Connie,

Did I date you or something in a previous life?

LOL, you follow me around and argue with anything I EVER say or contribute. you sure do sound and act like a nagging X girlfriend would sound and act... however I do not recall the "good times"

She asked for an opinion, and I am giving her an opinion. Hopefully she has taken a minute to actually think about the things I am saying.

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As far as the pictures.... Sit back, relax, and seriously consider this hypothetical situation. I know it is long winded, but if you TRY you should understand the point.

You just returned from a two day trip to Daytona where you picked up two new snakes. Your good friend (Julie) comes by unexpectingly to drop off something. She has a girlfriend (stacey) with her that you don't know. You invite them in. Stacey notices one of your snakes and asks you about it because she thinks snakes are beautiful and very interesting. Stacey used to own a garter snake as a child and thinks she knows a lot about snakes. You start showing some more of your collection because she is obviously interested.

Stacey is secretly horrified. She can not believe you keep so many snakes. She thinks it is cruel that you keep them in tubs in a rack system. as you pull a few out of the tubs, she notices that a few of the tubs are soaked with urin. she sees huge logs of fecies in a few too. Some of the water bowls were empty because they had been tipped over. (Remember you just came in from out of town, and were about to go through the tubs when they came unexpectantly). Stacey thinks the smell is horrible. She can't believe you can't even afford substrate, and are using newspaper. And she sees that you just got two more snakes!!! She secretly HATES you at this point.

You excuse yourself for a second to use the restroom... while you are gone Stacey secretly takes pictures of YOUR animals, and YOUR racks... She even cracks open the poop and pee filled tubs and snaps pictures of the poor snakes. You come back from the bathroom and she just smiles and pretends that she is perfectly comfortable and nothing is wrong.

As soon as stacey gets home she downloads the pictures of YOUR stuff that she took without your permission, and posts the pictures on a PUBLIC K-9 web site that she frequents... When she posts the pictures, she openly discusses how discusting it was, and how cruel you were. She rambles on about how you obviously can't take care of all those snakes, and they are living in filth. She explains how your two young children were in the same room as the snakes, walking right past the urin soaked tubs. She suggests that you can't afford to take care of them, and that you don't have the manpower to keep up. And that you just got two more snakes when you obviously can not even take care of the ones you have already!

She tells her K-9 buddies that she is considering calling the authorities to have you checked out. Her K-9 friends agree that as long as you are doing everything right, you shouldn't have a problem when the animal Po-Po pays you a visit. So she calls to have you investigated.


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After reading this, do you think "so what! send the animal police to my house! I take care of my snakes by the book! my husbandry is by the book!!!"

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Wake up and smell the coffee.

Hopefully you have already considered this, but most towns / cities have BS local rules that you don't know about... The kind that says you can only keep so many pets in a home.... You know that you are doing everything by the book care wise, but the officer that visits you likely doesn't... however he is familiar with the rule that limits you to X number of snakes. Bye-bye snake collection.

MOST of us have way more snakes then those rules would allow. Most animal police are NOT familiar with the benefits of keeping Ball Pythons in tubs. MOST ANIMAL POLICE WOULD ASSUME VERY BAD THINGS THE MOMENT THEY HEAR YOU HAVE 30+ SNAKES!!!