The unhealthy part is releasing the snakes back into the wild.

There's a reason laws involving liberating snakes into the wild, even if taken from the wild exists in many states.

You can introduce a bacterium or viruses that are alien to wild populations and therefore no natural defense exists for the wild snakes to fight off the introduced pathogen.

So you should do the breeding but KEEP the gophers or place them with someone who will keep them as pets and such.
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Thanks,

Frank Roberts