Culling Healthy Animals

Ok, I had a very good point here, but it was apparently lost in the noise. I'll try again.

Ball pythons are BEING IMPORTED INTO THE US IN HUGE NUMBERS. Every year. Most of them are captive-hatched babies, but you get some wild caught animals coming in as well.

The above WILL NOT change if breeders produce fewer normals. In fact, imports will naturally increase, as the value of those imports will increase, because the current demand is more than enough to account for the supply.

People like ball pythons. People routinely pay between 60 to 80 bucks for a normal male ball python, to a pet store. That ball python is usually an imported CH snake. Perhaps from where you are standing, 60 bucks is a disposable amount of money, but I think it's actually a fair chunk of pocket change, and the average person will not deliberately allow harm to come to an animal with a price tag that high. The fact these animals sell for $8 apiece wholesale doesn't mean that's what they retail for!

An increase in the production of captive bred snakes in the US MAY mean a reduction in the number of imports, as it becomes less financially sound to import them. The only way to reduce the number of imports is to make ball pythons plentifully available in the US for those who want them. Captive bred animals are generally healthier and fare better than CH babies do. By increasing the supply of CBB babies, we may be leaving more ball pythons in the wild--one can hope. If you decrease that supply, more balls will most certainly be yanked from the wild, because this entire business follows the law of supply and demand. It doesn't matter if YOU think there are too many low-priced balls on the market--the market clearly disagrees!

Yes, I do sell my normal males to the pet trade. I'll probably even wind up selling some normal females to the pet trade, eventually. I consider doing so to be beneficial to the hobby (as more people who want pets get healthy snakes rather than parasitized wild caught ones), and beneficial to ball pythons in general (while wild populations are stable, they certainly won't stay that way if they pull more of them from the wild to meet an increasing demand).

Do some people mistreat animals? Yes. Should people be prevented from having animals because some of them MIGHT mistreat them? That's exactly the mentality our hobby is battling at the moment! The right to NOT be lumped in with people who commit crimes. The solution is education, not banning, not restricting supply/access.

Those who are just starting out should have a good experience, buying an animal that is already healthy and doesn't require more than a routine checkup rather than meds and intensive care. Sick parasite-ridden animals in pet stores hurt our hobby. They make the entire industry look cruel. We should do all we can to make imports obsolete.

So, please address THIS argument--I have explained why NOT selling normal males is BAD for ball pythons, and BAD for the hobby.

I can see valid points in both opinions.

If you had a dreamsicle and a normal and you had to choose which one you'd rather keep and the other one dies, you'd keep the dreamsicle.

Killing an animal because you're making assumptions about what will happen to it is just plain stupid. You don't know for sure where it will go, and if it will get taken care of.

Shawn, a big part of the problem with this "debate" is we're coming at it with two completely different paradigms about life.

I believe life has value beyond whatever random $$$ might be associated with it. I believe part of that value, for some lives, is to be food for others....even IF some of those animals are snakes.

You believe that because it's OK to allow an animal to die for the purpose of becoming food, then it is therefore OK to kill an animal for whatever purpose or convenience suits your fancy.

The difference might seem subtle, but it's worlds apart, and the two cannot be reconciled. You simply can't comprehend my point of view...and frankly, I can't yours, either. I can follow your arguments...sure...but I don't believe your "logic" can justify the lack of value that you place on life in general.

And that value, or lack of it, is entirely your call to make...as I've already mentioned much earlier in this thread. They're your animals, and you'll do with them as you see fit. And I never said no one else does it. I've no doubt that many do. The "industry" is rife with people who are in it for the money and care little for the lives they choose to bring into the world. And I might even be surprised (sadly so) by the discovery of the truth about what some "big breeders" do behind closed doors. BUT THAT DOESN'T MAKE IT RIGHT, NO MATTER WHO IS DOING IT.

YOU are the one being hypocritical, by your own words. YOU decide that for some animals, simply being born is a fate worse than death...and yet YOU willingly make the choice to continue to bring as many of these "unwanted" animals into the world as is necessary to meet your own hobby goals.

You can dismiss all the opposing arguments you wish as "too emotional" or "misinterpreting your words"...but that doesn't change the fact that many, many people are morally opposed to the way you choose to run your business. No amount of justification or "debate" is going to change that.

I'll also state this--I don't necessarily think there is something wrong with feeding baby carpet or ball pythons to other animals, if that is what those other animals eat. Rats, mice, rabbits, cows, sheep, whatever--they can all be part of the food chain.

My argument is with the idea that this is somehow better for the animal being fed off than going to a pet home would be. I think that's an absurd idea. I also think that a baby male normal ball python is an expensive meal for an arowana, when compared with feeder fish. He dined well on a meal worth at LEAST $8. (Probably $20 if you actually put a few local ads up). And somewhere out there, a newbie herper bought a CH snake instead, and it died, and turned them off from keeping any more reptiles.

Is it unethical to feed them off? No. Is it ethical? Nope. Is it the right thing to do for the hobby? Absolutely not--if the general public caught wind of such practices they would tar us all with the same brush and call the whole reptile nation cruel. It doesn't matter that mice are used as feeders all the time, there are some animals that people find it acceptable to feed/eat, and some that they don't. Pets are in the 'don't' category. Even with rodents, people would be upset with the idea of feeding off a tame pet rat, instead of a feeder that was never handled. Logical or not, that's the way it is.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ash

pitch it as a morally responsible husbandry practice to a community who is fanatical about how beautiful and wonderful these animals are. What kind of reaction would you expect?

---

I bring it here because this is the place that it matters themost. IfO go to any other forum and talk about what we do, I'll get alot of people who agree with me, but thats only because they think any good snake is a dead snake. Here, we all like snakes, but we also agree that our hobby in under serious threat, I am am pointing out that we could be hurting ourselves by what we are doing, and offered what I do (and what others have done or do, and don't like to talk about) as a solution.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ash

A market saturated with "defective" stock might, in the end, be GOOD for the hobby, especially for those people who actually care about, and put effort into what they're producing. It would make beautiful, well-bred reptiles a rare and valuable thing, and make good keepers really stand out.

---

In the case of carpet pythons this isn't true. The reason is, unlike ball Pythons, we can't just go get more from the wild. We have to work with what we have. The more we muddy up the gene pool, the harder we make it to keep any line of carpet pure. There are guys who make a good living selling well documented animals, but they will be the first to tell you that it's everyone else indiscriminately selling hybrid offspring for cheap that are ulitmately sold as a "jungle" or a "coastal" that in fact causes the problem. As a by product...when there are ALOT of these animals out they...they have to end up someplace...and thats usually not a happy ending for the snake once people realize what they have is not what they thought.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ash

I also suspect that rather than really caring about the animal's well-being, you'd just rather kill a "ten foot, muddied up, ugly brown carpet python" than sell it to somebody, for the fear that if you did, they would only later realize what an unpleasant thing it is and then associate the negative experience with your good name. So, what I think you're doing is a business practice, driven by the profit-machine. Killing it means you don't have to clean it, feed it, advertise it, or ever think about it again. Are you sure things like that have nothing to do with your decision to kill your snakes?

---

Not at all. By the time that happens, most people have no idea who produced it. When I wholesale a bunch of mutt babies...they get sold again, and again. My name is never a part of the discussion, and is part of the problem. I am just a supplier at that point, not a breeder. I also don't feed off larger snakes because I can't stomach it. It would require me whacking them on the head r some other such thing, and I can't stomach that. Besides, it a useless death, which I don't feel really good about.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ash

So, what I think you're doing is a business practice, driven by the profit-machine. Killing it means you don't have to clean it, feed it, advertise it, or ever think about it again. Are you sure things like that have nothing to do with your decision to kill your snakes?

---

So is selling 100 of them at once on the cheap to get rid of them. It does exactly the same thing, and I actually make more money, not less.

S~

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Eventide

But see, what a lot of people here are trying to say is that breeding snakes for the sole purpose of feeders is okay, but breeding snakes to sell and then using the unwanted/ugly ones as feeders is completely different and not okay. Chickens, pigs, cows--all those fall under the "bred for food" category, like feeder mice or feeder snakes. However, a lot of people here (myself included) feel that breeding snakes to sell and then culling the less desirable (but healthy!) ones is wrong.

---

I totally get that. But the "why" it is wrong is an emotional response that's illogical. Thats my point. It feels wrong because we all like snakes, but, it's not. I am not saying you have to do this. I am saying you not should be stigmatized, or feel like an asshat if you are doing it. Thats who those who do, never talk about it.

S~

Yes I would give the burm a home for the rest of its natural life. Should I pm you my address?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ShawnC

So is selling 100 of them at once on the cheap to get rid of them. It does exactly the same thing, and I actually make more money, not less.

S~

---

Wrong!!! Killing them guarantee's their life will never be anything more than a few quick breaths, bright lights, funny sounds and then man it's cold, Oh I hurt..and then darkness..

Selling them at least gives them the chance to make some child happy, educate some no-snake person, spark the passion that causes a life long career in herpticulture.

Cull them all you want, tell your self what ever helps you sleep at night..But when the dust settles and all bets are off your killing healthy animals for the simple reason that you didn't like the way they turned out.

And that is a down right BS reason to end a life.

Last note if you don't want to try and sell it.." DON'T BREED FOR IT"

[QUOTE=pavlovk1025;1163490]

So, short version....he breeds snakes, creates snakes to sell and some to breed, and feeds off the rest. Love of the hobby is BS, love of the animals is BS, the intention behind the breeding is blatanly obvious...$.
[/QOUTE]

Not what I said. Its Blantantly obvious that you have not read what I have said, over and over. I feed of a very small percentage of my animals that I feel have little to no chance of leading quality lives in captivity (this actually costs me money). I produce normals that I opt to keep much more often than I produce animals that I choose to cull. I bet I cull less than 10% of what we produce in normal hybrid offspring. Please read what I say...not say what you think I mean.

S~

:snake::mad::confused::snake: