Quote Originally Posted by Jhill001 View Post
I agree with Deborah, I keep my snakes in naturalistic setups in aquariums and this is something that some keepers really frown upon, the same people who think it's a death sentence to keep lizards on anything but paper towels.

I don't want to make it sound like I'm accusing you of this, but It would come off better if you at least had some photos of examples of acceptable setups. If anything I'd give the discount for a picture of a thermostat. If they have one of those then it's likely they have done their research into whichever "style" of setup they want and can keep a ball python alive.
A thermostat is pretty much what I'm looking for. I understand that people have different ways of keeping animals and I respect that. I can see now from the customer's point of view though they don't know I am accepting of different ways to keep animals and as such might be a little defensive. I'm trying to find a way to pass along a discount for them providing me with some evidence that my babies are going to good and prepared homes. By giving me a pic of the setup, I know that someone isn't just taking home one of my babies and throwing it into a tank with a screen top with no heat or a heat rock or a heat mat with no thermostat and sand as substrate or something. I understand that someone could lift a picture off the internet but even then, at least it shows me that they have seen what a proper setup should look like and maybe inspire them to further look into how to do their own.

This is partially inspired by an incident from a past customer of mine who oddly enough was a vet tech. It was awhile ago, but I felt horribly bad for this person (and guilty myself for not probing more about the setup he was going into). They really did care for the animal (they called me to let me know and they were literally sobbing), they just honestly didn't know any better. They asked if I would be willing to sell them another like the one they had so, I went through the steps of what they needed to do to prevent it from happening again which they understood and (although I'm sure many would disapprove) I even replaced the one they bought with a multi-gene animal that was a relative of the one they had (once they were clear on the heating situation and promised me that they would fix the problem) free of charge. I know that was a lot of "they's" but I do not wish to name this person, as I believe they have learned their lesson the hard way. So now, I'm just trying to think of ways to hopefully prevent something like that from happening again in the future without prying too much or looking like a jerk.