Just hear me out and don't beat me up for my opinion.
OK. I will be the first to admit that I’m not sure that I’m crazy, well, I am crazy, I’m just not sure I’m crazy about this idea. Unfortunately for myself, I have never been afraid to ask the difficult questions.
First off let me state that I have never condoned the release of any non native animals by anyone into our environment whether it be intentional or not. Secondly, I'm not against any of my fellow reptile enthusiasts keeping any of the Big Ones and Third, I'm not against ownership of any of these animals along the southern coastal habitats. I do however, loath the fact that people have been irresponsible enough to release animals into our wild America. Not much better than those people that just want to flush their fish because they don’t want them anymore. Non-Native fish and Birds are a huge problem in Florida and will probably come under fire in the next few years as well.
I have a Granite Burm. Not exactly my preference but I got him in a purchase with a Peruvian Red Tail and I have just not been able to sell him yet (about 4 years old and 12 feet). Years ago, you would have had a hard time convincing me to buy any Red Tail Boas. I was into arboreal’s and loved my Green Tree Pythons to death. Today I have many Red Tails and can’t decide if I am going to start trying to sell some or not. Most likely they will have to pry them from my cold dead fingers or I will take them with me when I'm 6 feet under in my casket.
With that said (and I don't really like where I am heading with this), what if we worked with the senate to come up with a compromise that the reptile industry could live with which would only impose limited restrictions. More of a give and take type relationship. I only hope that their idea of give and take is not to take all of my rights away and give me nothing in return.
Our main goal here should not be to completely curtail our industry to the point that we hit "Black Market" status, but rather to 1) make striving efforts to aid in reclaiming the lands that have already succumb to the loose animals and 2) to prevent any further release of any boa or python species throughout the USA. Hopefully we could do this with only minor restrictions. Otherwise future headlines may read: "Rare Desert Rat pressed to near extinction status by Kenyan Sand Boas released in the Nevada Desert".
Our industry needs to be the driving force to develop proper educational programs across the USA as a whole. I personally would volunteer some of my vacation time in Everglades National Park aiding in recapture of the feral populations of pythons. I also think that we must be allowed the right to export our animals to other countries.
We need to work to convince the lawmakers that until the North American climate changes in such a way that it actually supports the USGS proposed Climate Change document, that we could impose a type of "Regulation Zoning" throughout the USA. As an industry, we know that none of these animals could survive Winter exposed in the Northern third of the United States. Most of the states that lie in the middle third of the U.S. (north to south) would also most likely not sustain these animals over the winter months. All of the southern states are likely to be able to sustain these animals for some prolonged length of time. So in the Northern Third we could have completely unrestricted trade but still chip at least the Burms, Retics and Anacondas. We would still be allowed to import through airports like O'hare , New York and maybe LAX. In the middle third we would chip our animals, be allowed trade between states that are not in the lower third and allowed exportation. In the southern third, Microchipping and permits would be required, there could be trade between states in an east/west direction, transport to the north but no longer transport from the north, no importation, but allow exportation to countries outside the USA.
Now lets talk numbers. Installing Microchips is probably in the range of $40 per animal at many Vets. Hopefully less. I hope that we could stay at the suggested 2 inch or larger girth requirement that I saw somewhere.
There will most like be multiple levels of annual permits required.
Class I: General Owner, Single Animal: can keep one of any animal on the ROC list. Cage/Enclosure approval required. Written Test Required. Trade/Transport regulations enforced. $100 permit fee.
Class II: General Owner, Multiple Animals. Allows holder possession of less than 5 animals of any type on the ROC list. Cage/Enclosure approval required. Written Test Required. Trade/Transport regulations enforced. $150
Class III: Broker Permit Allows for Purchase and Resale of animals on ROC list. Allows holder to have in possession at any given time, no more than 25 in any combination of any of the animals on the ROC list. Cage/Enclosure approval required. Written Test Required. Trade/Transport regulations enforced. $100
Class IV: Breeder - Single ROC Species. Allows holder to have in possession at any given time up to 10 breeding pairs of same Species of ROC list animals and multiple offspring for resale purposes. Cage/Enclosure approval required. Written Test Required. Trade/Transport regulations enforced. $250 per permit (multiple permits allowed).
Class V: Breeder - Multiple ROC Species. Allows holder to have in possession at any given time up to 10 breeding pairs of multiple species of ROC list animals and multiple offspring for resale purposes. Cage/Enclosure approval required. Written Test Required. Trade/Transport regulations enforced. $350 per permit (multiple permits allowed).
Class A: Export Permit. Available to anyone wishing to export a ROC animal to another country. $25
Class B: Transfer of Ownership. $10
I actually came up with these ownership class permit idea the last time they tried to put us to extinction. Yes this does affect me as well as I would currently require multiple Class IV single Species Permits.
I'm just asking the question......
Chris
