Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I used to purchase from him ALOT. I heard some nasty rumors years ago. Is he still in the Reptile Business ?

Hes a guide down here in florida , heres a couple links.
check em out
Where he is now

this link should clear up those rumors.
Hes a good guy from what ive been told, just made a couple mistakes.
straight poop

Yeah, seems like a really good guy. Makes about 200 "mistakes" then runs off to Belize when he realizes he's going to get nabbed. He's a real riot. It was always entertaining to hear him sling [bleep] on the phone about the "great" (meaning, infested with parasites) animals he was overcharging for back in the early 90s.

I think it's great they cracked down on this guy. I know at least a dozen people who bought something (read: ONE thing) from him and every one of them feels like they got taken. A legitimate mistake on their part, one that was not repeated.

dont know him personaly, just going by what i been told. Im sure there are some pissed off folk at there. What he did was dead wrong. Perhaps hes learned his lesson , who knows?

Hehe...I didn't mean to imply you thought that yourself. I've gotta meet some of these people who can vouch for him being a good guy, though. Herpetocapitalism certainly takes all comers.

Didn't one of those mistakes include gassing all the animals in his facility to death with incecticide canisters before running off to central America ahead of law enforcement?

Yeah, he's a heck of a guy.

Sorry for the typo - should have been "insecticide" cannisters.

I don't know this for a fact, but have heard it from more than one reliable source.

Hi,
I've known Tom Crutchfield for longer than a lot of people here have been keeping reptiles. He was/is a real character, a guy of genuine color with a flare for promoting reptiles & business. To me, he epitomizes a time in the reptile business that holds a special place for me, an earlier, simpler time when we had a lot of fun and primarily just cared for the animals themselves. We used to wait impatiently every month for his price list to come out. It was always the best. He always had all kinds of new & neat reptiles, we couldn't wait to see them. I bought a lot of stuff over the years from Tom, and I was happy on every occasion. In fact, some of the "stars" of my collection, and many other collections as well, came through Tom. Everyone had animals in their collections from Tom. He is one of the pioneers of the reptile business, especially in the area of the printed price list ( now a thing of the past), and he seemed to have a knack of acquiring the very best & most outrageous reptiles. He can be credited for the importation of the first Albino Burmese python and many other reptile "firsts" in this country. Many species are viable as captive populations today because of Tom.
I & a lot of other people have a lot of very fond memories about our times going to visit his place & doing some reptile dealing. Yes my friends, those were the days. We had lots of fun. I, for one, am sad to see them gone. When Tom Crutchfield went, that marked an end of an era: it was nothing short of the beginning of the reptile industry we see today, helped along, in no small part, by Tom Crutchfield.
Thanks,
Paul Edwards

I admit,I used to anxiously await the monthly price list! I to bought alot of beautiful, quality animals from Crutchfields. I was just getting into breeding when I 1st wrote for a price list.At this time I'd never seen, nor used a PC.
Every animal I got from Crutchfields was killer. I was into Corns & small pythons @ the time.
The prices he had was always a more than fair price. I never met Tom nor seen his shop........ but I would have loved to.
I guess the laws have changed over the yrs. I watched a show on Reptile smuggling the other nite. They flew, a smuggler, (Law inforcement & wildlife agents)into the U.S, 1st class, gave him a killer motel room,set up a deal & then busted him. He shipped ALOT of endandered animals (smuggled) which most died due to over packing. He got 70 days in the pokie & 2 yrs probation

I must admit that I too was a Tom fan and waited for his monthly list (one of several i got) At the time I was into lizardsm but was never unhappy with the animals I received. I did not even know about his second arrest until a little bit ago. back in the day it was not uncommon for the big reptile guys to tell stories about how they got this snake in the country or that one in the country, but it was illeagle then and still is. I am sorry to hear about Tom's second conviction and I hope he is out of the game for now on, the third conviction will send him away for awhile and I would hate to see that.
Jim Hopkins