TAMPA TRIBUNE (Florida) 28 June 10 Ban on sales of 5 snakes, Nile lizard starts Thursday (Neil Johnson)

The specter of giant pythons swarming through the Everglades and the tragic death of a Sumter County toddler in the coils of her family's pet python prompted a law going into effect Thursday that bans the sale of the pythons and other reptiles in Florida.

The new law also bars people from owning the snakes as pets, though residents who already own them can keep them, provided they already have state permits and continue to renew their licenses for $100.

The law applies to five species of snakes and the Nile monitor lizard.

Dealers and breeders can still sell the snakes, but only to customers outside Florida.

The law covers some of the more recent headline-grabbing reptiles: Indian, Burmese, reticulated, African rock and scrub pythons; plus green anacondas and Nile monitor lizards.

The state has issued fewer than 300 permits for people with those reptiles, said Patricia Behnke, spokeswoman for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, but there is no way to know how many people have the pythons without a permit, she said.

Last week, the agency put the finishing touches on how it will enforce the new law, though it will probably take a month before the new rules can be implemented, Behnke said.

The game commission's rules allow people with or without a permit to turn over snakes they no longer want or can't handle to licensed keepers at any time rather than on a few amnesty days a year, as has been the case.

But some in the reptile business believe the law will do little to curb wild populations of the snakes and say the number of the exotic reptiles breeding in the wild is highly overblown.

"The number of pythons they claim are loose in the Everglades is inflated," said Anthony Green, who takes snakes people turn in at Westside Aquarium and Pets in Tampa.

Limiting sales to people outside Florida will make little difference in the number of snakes breeders keep, Green said.

"I honestly don't think it's changing anything," he said. "The law is not going to stop them from doing what they've been doing. Breeders breed here because it's tropical."

Joe Fauci, owner of Southeast Reptile Exchange, a wholesale dealer in Tampa, said the new law will squeeze his business.

"Probably in the long run it will be about 30 percent," he said. "And they're doing this when the economy is bad."

Fauci doubts the law will do much good. "It will just create a black market trade."

The law passed after weeks of warnings from the game commission that breeding populations of pythons were well established in the Everglades, news stories about giant snakes and a much-publicized trapping effort, organized by the state.

Vernon Yates, founder of Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation in Seminole, said the ban is based on hype.

"It's exaggerated. It's blown out of proportion. It's all being done off of hype," he said.

The ban also will ripple beyond the breeders and pet shop owners who will no longer be able to sell the snakes in Florida, he said.

The people who breed mice and rats for food will lose business. So will companies that make cages and enclosures, Yates said.

And he doubts the new law will solve anything.

"It will push the python issue underground. It ain't gonna stop me from having one," he said. "It's going to make people have them illegally which means they're not going to be properly caged and not going to be permitted."

Dealers and breeders who have any reptiles on the banned list will have to keep them or sell them out of state. There is no other way to dispose of the snakes, Yates said.

It also means he has no outlet for pythons he captures in the wild or that someone turns over.

"I'll be stuck with them," he said.

The game commission has an online locator map to find people who will take the snakes from owners at https://public.myfwc.com/maps/rocmapping/default.aspx
Ban on sales of 5 snakes, Nile lizard starts Thursday

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