Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Just a random thoguth I had pertaining to the issue below...

If you really get down to it, any big supplier that supports this is really shooting themselves in the foot, as I would really think that the vast majority of people who purchase high end animals, and the supplies for them, are small time people looking to breed a few snakes at home. I know that, while I truly care about the snakes I keep, there are a good chunk of them whose price tag was only justified by the fact that they can be bred to help offset their cost a little. Most people aren't going to buy a several thousand dollar snake just as a "pet". Then we lose any motivation to see just how far different breeding can take us and what the next awesome combo or newly discovered genetics will be. You take out the "little guy", and you're taking out the backbone of the reptile hobby. We can't stand up for ourselves without a backbone.

If this passes and only certain breeders are allowed to continue breeding, then we'll all know who sold us out for their own benefit. And I know I will never buy anything from them again.

>>as I would really think that the vast majority of people who purchase high end animals, and the supplies for them, are small time people looking to breed a few snakes at home.

THIS is exactly what the Feds will absolutely never control. They can't control it unless people (say your neighbors) or undercover agents by the thousands starts to get involved to infiltrate this hobby and 'rat you out' as a breeder, keeper, etc. If they attempt to control this, they are going to create the worlds largest underground reptile breeding community. Count on it! They can't come close to controlling the drug problem here in the U.S. Think they can control reptiles? Good luck with that! Drugs create far more social/economic/demographic problems than reptiles ever will.

Matt

p.s. - This is in no way to say we should not fight/protest their attempts at exclusions or bans as keepers/breeders. They just need to get more realistic goals for public input if they are going to attempt to legislate anything at all.
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"Change what you cannot accept... do not accept what you can't change!"

Tod Ashley C.$.C.

What you don't understand is that the people that support the NRIP are not wanting to sell a few animals for a few thousand dollars, they want to sell hundreds of thousands of animals for $10. Some don't understand the size of these commercial breeders like the one below who posted on this topic. People do not buy $25 snakes to breed them usually, they do not usually even research them and the snakes usually don't live. But that is what keeps these people in business, THE REPEAT BUYERS because the animals don't make it at first. These very rookie keepers that bought the animals at PETCO for instance on a whim learn from their first couple of animals and by the time they have a snake live into adulthood they have bought 3-4 of these $25 animals. If you think these giant commercial breeders care anything about your or my desire to breed these animals, THINK AGAIN!!!!!! They want to have there 100 employees and rule the reptile world supplying all the giant chains and driving the small family owned pet stores out of the market. The funny thing is where I live in florida there were 5 small family owned petstores within 30 miles 5 years ago, there are 0 now and 2 nice petco's within 10 miles of each other. You figure it out.
I'm out.....
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Josh & Krysty Hutto
J&K Reptiles

Various Ball Pythons, boas, dogs, cats, fish, an amel tiger retic female, a couple sulcatas and a few other odds and ends.

a BAD dog is MADE not bred, support the American Pit Bull Terrier as the greatest breed of dogs on Earth!!!!!

I wasn't referring to the people that produce thousands of cheap animal for supply to pet stores. These people, as you pointed out, will continue to thrive, probably even do better than they were doing. I'm talking about the big breeders who make their livelihood breeding and selling high end animals. While I expect to see people in a Petsmart buying an overpriced normal ball python as a pet, I wouldn't expect the high end breeders would be able to unload their animals on pet stores for what their current going value is, otherwise we'd end up with things like $5,000 pet store piebalds once the markups got done. I should have been more specific when I just said "big breeders", but no, you are right, the people who mass produce 10 dollar snakes will continue to rake in cash-unless an HR 669 type bill passes.

What you don't understand is that some of these BIG suppliers are gathering together right now MASS quantities of several Ball Morphs [Pastels are one example] and this year alone will produce over 1,000 clutches of only a few types. Pastel Balls by the end of this year will be LESS than $75 in pet stores. YOUR NOT GETTING THE BIG PICTURE. Wake up because this is happening right now!!!!When you produce thousands of the same morph by only one or two people they CONTROL THE PRICE. Exactly what happened to colubrids is RIGHT NOW in the process of happening to certain Ball Morphs and most of you don't have a clue......
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Tom Crutchfield
www.tomcrutchfield.com

Josh Hutto knows this and knows I'm right and fully understands and explained in his post quite clearly but it's hard for a lot of you to conceive what is actually going on.....
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Tom Crutchfield
www.tomcrutchfield.com

Tom, you're right, I wasn't aware that there are suppliers planning to carpet bomb the market with some of the ball python morphs. I think you and Josh might be under the impression that I think what is going on right now is no big deal, and that's absolutely not the case. I was trying to make the point in my original post that people SHOULD NOT support things like the NRIP, regardless of how big a breeder they are. I am taking this matter very seriously and I think our community is at a critical crossroads, and if we don't, as a group, make the right decisions, it's going to have an extremely detrimental effect on the majority of us, while only a few (like the ones you mentioned) continue to propser.

I might add there's nothing illegal or immoral about that it's just a smart business move designed to destroy competition. Anyone with the money and space could do it with almost any species....Thanks
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Tom Crutchfield
www.tomcrutchfield.com