Well of course.....

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Posted by MsTT on May 11, 2003 at 15:46:54:

In Reply to: Well of course..... posted by oreganus on May 11, 2003 at 15:14:18:

:Heaven for bid that anyone besides a venomoid owner could be wrong for keeping a snake in captivity. How do you explain zoos that keep elephants,girafs,whales,or any other animal that likes to migrate for miles, or how about humans inbreeding tigers to make them "that pretty white" that people seem to like so much? Are these not examples of man negatively attending to nature?

Again, I think it boils down to whether or not the animals are comfortable and well cared for in captivity. Some animals adapt very well to captivity and others do not. Some zoos and keepers treat their animals well and others do not. Some breeders are responsible and others produce a large number of sickly and deformed offspring from too much inbreeding.

: There is no way in heck you could possibly say that the animals I named above, could ever have enough space in captivity to be totally comfortable campared to life in the wild.

From what I hear at AAZK meetings there are far more serious issues with elephants than with the other two. Marine mammals would probably be second on the list, and a lot of keepers feel that they are best off in a "free contact" situation where they have the whole ocean to roam in. I understand that captive born giraffes are very well adapted however.

: Snakes are no different, but I do agree that we must make there lives as comfortable as possible, the surgery on venomoids is a good way to keep the animals safe from paranoid harm by a society that would rather see a hot snake "killed with a shovel" or ran over on the road.

Uh...if some psycho with a shovel gets into my house and tries to open my locked snake cages, he'd have to go through me first. The fact is that most people who have venomoids don't use them for education. They aren't protecting snakes that would otherwise be killed. They're taking snakes and having them chopped up so they can have a cool pet.

: You cannot say that venomoids have done no good, look at how many people have been able to be educated about venomous reptiles with the use of venomoids. It is not a fair society, if you tried to do a educational program with a hot snake, there would be very few parents that would let their children attend no matter how good the handler is.

If every venomoid in the world was done by a qualified veterinarian with proper instruments and humane pain medication, and every venomoid was seriously used for educational programs, I would have much less of a problem with the whole issue. But that isn't the reality of the situation. I wish it was.

Follow Ups:

Tanith, I am going to agree with you completely, but.... oreganus 05/11/03 (1)
- That's the problem. MsTT 05/11/03 (0)