Yet another python story...

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Originally Posted by eclipsesmommy

sadly in places where people live close to eachother stuff like this is bound to happen. i agree that the python owner should have been keeping a closer eye on the snake, after all its a snake not a dog or cat that will come back when you call it. poor kitty, it was very pretty but it was probably a nice snack for the python! too bad they couldnt have been friends like when you see dogs with baby deer and stuff like that. if you read the end of the article where it mentions how a toddler was killed by a python, it truly shows how dangerous big snakes can be and owners should be under strict conditions including keeping the snake in a confined area. (how was the owner going to get the snake back in the house anyways ? carry it??) but a licensing system wouldnt help a darn thing. this snake owner should have been more considerate of the dangers and aware of the snakes power ! i woulda chopped the snakes head off if that was my kid being strangled and im a snake lover !

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i pity the cat but the owner is an idiot. going on a pointless and unjust one man crusade at the heavier end of 30 years old just because he can't keep his emotions in check and realise that nature is nature and unfortunately sometimes things eat eachother is just sad.

if his cat ate a neighbours rat, i'm sure he'd see the monstrous stupidity in asking to ban all cats. but he's so incapable of keeping a level head and emotionally overwhelmed that he's gone on this militarized solo program to ban all pythons.

people like this are the reason we have wars. honestly.

I have no sympathy for either owner. Who here would leave their snake out in the yard to the point where they wouldn't see a cat near the snake or being eaten? The only reason the owner of the snake wasn't fined was because it happened on his property, the people on both sides of the issue are idiots.

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Originally Posted by Dragoon

I have no sympathy for either owner. Who here would leave their snake out in the yard to the point where they wouldn't see a cat near the snake or being eaten? The only reason the owner of the snake wasn't fined was because it happened on his property, the people on both sides of the issue are idiots.

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yes absolutely, although if the snake owner was sure that his garden was secure, and was only gone for a minute to get a drink before returning to enjoy the sun or something.. its understandable. he can't predict what neighbours cats are going to do. especially ones that live half a street down the road (as is the case here).

Hi,

I sent this email;

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Originally Posted by dr del

Hello,

Firstly I would like to offer my sympathies for the loss of your pet.

I am slightly dissapointed however to find you wish to inflict this pain ten-fold on myself. :-(

I feel strongly that your neighbour should not have had his animal unsupervised in his garden for its own good let alone Wilburs.

I have to say however, in all fairness, that you yourself were not supervising Wilbur either.

Your pain is shared by many pet owners who lose their pets whatever the means and this includes those of us who keep reptiles. I live in Scotland where no DWA licences have ever been granted (though there is no legal reasons for them not to be - the councils involved just choose not to ).

This would mean my collection of royal pythons ( a species that rarely reaches six feet in length and is known for being docile ) would no longer be allowed if your petition were to succeed. Since I spent over £1000 in the past year on buying two of them ( colour morphs ) this would be a huge financial as well as emotional blow at a time when we are all suffering.

If Wilbur had fallen to a dog would you be asking that all dogs be banned? After all they have harmed and indeed killed many people in Britain which not one single python has ever done. Not one death from pythons in Britain. Ever.

Please do not allow your pain to cause you to over-react and penalise an already misunderstood group of fellow pet lovers.

I hope you can find it within yourself to reconsider this petition.

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I know it probably won't help but I had to at least try.


dr del

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Originally Posted by aaramire

Neither the cat nor the snake should have been outside at all.

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I agree unless they are supervised ,although i do have one cat that has escaped a couple times , But he was born in a barn. lol
:sheepish: :sheepish: :sheepish: :sheepish:

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Originally Posted by MasonC2K

Apparently none of you have ever owned a cat before. Very few people keep their cat's indoors all the time. And I tell you, it's hard to do. Trying to keep 2siamese inside is a hard task. There are also no laws for keepign cat's inside or leashed. Try leashing a cat. Can't be done.

If I undertand the article correctly, the snake was just allowed to roam the backyard? If that was the case, then it's the nsake owners fault for not properly housing the snake.

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I highly doubt that the snake was allowed to roam free. How tall of a wall did the guy have if a 13ft snakes couldnt get over it??? Most just from what I see are about 6 foot and thats no challenge for a snake that big.

Also for everyone assuming the snake was just left to roam free outdoors, who said it was. I read that it was a garden maybe it was some elaborate outdoor enclosure that the owner made and was not as secure as he thought. Don't believe everything just because its in the news. Also if it was as simple as the cat jumping over the wall then why didnt the owner simply jump on over to help the cat instead of sitting there and listening to the cat die? This story makes no sense to me. Go let one of you snakes loose in your yard and see how long it stays there.

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Originally Posted by MasonC2K

Apparently none of you have ever owned a cat before. Very few people keep their cat's indoors all the time. And I tell you, it's hard to do. Trying to keep 2siamese inside is a hard task. There are also no laws for keepign cat's inside or leashed. Try leashing a cat. Can't be done.

If I undertand the article correctly, the snake was just allowed to roam the backyard? If that was the case, then it's the nsake owners fault for not properly housing the snake.

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It can and has been done:YouTube - Mean Kitty - Outdoors 8.9.09

Dr. Del said it perfectly in his e-mail :gj:

This is a tough issue for me since I (like a few others who have posted) love both snakes and cats. I have one cat of my own and my parents have 7 that are indoor/outdoor (they live in the middle of nowhere though with the closest house a 1/2 mi away). Mine is not used to going outside, though, and I will probably never let her simply because I worry too much. If a cat is used to going outside and likes to do so however, it can be very difficult to restrain them. It can be done, and in some situations probably should be, but they really do enjoy themselves outside and I have no problem with people that allow their cats to roam in relatively safe areas. If you do let them outside, it also can be very hard to enclose them in a yard. Cats can and will find a way over, under or through almost any fence, and I completely sympathize with Wilbur's owners in this case. It doesn't mean that they should have let him out in that kind of situation with neighbors so close (I wouldn't because my mom has horror stories of living in the suburbs and having several of her cats poisoned by the local cat hater), so it is partially their fault for not exercising good judgment, but I at least feel for them and he was a very pretty cat :(

The bigger issue I think, is that the owners of the snake left it unsupervised in the yard. That to me is completely irresponsible :mad: The article said that the owners of the cat got no response from the snake owners' home, so they obviously just left that giant snake alone in the backyard!! Yes, the incident actually happened on their property, and yes, the cat probably should have been kept inside, but that doesn't change the fact that they left a giant snake unsupervised, where it could have easily escaped the yard itself, and at the very least caused mass hysteria. ((Maybe they had initially put it inside some sort of enclosure, but it obviously wasn't a very secure one, and they are still irresponsible for not keeping an eye on it))

So, to sum up my rambling: the owners of both animals are equally to blame and it is a horribly unfortunate event. But I definitely agree that they are going way too far with wanting to ban all pythons...that is just ridiculous :mad: People always over-react and I also agree with the dog comparison. It definitely wouldn't have made the news if it was a dog instead, and it frustrates me to no end that the anti-snake people will only use stories like this against us. I feel mostly bad for Wilbur himself though, who, if his owners had any sense, would have been kept inside :(

Okay, I think I'm done now :P

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Originally Posted by MasonC2K

Apparently none of you have ever owned a cat before. Very few people keep their cat's indoors all the time. And I tell you, it's hard to do. Trying to keep 2siamese inside is a hard task. There are also no laws for keepign cat's inside or leashed. Try leashing a cat. Can't be done.

If I undertand the article correctly, the snake was just allowed to roam the backyard? If that was the case, then it's the nsake owners fault for not properly housing the snake.

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its people like you that allow there cats to roam the streets and create more..feral cats..and these cats for the most part "get by" and live in the streets but some die because they are not cared for. and every day i see dead cats in the middle of the road. if you own a pet it is your responsibility to care for it and keep it on your property. regardless of the species. end of story. that simple. both owners were careless.