People against wild caught Garters

[PitGirl89]

How do you guys deal with this? I've barely had my Garter for a week and a lot of people are already down my throat about "Whats wild should stay wild" blah blah blah. For the most part I agree... I agree when it comes to morons keeping pet lions and tigers... but here where its illegal to breed and sell Garters, I didn't have a lot of options. I didn't go looking for this snake, I wanted a Garter, but I just happened to stumble across No Feet and having had all of the materials to house and properly keep her already at hand, thought that it was a good oppurtunity. Its just frustrating, the only thing I can tell them is that there aren't any Garters readily available for sale here and that No Feets odds for survival in the wild weren't exactly in her favor... Atleast in my care I can guarantee her a healthy and safe from predators life...

What do you guys tell them? I imagine there has to be a handful of them everywhere...

[guidofatherof5]

I haven't run into much of that. I wish I did.
I get the "I kill everyone of them I see, how could you keep one of those in your house".
I'm not keeping 1

[Millinex]

I think it really depends. For a first keeper in a lot of situations taking a single garter (not a gravid female) is perfectly ok. I grew up collecting them around my town, and to this day I take wild garters. I do however make a point to take from only certain areas. I will take snakes from being killed, or from construction areas. One of the parks I herp is doing some new construction so I collect there, because snakes that are moved and relocated do so poorly I would rather care for it than it die.

[brain]

I haven't run into much of that. I wish I did.
I get the "I kill everyone of them I see, how could you keep one of those in your house".
I'm not keeping 1

Good 1 ...hehe

[Didymus20X6]

because snakes that are moved and relocated do so poorly I would rather care for it than it die.

Really? I've been catching snakes around the neighborhood and relocating them so the neighbors won't kill them. I've been taking them to a little stream about 10 miles away, where there's plenty of woods, and I'm sure far enough away from people. I'm hoping my efforts haven't actually put the little guys in any danger.

[PitGirl89]

I get the "I kill everyone of them I see, how could you keep one of those in your house".

I'm sure I'll run into that shortly enough as well. You know what they say... Ignorance is bliss.

[bkhuff1s]

.... in area where a specific species is thriving I don't see a problem with taking a couple out of the wild population. In all honestly a few hundred years ago they were probably hunted by humans for snacks.

[wolfpacksved]

Collecting a few WC animals is nothing compared to habitat loss. Snakes have the odds stacked against them from the day they begin to crawl. Humans, predators, pet trade all take their toll, but habitat loss decimates populations more than anything.

[drache]

I think it is a matter of degree
when someone takes one or two to keep as pets and/or propagate, I see nothing wrong with it, as long as the population is healthy
it does bother me a lot when people take a bunch to sell them, or a lot of gravid females, regardless of how healthy the population
some of these people are just uninformed or thoughtless, and don't realize the potential damage, but some are plain greedy bastards who don't care about the animals
I imagine that the ones that gravitate to this forum are less likely to be in the latter category

[Stefan-A]

Collecting a few WC animals is nothing compared to habitat loss. Snakes have the odds stacked against them from the day they begin to crawl. Humans, predators, pet trade all take their toll, but habitat loss decimates populations more than anything.

So why do it? To get a snake for free? That it's not as damaging as habitat loss, is not really a justification.