Quote Originally Posted by Big Gunns View Post
BG does understand that this kind of experiment can help us, but BG's point is that it would never be done with other animals. Do you think they would do something like this with feral cats?(the biggest invasive species ever by the way)

Like BG stated earlier. The animals with the microchip are a leeetle different, but not much when they know where they are and it's freezing out. They still know the animals are suffering. No way it's done with any other animal. If it was.... BG wants to see it.... and see if it was made public while it was being done.

What we need to realize from this is. Nobody really cares about us or our snakes. People just don't care about a snake. They don't care if we have them(well they do, but not in good way), or if they suffer in death.
guns, these experiments have been done time and time again. using controled environments, animals are stressed to highs and lows to see when their bodies stop functioning and what the optimal range is for the animal. you can do these experiments for a number of factors such as salinities, oxygen concentrations and, as in this case, temps. these studies are a vital part of science especially in marine science to show how human impacts can and will effect populations of animals. you wanted an example so here is one: http://www.springerlink.com/content/w1471837v6763712/. not sure if you can open the entire article. i use a computer connected to a university network so i can get a number of journal articles.

this type of test can show some valuable information that may not become evident in a lab. it is my understanding that the animals are in a large pin outdoors. if a similar study was done indoors in a caged environment, you could question just about everything with the experiment. for example, how do you know that the animal was suffering from temperature stress or the stress from being in a cage. lab experiments can be helpful but nothing compares to the data you can get from an in situ experiments.

now, is this particular study vital to science....well maybe not. was the animal going to die anyway....YES! i said it before and i will say it again. at least the animal wasn't killed for no reason. we now will have some good information on temperature stress in large constrictors.