Corn snakes and Chameleons

[beardy_boy99]

i luv chameleons and if legal i would definately have 1 not a corn snake though(no offence, there a beatiful snake) but i would not risk my herps for it!

 

[cris]

I love these arguments LOL. If you care about our native fauna how could you possibly consider keeping a Chameleon ?? Just imagine the damage one of those things could do to our environment ;-) By all means keep cats, dogs, mice, rats, rabbits, guinea pigs, horses, cows, goats, Llamas, alpacas, pigs, deer, peacocks, guinea fowl, chickens, turkeys etc etc etc but a Chameleon ARE YOU MAD ?????

Great logic there, we have already introduced heaps of damaging animals so a few more couldnt possibly hurt :? Most(if not all) of the animals you listed where here before cane toads so obviously cane toads cant be a problem because other animals were introduced first.

Red ear sliders are a good example of the damage the illegal exotic trade can cause. Its only going to increase and get worse in the future due to selfish morons who cant see the problem with it.

I personally think they should be legalised and strictly regulated with extremely tough penalties for those doing anything illegal, minimum 15 years jail or $250000+ fines would probably do(i personally think capital punishment would act as a good deterrent). It will never happen though so we will just go on as it being seen as a trivial or harmless crime and we will definitely see more damage caused by it in the future.

 

[Dodie]

I personally think they should be legalised and strictly regulated with extremely tough penalties for those doing anything illegal, minimum 15 years jail or $250000+ fines would probably do(i personally think capital punishment would act as a good deterrent). It will never happen though so we will just go on as it being seen as a trivial or harmless crime and we will definitely see more damage caused by it in the future.

I just couldn't agree with this. Even though the majority of people that would own an exotic rep would keep them without doing anything stupid you just can't trust everyone. Just look at the state of other animals most people can own, too many ferals.

Even look at how many snake keepers lose their snakes, alot of them find them again but some exotic's would easily get out and stay out, breed and start to cause damage.

We don't need anymore exotic animals to be legalised, it will just cause alot more problems than the ones already present.

I also think it should be a lot tougher to keep any of the animals that boa has mentioned (any exotic's) They should be on licence and if anyone slips up licence revoked and fined. Personally I would prefer that we didn't have any exotic animals here but it's just like alcohol, loved too much and complete prohibition of it wouldn't work Just need stonger regulations

 

[GSXR_Boy]

Theres "supposedly" a wild colony of corn snakes out this way or something.

Meant to be a fair few wild ones out at mac' fields.

 

[Retic]

Well at least you appear to have seen the point of my post Dodie, I obviously wasn't saying because we have all those I listed another wouldn't hurt. My obvious point was that it's funny how probably every one of us would drive down the road past most of those in a paddock and they would get a sideways glance but a Chameleon will devastate our ecosystem.
Of course farm animals can't be licensed but the hypocrisy of it is just amazing.
It's quite simple really, if they aren't licensed and regulated they will continue to increase in numbers exponentially.

 

[pythonmum]

Well i have been offered from a private contact of mine (dont ask for there details) a cornsnake if i wanted one i've ever handled them just after they have hatched. While i must admit they are one of the most beautifull snakes that u can get for the price i dont know if i would take the risk as my first snake. I dont really wanna get a bredli and then 3 months later get busted by someone licenece ripped up big fine for me and so forth,,,, In all honestly if i wasn't going to get a bredli yeh i would get the cornsnake.

If we had a more variety of snakes in aus that had the same patterns and colours as a corn snake i would differ but the closest things ive seen are green tree pythons which are expensive as hell.

I've handled and helped keep corn snakes in the USA and they are lovely, but I think a Bredl is a great native alternative. (I've got a pair of hatchos on order for next year, in fact.) As some others have said, corn snakes are really nothing special and it's not worth risking your license and the native fauna. Escaped and thoughtlessly released animals really stuff up our native wildlife and environment.

 

[Radar]

Well at least you appear to have seen the point of my post Dodie, I obviously wasn't saying because we have all those I listed another wouldn't hurt. My obvious point was that it's funny how probably every one of us would drive down the road past most of those in a paddock and they would get a sideways glance but a Chameleon will devastate our ecosystem.
Of course farm animals can't be licensed but the hypocrisy of it is just amazing.
It's quite simple really, if they aren't licensed and regulated they will continue to increase in numbers exponentially.[/quote]

No, they won't. Besides that statement being too general to mean anything, no population continues to grow exponentially indefinately.

Other than that, I agree with your points about the rest the animals we've got in the country. Possibly the worst thing this country could ever do to its ecosystems is introduce cattle and sheep, simply due to our geological history, but Im not getting into that side of things atm.

I just dont believe making exotics legal can in any-way reduce the numbers present in the country, how does that make sense? Unless every individual brought into the country was sterilised before shipment, and even then.........there are going to be more then there were before legalisation.....the only difference would be that they couldnt breed when (not if) they escaped.

 

[Retic]

Well I guess that statement may have been slightly too general, my point was that they will continue to increase unabated since little seems to be done to stop it. I'm not saying numbers would necessarily decrease if regulated but at least the authorities would have some idea of at least a proportion of what is out there.

 

[Hickson]

but at least the authorities would have some idea of at least a proportion of what is out there.

Why is this important? They know there is a quite a substantial number out there, why do they need more exact idea?



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