Ball Pythons... deadly? According to animal planet...

I'm watching Animal Planet and they did a "bust" on someone’s place that had reptiles (I guess they aren't allowed in San Francisco) and they made it sound horrible. Usually animal planet does a good job but... the guy has mostly BPs (include a pretty pretty piebald), I might have seen a Burmese, rainbow boa, jcp, red tail and a couple I don't recognize (boas and pythons though, and no reticulateds) and there are only 26 - and the officer is saying that it is a dangerous collection that could kill or seriously injure a large grown man. AND that having that many means that the man has an unnatural obsession with snakes.

He had them all in a nice rack set up - he was breeding mice to feed them and every single one was able to be handled without so much as a tag or hiss and the show is making sound like it was this horrible underground black market trading ring. They say that with this many snakes he must be into *gasp* trading.

This isn't the first time either - they picked up a Burmese on another episode (animal cops) and the guy said he had picked one up that was like 20' before and it ate a 60 lbs pig (which the narrator then pointed out was the size of a 7 year old child).


They do such a good job of challenging myths about pitbulls, I wish they would do the same about snakes.

I hate when something gets misrepresented just for ratings.

There is no educating the folks at Animal Planet. It's all about shock factor and ratings. Let this be a lesson to us all. Don't let your neighbors know about your collection or you may be next.

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Originally Posted by Jenn

There is no educating the folks at Animal Planet. It's all about shock factor and ratings. Let this be a lesson to us all. Don't let your neighbors know about your collection or you may be next.

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This guy got caught when they got a call from UPS that a package they were delivering was moving - it was two BPs.

I was just watching that episode a few minutes ago. It was ridiculous what they were saying about those snakes. he had some gorgeous rainbows and womas, and I just dont see how he had a "deadly" collection. the cop was freaking out about this guy's obsession too, like you said. I just dont see the problem here.

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Originally Posted by Salem Purrs

I was just watching that episode a few minutes ago. It was ridiculous what they were saying about those snakes. he had some gorgeous rainbows and womas, and I just dont see how he had a "deadly" collection. the cop was freaking out about this guy's obsession too, like you said. I just dont see the problem here.

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Yea - I'm just watching it. For the sake of the folks on here I hope that having 26 snakes don't qualify someone as crazy... :rolleye2:

And what kills me is that it wasn't even a bad situation like reptiles are sometimes rescued from- from what I could see they were all in really good shape and were getting taken care of very well.

is that the animal cops show? i hate that show - so depressing. people can do such horrible things to their animals.

I agree that it sucks that they are playing up the "dangerous" aspect of snakes. I don't understand why a channel named animal planet would be nurturing an unnatural fear of snakes by making people with snake collections look like creeps. Reaching out to a new audience???

lame.

They had an episode a while back where I believe a medium burm, maybe 8-10 ft bit and constricted a really ignorant woman who was helping her sister and wasn't shown what to do. The woman had a rabbit in a bag, and tried to drop it in the cage, but it got stuck and she reached into the cage to pull it out, and the snake struck, and constricted her arm. Obviously her arm was much warmer than the dead rabbit, and the snake got confused. The animal police came out and wrestled it off her, and then they did a little narration on why the woman was at fault, and ultimately her sister was responsible. Aparently the sister moved, and couldnt take it, so it was left with a total novice, she wasn't instructed how to properly care for the animal, and got bit, it could have been worse, it only constricted her arm. I think it might have been Animal Cops Houston, I find that they seem much more knowledgeable, but their animal behavior specialist seems to always want to put the dogs down, we joke in my house, "those puppies are too cute, gotta put em down." Animal cops NY seems to rehab a large percent, Houston puts down all dogs with a hint of aggression, even if they were starved for months and show food aggression, this can be dealt with as they put on weight.

anyone know for sure what show it was? i am trying to find it.

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Originally Posted by scutechute

is that the animal cops show? i hate that show - so depressing. people can do such horrible things to their animals.

I agree that it sucks that they are playing up the "dangerous" aspect of snakes. I don't understand why a channel named animal planet would be nurturing an unnatural fear of snakes by making people with snake collections look like creeps. Reaching out to a new audience???

lame.

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I don't think it's the channel, I think the animal cops in that city are just stupid. E Vet interns is always favorable to reptiles, and I have seen successful snake rescues in animal planet NY. Plus the Crocodile Hunter was great herp advocate. Remember that being an animal cop is probably not very lucrative, and these people tend to be more fur pet oriented. I think more money can probably be earned breeding herps than being an animal cop, so they don't really get the experienced reptile people (who wants to work with a bunch of people who think breeding snakes makes you crazy?)

I was watching Animal Precinct last night. This guy was surrendering his snake because he wasn't supposed to have it, and was moving.

So their snake guy shows up, and was like burmese pythons get this big, blah burmese, blah blah gets released into the wild, burmese blah, blah, blah...

Yeah, it was a great looking adult Boa constrictor. The owner was standing right there as he was talking about it too, wonder if he thought he had a burm?

Anyway, I found myself saying No Dude thats a boa. My husband just laughed at me.. saying they can't hear you, stop correcting them:)

Oh well, I try.

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Originally Posted by Microddot

anyone know for sure what show it was? i am trying to find it.

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Animal Cops San Fran

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Originally Posted by lunajl97

They had an episode a while back where I believe a medium burm, maybe 8-10 ft bit and constricted a really ignorant woman who was helping her sister and wasn't shown what to do. The woman had a rabbit in a bag, and tried to drop it in the cage, but it got stuck and she reached into the cage to pull it out, and the snake struck, and constricted her arm. Obviously her arm was much warmer than the dead rabbit, and the snake got confused. The animal police came out and wrestled it off her, and then they did a little narration on why the woman was at fault, and ultimately her sister was responsible. Aparently the sister moved, and couldnt take it, so it was left with a total novice, she wasn't instructed how to properly care for the animal, and got bit, it could have been worse, it only constricted her arm. I think it might have been Animal Cops Houston, I find that they seem much more knowledgeable, but their animal behavior specialist seems to always want to put the dogs down, we joke in my house, "those puppies are too cute, gotta put em down." Animal cops NY seems to rehab a large percent, Houston puts down all dogs with a hint of aggression, even if they were starved for months and show food aggression, this can be dealt with as they put on weight.

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I have noticed the Houston one does a terrific job with reptiles. They picked one up the other day (can't remember what it was for the life of me - we watch it at work) and he handled the snake easily and pointed out that it was "friendly" unlike the florida one where I have seen the "reptile expert" (not tha animal cop) use a snake hook on a ball python.

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Originally Posted by Kristy

I was watching Animal Precinct last night. This guy was surrendering his snake because he wasn't supposed to have it, and was moving.

So their snake guy shows up, and was like burmese pythons get this big, blah burmese, blah blah gets released into the wild, burmese blah, blah, blah...

Yeah, it was a great looking adult Boa constrictor. The owner was standing right there as he was talking about it too, wonder if he thought he had a burm?

Anyway, I found myself saying No Dude thats a boa. My husband just laughed at me.. saying they can't hear you, stop correcting them:)

Oh well, I try.

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From the way he talks the snake expert from the florida one didn't know the difference between a burmese python and a reticulated pythons - a burm they catch he refers to it as both during the show.

wow just watched that myself.

Is there an easy way to watch it online?

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Originally Posted by Microddot

Is there an easy way to watch it online?

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I don't think so, I watched it on animal planet.

dang, now i am going to have to find it somewhere.

Speaking of "deadly" ball pythons...............

AK Airlines has "special" restrictions for shipping them because according to them they are a very heavy bodied snake and you can't have too many in a bag. Uhhhhh, nevermind that I'm also shipping two blood pythons which get WAY more heavy bodied. :confused: Whoever is writing their reptile info has no clue.

I feel sorry for the guy :( I hope they'll do a rerun so I can watch it.

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Originally Posted by Jenn

There is no educating the folks at Animal Planet. It's all about shock factor and ratings. Let this be a lesson to us all. Don't let your neighbors know about your collection or you may be next.

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That's it in a nut shell.... sad that we as keepers of pretty harmless animals are branded by uneducated people who are clearly not even qualified to perform the job they have as people to be feared for keeping harmless snakes. I guess we all need psychiatric treatment because it is unnatural.... :rolleye2:

I am a cop (not an animal cop) and should be receiving my 3rd BP by 1030 in the morning today from Nebraska. I must be really messed up then!:D
Got the first one June 30th at a show. My Homicide sgt. Brother in law bought it.

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Originally Posted by JMH

I am a cop (not an animal cop) and should be receiving my 3rd BP by 1030 in the morning today from Nebraska. I must be really messed up then!:D
Got the first one June 30th at a show. My Homicide sgt. Brother in law bought it.

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Good for you! :)

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Originally Posted by SecurityStacey

Animal Cops San Fran



I have noticed the Houston one does a terrific job with reptiles. They picked one up the other day (can't remember what it was for the life of me - we watch it at work) and he handled the snake easily and pointed out that it was "friendly" unlike the florida one where I have seen the "reptile expert" (not tha animal cop) use a snake hook on a ball python.

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The florida "reptile expert" is the biggest yahoo on tv. i once saw him trying to lasso aligators, it went poorly, he used rope that wasn't stiff, so it was like he was throwing a big wet noodle at the "gator". I think they eventually caught him when some other guy was called in to help. The Houston cowboy hat guy is my favorite, he really knows his stuff, and goes the extra mile.

Did anyone see the National Geographic "Taboo: Pets"? I lost a lot of the respect I once had for NG after that one. I almost turned it off, but it was sort of like watching a train wreck. I wanted to see how bad it really got. They interviewed pet owners who were actually crazy, which just perpetuated all the myths about reptile owners. There was a woman who dressed an iguana in clothes and put it in the child seat in carts at the grocery store, and they tried to pass that off as typical exotic pet owner behavior.

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Originally Posted by desertpirate

Did anyone see the National Geographic "Taboo: Pets"? I lost a lot of the respect I once had for NG after that one. I almost turned it off, but it was sort of like watching a train wreck. I wanted to see how bad it really got. They interviewed pet owners who were actually crazy, which just perpetuated all the myths about reptile owners. There was a woman who dressed an iguana in clothes and put it in the child seat in carts at the grocery store, and they tried to pass that off as typical exotic pet owner behavior.

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...You don't bring your reptile to the store and put them in the kids seat? .... :weirdface

:P

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Originally Posted by SecurityStacey

...You don't bring your reptile to the store and put them in the kids seat? .... :weirdface

:P

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The kids seat? Geez, I bring the whole bunch and just pile them in the cart :8:. Oh you crazy people with lots of snakes, whats next? Crazy people with lots of cats? This country is just spiraling out of control if you ask me lol.:salute:

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You don't bring your reptile to the store and put them in the kids seat? ....

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:laughing: The reptiles don't fit next to the fishbowl...

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Originally Posted by desertpirate

:laughing: The reptiles don't fit next to the fishbowl...

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Oh... you own fish... crazeeee

Lol.

No kidding, lets hope animal planet never finds any of our BP breeders, lol.

I'm not surprized they said that sort of stuff though.....

They did acknowledge he was making a bunch of money later on though. The guy was like "this is a blah blah, it's probably worth blah blah. If he breeds them he could get money blah blah"


I did get mad when he said "It's kind of like you have an obsession with them, right"
Even though I only have a few...

I don't like animal planet its all about dogs and cats...I only watch it...when they have jeff corwin on hes the shiz.. man

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Originally Posted by SecurityStacey

They do such a good job of challenging myths about pitbulls, I wish they would do the same about snakes.

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i HAVE BOTH PITBULLS AND SNAKES SO I CAN PROVE ALOT OF THE MYTHS FALSE LOL sorry for the caps

Maybe none of this would have happened, if the reptile owner didn't have his snakes shipped UPS, which is against the rules? Wow.. how did it go from "this guy is getting a package with snakes in it" to "let's search the guy's house and raid it?" How did they get a search warrant? I guess that if the BPs were illegal to have shipped, maybe that is how? Like, if someone got marijuana mailed to them, and got found out.. like that? At any rate.. alot of non-hobbyists are aghast at rack-system keeping. They just don't get it, tht racks are really (at least in my opinion, and in the opinions of most professional breeders) the best way to house many BPs and other snakes. I have to explain this all of the time to people who visit us, and most leave understanding. Some like my friend, insist that it is "cruel" and inhumane to "warehouse" them.
SIGH...!

Before I owned any ball pythons but was interested in them I remember thinking that some of the people owning them were keeping them in inhumanely small cages.