Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi, My name is Joe and I have been on this fifteen year hunt for a pair of pinesnakes, the ones found south of the Tampa/Orlando area,and in fifteen years of serching I became aware no one in the rest of the pet/breeder trade seems to have this blood, all pics are northern florida color variant (excluding the genetically altered pool out there.) This is what keeps happining to me, I obtain a male and hunt for years for a female and release the male only to have someone give me a female and then hunt for years for a male... I only look for wild animales that are destin to become relics of the ancient sandhills of florida, I'm not one whom belives in leaving snakes in the wild to be chased by pigs all their lifes I'd rather save them. the decline of their numbers in the wild are not at a slow trickle they have gone from 0-60 starting in the 40s in 20 more years pinesnakes and hognose will be gone. the northern florida pinesnakes all have that mask on the head and/or spots of black...of The pinesnakes found south of Tampa/Orlando all I've seen had no black or dark brown on their anteriors and all had clean white heads. I need help collecting this exceptional gene before its gone... this should not take fifteen years...Especially concidering my passion and the fact I was a commerical collector in the early 90s and I know this state better than most collectors, I have seen over 50 indigos in fifteen years and still hunt big burns from time to time and the only place I do find pinesnakes is north of Tampa/Orlando,this is probaly due to use of the pocketgopher tunnels as refuge 85 % of the snakes lives, here they have only a few, old, partilly filled in gopher tortoise hole every acre,and have to fight for them with the more common indigo...anyway This is a pic of a pinesnake found in sarasota. JB

Joe,

Great post! I certainly understand what you're saying about the limited gene pool in pines. I can only imagine how inbred the black pines in our hobby are...when's the last time you heard od someone catching a PURE black pine?

Temporalis keepers experience the same. It is believed that all Tyrell Co NC animals in the hobby originate from 3-4 wcs. How crazy is that? I wish you luck with the pine search. I still can't believe how many indies you see down there! wow!

I have a central FL trip tentatively planned for 3/21-27. We would like to target edb's and pines (probably too late for indies, right?). We are thinking of Ocala NF. Any thoughts? Any simus in there (even though that will be too early)
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Anthony Chodan

www.gradeareptiles.com