wildlife resources.

I take this as a very positive step in the right direction. For my part I promised to help restore Representative Hilderbran's public image. Why? Firstly, because he sincerely wants to reach some kind of agreement that works for all parties involved. Secondly because if we continue to drag him through the mud he WILL NOT help us.

Please, do not start with "well he did this... etc etc". That is no longer the point and what is done, is done.
The point now is that if we want his help in getting this resolved and moving forward, we have to respect him. I gave my word and I'm going to give them the chance to help us.

I'm sure not everyone will agree or like it, but I'm calling on everyone of you to mind your P's and Q's and call out anyone who gets in our way of progressing by making an inflammatory post in respect to Todd K, Rep. Hilderbran, or TP&W.

We may not get what we want, but for sure we will get what we need. What we needed was a chance to work with TP&WD to come up with guidelines for non-game management and regulations that will work for everyone, Herpers, Ranchers, TP&WD, The General Public, and our Wildlife resources.

I'm sorry I can't answer everyone's calls and e-mails, but please understand my phone rings about 200 times a day now and I get over 300 e-mails a day. Most of you want an update, well here it is, and the others just want to know why I didn't return your call, well there that is too

That's all for now. I've got to cook dinner, pack, and get some rest because I'll be gone for a few days, back for two days, then gone for a few more days.

Thanks for the update!

I will agree not to trash HH at this point to see what happens down the road. However, I would still love to see the constituents of his district remove him from his seat as their current state rep due to the reprehensible action he orchestrated and unleashed upon us! Unfortunately all the good will that is seemingly being discussed as of today, isn't going to unring the bell, at least not any time soon, that HH & his ilk rang so loundly w/ this ill conceived, poorly written, & soon to be selectively enforced law.

While I welcome them to the table, that is as long as they are genuine, I will remain very skeptical as to their motive in doing so.

Good luck w/ this course of action Joe! And I'm not being sarcastic.

DB

Ultimately, HH needs to be removed from office as a message to other would be PETA members that their jobs can vanish also, if they decide to start taking people's liberties away.

I think these people would be shocked at how much money we could raise in an effort to excise them from office.

As a side note, LE loves this stuff, simply because it gives them something to do. It is simply a matter of job security.

We need to make it a "bad career move" for politicians to take our rights away, in the middle of the night and then want us to be all nicey nicey and diplomatic the next day.

Well since you asked if we could give a personal history here goes.

I have been interested in herps since my earliest memory, starting with dinosaurs and catching lizards on the wall outside church.

I leardned to be a pretty effective snakehunter around 1992 in the deserts, foothills and mountains of California. Because I was taught by experienced herpers with concern for the environment I have never approved of commercial collecting although I do feel that sport or personal collecters and captive breeders have gotten an unfair bad rap amongst game agencies. I would say it's mainly because of some unrestrained commercial collecters and the infancy of this hobby which has not had alot of studies done like for fish and game animals.

I started hunting west TX in 1996.

I have gone every year since then, spending an average of $1,700-2,000 for a two week trip and/or $1,200-1,500 for a one week trip. I have taken at least one two-week trip per year and occasionally a second one-week trip some years.

My focus has been gray-bands, milks and trans-pecos rats.
In that time have collected about 10 graybands by myself and another 5 or so with friends. All have been used solely for captive breeding and I never have, nor ever would sell a grayband. I would rather release or give away one than sell one. I also have 1 wild caught milksnake and 2 wild caught trans-pecos rats. I have specific goals towards catching about 5 more alterna in order to pair up a few localities, 1 milk and I am completely done with rats unless it's an albino or something. After that I still intend to hunt west TX but it will likely be all catch and release, even graybands.

I do not think personal take from ROW could ever hurt graybands. The reason is there are so few roads in TX vs. amount of untouched habitat. Another reason is their secretive nocturnal nature. I compare them to California Mtn. Kings(zonata). Clutch size is similar(3-4 for zonata and 4-6 for alterna). The difference is zonata are diurinally active in the spring and like to bask under rocks. These rocks are granite and zonatas like the thin ones that heat up fast. I can find upwards of 10 zonatas per day in CA flipping rocks yet if I roadcruise them looking only for suface active ones I only find about 1 for every 3 to 5 nights. Graybands prefer huge limestone outcrops that are incredibly hard to rockflip and nobody has ever been able to find them in numbers that way. I know of only 3 or 4 found flipping total in that last 20 years or so. Additionally zonatas do not like dense shade, north or east facing slopes. Graybands not only have more prefered habitat per acre(as they inhabit north, south, east and west slopes and both open and shaded areas) but they also have larger clutch sizes than zonata. What this tells me is that graybands are not only likey more much dense than zonata but they are much more secretive. In conclusion I think there is every logical indication that there are far more graybands that never get seen and therefore short of taking crowbars or tractors out there, humans just cannot access the bulk of the population.

I know I am not a scientist but I have about 15 years dedicated personal experience with zonata and 11 years with alterna and have never, not once sold or traded a wild caught one of either.

I must edit. I said I have never sold a grayband. That should read never sold a wild caught grayband.
I have captive produced many graybands over the years some of which I have sold and some which I have kept.

Somebody needs to offer to take Todd herping.....

How can he fully understand the issues without trying it???
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Lloyd Heilbrunn

Palm Beach Gardens, Fl.

Already suggested that on another forum for precisely the same reasons.

R

This is a good idea. I am for this. Who's taking him???

Wayne

you and tank seem the obvious choices.

I will give a short collectors Bio,

I am 33, have had snakes since the age of 12, and I am from NJ, I began collecting snakes with my uncle in West Texas in 1996, and I have made it down every year since. I have spent thousands on travel, hotels and hunting licences over the years, spending the money in Del Rio TX for the most part. I am not collecting for commercial purposes (I would never sell as snake I collected) just as a hobby and I have found about 7 graybands total although two were already dead on the road, and this is over a 12 year period. Most of my snakes are captive bred, although I have 2 that were wild caught and given to me for free from other collectors. I breed the snakes and usuallly I give or sell extra babies to friends. I will occasionally sell captive born babies on kingsnake.com if I have to many, and I have also made new friends that way. I have not bought in more money than I spend on feed, so the money just goes to offsetting my costs.

I usually don’t think of it but if I collected everything I have seen I might have been able to bring in $1000 - $2000, but I have spent in the neighborhood of $15000 on my trips. I release and move to relative safety better than 80% of what I find, only a couple instances where I have kept a specific snake for a friend’s breeding program. I only keep graybands, and I have only been lucky enough to find a few. About 20% of the reptiles I see are dead on the road.

I am upset by the ban on hunting the Right of way, I can understand the hazards of slow moving or stopped cars on the road and problems that road cruising can possibly contribute to Reckless driving. I may not be a great hunter but I do it safely, and I hope you can find a common ground at least allowing for parking safely and walking the cuts with a light and possibly dimming the light when a car approaches.

Please understand that we are a group of collectors, we get together during the day to share our experiences. We watch out for each others safety, and we do warn newcomers to be safe out there.

The main reason I continue to go to Val Verde county (other than to find a grayband) if the friendships and memories created with the other hunters. If the ban on snake hunting is enforced I still plan to go down and photograph the animals, and continue the friendships and memories, I just will not be collecting or hunting. I have enjoyed the open space of West Texas for the past 12 years and hope others can continue to enjoy it in the future.

Jim D.

For a long time there has been a list of missconceptions applied to us and our hobby...

Give them a chance to get to know the people they represent.

--They are concerned about large scale commercial take
--They are concerned about impact on desired species
--They are concerned about personal and public safety

With those concerns we have nothing to hide....

Lance

i am a creepy snake people i actually CARE about herps.i will continue to remove/relocate ANY herp i see in/on a roadway with vehicular traffic regardless of ANY law in place. i dont sell wild caught herps. i try to educate people about herps and encourage education to change the only good snake is a dead snake point of view thats so popular.

--They are concerned about large scale commercial take
--They are concerned about impact on desired species
--They are concerned about personal and public safety

these are all non issues. takes will/can be regulated by simple bag limits as with any other tx.wildlife. pulling off to the side of a road and removing a herp is no more dangerous than crossing a street. like i told toddK. on the phone its not like we(herpers) are jumping out onto a highway like I-35 chasin a snake! "the only takes one" talk is just a grasp at nothing and they full well know it,,,,,,,,,,thomas davis
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Morphs... just like baseball cards BUT ALIVE, how cool is that???

my website www.barmollysplace.com

ok joe im not attacking you but if you are going to have a sit down with the powers that be about something that directly effects me im gonna say what i want when i want and how i want. i am copying your post to publicly put my opinion on it for toddk,hh or others who read this forum. again this is not against you simply stating how i feel i applaud your webpage about HH and will/do back you/herpers anyway i can...

I had a meeting with Todd K from Harvey Hilderbran's office today.
Right now I'm way too busy to go into detail but I can offer up a short synopsis.

First, I am very encouraged by the meeting. IMO it went very well.

Todd asked a lot of questions. He is anxious to learn everything he can about who we are, what we do and why we do it. (He reads this forum, so if you want to offer a brief biography, do so. Tell him how long you've been doing it. What you look for, what you take home, what you leave in the field, what you do in real life, and those kinds of things. Don't fluff it up for him, just give him a run down).

>>>i feel this is TOTALLY irrelevent to the hows&whys this law was illegally enacted.

Todd is very concerned about the safety angle. Even though we have not had a major accident or fatality in 60 years all it will take is one family of four to come around a corner and have a head on with a snake hunter's car in the middle of the road and this whole thing will blow up in our face - I agreed.

>>>WHAT! why agree joe its a NONISSUE and they know it! on that line of thinking i suppose every paved road should have crosswalks!only takes one HA sorry but come'on...

Todd is very concerned with commercial take, as we all should be. We didn't go into detail there, we just agreed that we were both concerned about it. He is also concerned about the number of gray-bands being taken from the wild. Again we didn't go into great detail but I did (try to) explain that gray-bands will be around long after the Human Race is extinct because of the habitat preference, secretive habits, and inaccessible habitat, etc.

txpw has that info easily easily resolved with bag limits another nonissue...

NO conclusions were reached by by this initial meeting. There will be more meetings hopefully/probably with a TP&WD representative present in order to start working on an amicable, agreement somewhere in the middle of where we were and where we are now. Todd indicated to me that we "could" reach middle ground, a solution that will benefit all parties involved, including the wildlife resources.

I take this as a very positive step in the right direction. For my part I promised to help restore Representative Hilderbran's public image. Why? Firstly, because he sincerely wants to reach some kind of agreement that works for all parties involved. Secondly because if we continue to drag him through the mud he WILL NOT help us.

>>>its simple he/they broke the law they must be held to account for that.

Please, do not start with "well he did this... etc etc". That is no longer the point and what is done, is done.
The point now is that if we want his help in getting this resolved and moving forward, we have to respect him. I gave my word and I'm going to give them the chance to help us.

I'm sure not everyone will agree or like it, but I'm calling on everyone of you to mind your P's and Q's and call out anyone who gets in our way of progressing by making an inflammatory post in respect to Todd K, Rep. Hilderbran, or TP&W.

We may not get what we want, but for sure we will get what we need. What we needed was a chance to work with TP&WD to come up with guidelines for non-game management and regulations that will work for everyone, Herpers, Ranchers, TP&WD, The General Public, and our Wildlife resources.

>>> i agree your word is your word joe not mine on the issues of HH and his image, and politicians will do what all gov. does and that is keep'um seperated. the guidelines for nongame in tpwd are/were more than sufficient and bag limits are the way as w/ALL tx wildlife numbers are held in acct. i do back you joe keep that webpage up you should have it linked to every one of your post as should we all,,,,,,,,,,thomas davis
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Morphs... just like baseball cards BUT ALIVE, how cool is that???

my website www.barmollysplace.com

Slipping that in on HB 12 was not a criminal offense. I do not agree with it, but the end result is that this law is on the books now.

I for one plan to make sure this does not happen again by working with the peopel that make these laws and policy. And I think we will do much better with it if we come to the table and work things out. After all, we got this slammed on us because of bad information and a lack of understanding.

Why not fight it with good information and a better understanding of us as a hobby?

No matter how long you yell at a broken dish, it will not mend.. Pick the pieces up and get to work.

Lance

Hey Thomas, freedom of speech, yeah baby! But you must realize that we are now in a position to fix this I would like to take this moment to ask you to mellow and let them hash it out. I would like to know why this all happened and we could all get something more than what we had. There are many options that I have long thought would look good to herpers here in Texas, like opening up the Wildlife Management Areas to regulated herping for one. This thing is out in the open now and getting some fresh air. Again, not a slam, and I love the fact that we can still speak our mind, but if we sling mud, we will undoubtedly get some on ourselves. E mail me por favor at antelope297todd@aol.com
Todd Hughes
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Todd Hughes