Catching Tadpoles?

[Didymus20X6]

Generally speaking, the term "trolling" is typically regarded with a much more negative, mean-spirited connotation. It's less about amusing people and more about deliberately trying to annoy people. Most forums highly discourage it.

As to whether what Joe was doing can be considered "trolling" or was merely joking, that's a different matter.

[Sonya610]

Generally speaking, the term "trolling" is typically regarded with a much more negative, mean-spirited connotation. It's less about amusing people and more about deliberately trying to annoy people. Most forums highly discourage it.

Technically trolling is saying things to bait a group into some sort of excited, angry, or offtopic response i.e. trolling for sharks by throwing chum in the water.

I agree he was joking, not trolling. If he pretended to be serious and got everyone all upset THEN it would be trolling, but it was obviously a joke.

[RedSidedSPR]

I looked it up and it said otherwise...

Dang. But seriously i don't really care. If i have a snake that will only eat tadpoles or he'll most likely die, and i HAVE to scent with them, I'm gonna catch 4 or 5.

But ONLY 4-5. I don't have any intentions other than to feed my snake. And he now eats unscented guppies, so... I wont be needing any more.

Like I said guys, i didn't make the freaking 100 tads trade. So I didn't really do anything... other than keep my snake from dying.

AND TO TOP IT OFF, the few that I caught I RELEASED AFTER SCENTING. Right where I found 'em.

And heck, I didn't even know! My bad

[infernalis]

Fish and game officials read forums.

[d_virginiana]

Fish and game officials read forums.

If anyone reading this is a fish or game official, they can rest easy; the 'offenses' mentioned above happened years ago, when I was under the legal age to be charged with anything (as in, I was under 12). In addition, I recently released my bullfrog tadpole after realizing that he was contraband (just in case someone was thinking of pinpointing my exact location and doing a raid for one tadpole).

Also, if it will keep me out of prison, I will promise to in the future allow my dog to turn whatever small critters she catches inside out (which is apparently entirely legal).

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

Fish and game officials read forums.

and they don't care about small fry like us who saved a garter snake, a squirrel or some ducklings. I raised an orphaned squirrel last summer, after CALLING fish and game MYSELF, talking to an officer, telling them I had a baby squirrel and asking them what I should do with her since it's not legal to have a squirrel in PA, but that she was in need of immediate attention. I was basically given the "we will contact you back regarding this matter" and I never heard from them again. They had my full name, address and phone number. So I raised the darned thing and slowly transitioned her outside and she did just fine.

They know this kind of stuff goes on, they have bigger fish to fry. The whole argument of this thread originally was NOT the legal aspect, but the MORAL aspect... which I found strange considering multiple people on this forum have collected feeders from the wild for personal use... but suddenly it was taboo. The photos of Magma pigging out on newborn baby frogs on a floating log in a tank full of tadpole are still up on this forum from a thread in 2008. Magma wasn't even a starving baby that NEEDED the frogs and tadpoles like the blacknecks did, but I don't remember anyone jumping in to criticize how morally wrong it was. And I clearly remember you did not seem at all morally torn about it. I am not trying to argue with you Wayne, I am just pointing out that you yourself have done and probably still are doing what you are now making out to be such a terrible crime, and that you yourself KNOW it's not a terrible crime. Fish and game officials take issue with things in forums when people have a malicious intent... such as profit/smuggling/etc. They don't have the time, the manpower or the care to come after everyday folks who were just trying to help.

Seriously guys this thread should have died by now. And I don't understand why it hasn't. I thought that things were going back to normal with Joe's hilarous bit of trolling (being a MAJOR troll myself, he was, by all means, trolling, trolling does not necessarily mean you have malicious intent) Everyone who is dragging on with the whole "this is also illegal so it's not okay with me" spiel needs to just drop it... it was never an issue before and now suddenly on one thread, it is? Please examine your own life histories and if you have never crossed the law any which way I will just shut up and never post again! Is that what this forum is turning into? Let's adopt a new policy as a forum... we google the state laws when a newcomer comes to the forum with a garter snake they just saved from a cat and needs immediate help, instead of offering help we need to make sure we morally agree with everything and that it's entirely legal first? and then scold them for having the snake if it's questionable? I feel like if we followed the protocol that was used in this thread for all threads, that's what would happen. And our forum would be one heck of an unwelcoming place. Everyone would probably leave. But in theory, it would be the right thing to do..............................

[ConcinusMan]

With duck hunting season in the fall and ducklings being born in the spring, how is it that you arrived with hunter-orphaned ducklings?

Well, nobody said it was legal hunting. But I still have to wonder how one knows for sure that the ducklings in question, truly were orphaned? If I had a nickel for every time I've seen people pick up baby birds with the intention of "rescuing" them "because they were abandoned" when they really weren't...

I understand why it's a law, though I can't really say I apologize for taking a half-dead turtle from my dog, giving it a bit of neosporin, and feeding it from our garden for two weeks until it could walk again, ya know?

And I don't think anyone here feels you should apologize.

I've seen plenty of threads along the lines of 'saved this garter from my cat' where someone takes a wild animal and keeps it and gets nothing but praise. I have no issue with that (obviously) but it just seemed a bit unfair when the same law was broken in both cases, you know? I'm on the third day of no sleep and intense family drama, so I apologize if what I'm writing is of dubious logic.

Not questioning your motives or your actions at all. In fact, I would be one to pat you on the back and praise you when the outcome saves an animal. Just saying the actions of doing so isn't exactly legal and there's even a very good chance that in spite of saving an animal, you could end up doing more harm than good by interfering, depending on the circumstances.

I just think that for the most part, rescuing wildlife should be left to the people who are authorized to do so. If someone really did kill the parents of the ducklings, the best thing you could have done is call wildlife officials and report it, since ducklings are born outside hunting season, instead of taking it upon yourself to rescue the ducklings. It's a little different when you're talking about "my cat caught a garter snake" because quite frankly, they wouldn't bother with rehabilitating a garter snake so that pretty much leaves it up to you.

[d_virginiana]

Well, nobody said it was legal hunting. But I still have to wonder how one knows for sure that the ducklings in question, truly were orphaned? If I had a nickel for every time I've seen people pick up baby birds with the intention of "rescuing" them "because they were abandoned" when they really weren't...

The pond they were being raised in is on the edge of our property. We watched until it became clear that neither parent was going to return and the ducklings health was starting to fail (and also our cats figured out where they were...). Honestly, I'm not a huge bird fan, so I would ALWAYS prefer that the parents come back (...at least they weren't chickens)
You're totally right. In retrospect, the ducks really would have been better off with licensed rehabilitators, but I already mentioned that I was very young when that happened, and we really had no clue what to do. Luckily, they ended up being raised by a couple of Canadian geese that had lost all but one of their offspring. Our babies started following them around and they allowed it and protected them with their own. Apparently they new what they were doing much better than we did, as we continued to see our ducklings when they returned for many years (seriously; even now I'm surprised that particular technique worked!)

[Didymus20X6]

There's only one problem: it's so difficult for hunters to know whether it really is duck season when that blasted rabbit keeps holding up those signs.

[ConcinusMan]