Breeder vs Client Conflict Need Help

IMO soon as he assist fed and didn't take it to the vet, it's not my concern. I would NOT be refunding or paying for a necropsy.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Not a damn thing

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by John1982

The 3rd party acting as broker makes it a sticky situation. Can you 100% back up an animal that has not been in your possession since before it even hatched? Is the responsibility yours or theirs, or is it shared? Who's TOS do you follow? What is your terms of service? Who chooses when an animal is ready to be sold and what guidelines are you following?

Do you have any pictures of this "well enough to be rehomed" snake so we can get an idea of its overall build and what possibly possessed this person to think assist feeding was a valid option? Saying she had several meals on her own alludes to her originally requiring assistance. If this is true, how many times was she assist fed and how many consecutive meals did she take on her own before she was sold?

---

The couple people i would allow to be third parties with my animals would not make anything "sticky", as i know how they are with their animals and taught me a lot about them to begin with.

Example, went on a week long vacation and had one of them tend my collection at it's peak. 6ish adult bearded dragons. 67ish baby dragons, couple geckos, lovebird, cats, dogs, 30some baby cornsnakes, 10ish adult corns, few baby albino boas, few ball pythons, 2 carpet pythons, and we cant leave out my prarie dog.

He was capable of that. Id leave anything in his possession to care for and sell on my behalf.

i have a job out of town to do and he will be hatching my dragon eggs for me. As long as you know the other breeder is doing right, you have no obligation here, i equate it to someone buying a $700 ball at a show and leaving it in their car so they can look around some more, then the snake dies and they want a refund or exchange....have seen this happen before. Most stores have a 14 day guarantee.

Okay, so if he only had the snake a month, and it ate fine after the assist feeding, then that means he would have had to assist feed it after only one to two missed feedings? That seems (incredibly!) quick to decide to try assist feeding; I had always assumed that was the last-ditch 'snake-won't-eat-and-is-losing-all-its-weight-it-won't-live-if-we-don't-do-this' option...also, isn't handling a snake within 48 hours of feeding bad for it? I feel like I remember reading that the teeth and nails of the mouse/whatever can potentially injure the snake's internals, or at the very least that handling too soon can cause the animal to regurgitate. If the snake was having so much trouble eating, why the heck would you risk causing it to regurgitate once you'd managed to get it to eat at all?

This is speculation, but I would imagine a snake that has just eaten wouldn't much care for being handled, either...if he was only handling it after feeding, could that maybe be why it was squirming and striking so much? I would imagine at the very least that it was pretty stressful for the animal.

Also, the fact that he didn't take it to the vet when it first passed out and voided its bowels says something, too...why wouldn't he get his $200 investment checked out when it first started acting strangely?

It doesn't sound like someone trying to maliciously scam you, but it does sound like a newbie who made some mistakes and perhaps doesn't realize what he was doing wasn't helping the animal at all.

I don't feel like you owe him anything, but at the same time, I can understand him being upset to have lost a $200 investment so quickly. A $400 necropsy for a $200 snake just to prove that it's your fault and that you owe him $200 is RIDICULOUS, though...that's $600 basically out of your pocket for something that probably wasn't your fault. I can understand feeling kind of against the wall between losing that kind of money to keep your friend or losing your friend to keep the money, though. Not a good feeling for anyone.

If you really want to make it right by this guy--since he's your friend, NOT because the situation is your fault--there are a couple of things you could do, I suppose.

-Did this guy buy the snake for a pet or a breeding project? If it was a pet, you could offer him one of your male lessers and the $25-50 difference between lesser male and female pricing (sorry if that's not the exact amount difference; I don't know that much about lessers, but I saw a pair at a local show today going for, like, $300, so I assume the males can't be worth much more than $150-175 by themselves, given that you sold him the female for $200). That way, he's got a snake and doesn't feel like he lost out on the monetary difference between males and females.

-You could give him a full or partial refund. $200 is waaaaay less expensive (half as expensive, even!) as a $400 necropsy.

-You could give him a discount on another snake.

-Or I guess you could sign an agreement with him that if you provide money for the necropsy and it shows up as not your fault, that he gives you the $400 back (and you refund him if it does turn out to be your fault), if you really feel like wasting $400 on a $200 snake to prove a point. :/

Sorry you're going through this, and sorry this guy lost his snake, too. It sounds like a bad situation on all fronts; hope this doesn't ruin your friendship. Good luck with it. :(