Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Many of you know that USARK attended a meeting at Senator Bill Nelson's office in West Palm Beach last Friday to discuss S373 "The Python Ban". The USARK delegation was led by Andrew Wyatt and consisted of Captain Ernie Jillson, Miami-Dade Fire & Rescue (MDFR) Venom Response Unit (Venom One), Captain Chuck Siefert, MDFR Venom One, Shawn Heflick and Greg Graziani. Wyatt said "The meeting went about as good as we could have hoped for. They heard our message and it was well received."

The USARK message was one of respect and cooperation for Senator Nelson's position on the protection of the Everglades. A willingness by Senator Nelson's office to work with USARK and Protect the Reptile Community was given in return. USARK will work with Senator Nelson's office during the August recess to craft language that will serve the Senators goals, as well as protect the trade in ALL pythons. We would like to thank Senator Nelson and his Chief of Staff for holding this meeting in good faith with USARK's Florida herpers.

It is not a secret that there are ideologically driven Animal Rights (AR) groups that would like to use S373 as a tool to enforce their long held goal of ending the ownership and trade in reptiles. But, again they have no credible science or facts to back their assertions; only emotionally charged rhetoric and sensationalism. They will try to turn this discussion into a circus. They are extremely well funded and have a loud voice. It will be our challenge to stick with facts and logic and not be bated by their blatant mischaracterizations.

We MUST raise enough money to stay in this fight and see it through. We have come too far to fail now because we can't raise enough money to play this high stakes game. We need the Reptile Nation to rise up and support us the way the AR folks support their organizations. We can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but we have not made it yet. If USARK had stayed on the sidelines, the game would be over and "The Python Ban" would be waiting for a signature from President Obama. Help us get through this legislative session. What we have accomplished against huge odds is amazing, but we still need to see it through.

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Send questions to president@usark.org

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Andrew Wyatt
President USARK

Just so I understand USARK is in with Senator Nelson giving up the 3 larger pythons in somewhat of a trade to keep the rest? I hope this is not so, if it is then I would not call this a victory but a loss. The Burmese are just breaking ground on the morph market and the retics are becoming well diverse in color phases. I hope I'm wrong and this is all just a misunderstanding!

A little bit of something can be better than a wwhole lot of nothing.

As I understand, it's just for imports, not CB.

From my understanding USARK met with the senator and proposed banning the import of Burmese and African Rock pythons. The message was "received as well as USARK could have hoped for". I think that means that the senator is willing to amend the bill to allow for interstate commerce of all pythons and to ban the import only of WC Burms and African Rocks.
Wont know if the senator goes through with this or the AR groups convince him to leave the current bill alone until the committee meets again.
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1.0 Albino American alligator, "Smoke"
1.1 American alligator,"Al Bite Ya & Mollie"
1.1 Purple Albino Reticulated Pythons, "Gumbo & Abita"
0.1 Eastern Gaboon Viper, "Gabbie"

Well no matter if they are wild caught or captive born just remember a ban of any kind is truly one step closer to all and any snakes. Including the ball pythons and any others for that matter. The minute someone sees a ball python crawling around in Florida loose you can bet they'll be up for a ban as well! I only understand the need to ban endangered species. The endangered species should only be allowed in private collections for reproduction and repopulating that species.