Friends -- I am a raptor guy, not a herp guy, though I did inadvertently rescue a gopher snake once from a red-tailed hawk because the hawk saw me and dropped its uninjured prey and flew off while I took a moment to photograph and admire the snake. And I have found many snake skeletons under hawk nest tree;: I believe that hawks pick the meat off the bones and often discard the entire skeleton with ribs often intact to the ground below the nests. One other connection between me and herps is that I visit the East Bay Vivarium in Berkeley, CA occasionally to obtain feeder mice (they sell dark brown, natural looking "jumbos") for raptor trapping and I enjoy the incredible collection of all sorts of snakes, lizards, tortoises, etc. and at emporium of herpetological commerce.
And that brings me to an observation or two -- I believe it is correct for me to saw that possession of some native herps is legal, even in California. Whereas it is illegal to possess (without special permits, such as falconry, rehab, banding, etc.) any native bird including raptors in California or other states. When I hold a captive red-tailed hawk which I may have trapped for falconry or for banding, I always feel and sense the reptilian ancestry of those birds. Scaly legs, reptilian head shape, talons like giant toenails, etc., really make me see that I am holding or interacting with a product of evolution that held reptiles as evolutionary ancestors of these big birds. Yet no one, including the government, cares if I hold a fence lizard without a permit, but if I were to capture a hawk without a permit, or on an expired permit without awareness that the permit had expired, I could be subject to prosecution. In fact, the local game warden did attempt to prosecute me once for banding raptors on an expired scientific collecting permit, but the court threw out the case because the evidence showed (in my view) that I was unaware that the permits had expired after the same game warden had investigated me and (mistakenly) told me my papers were in good order. In Australia, falconry is completely illegal. An Australian teenage kid cannot obtain a native raptor and fly it at game. In the U.S. there is a minimum age for beginning falconry, but once that age is reached, if you obtain a permit you can trap a wild kestrel or red-tailed hawk and start off a career as an apprentice falconer. Why do we have the disconnect between possession of reptiles versus birds? Some of it is no doubt to the fact that in prior generations there was a feather trade in wild birds, and protection laws were written to take commercialism away as a threat to wild birds. But, somehow I have to suspect that there is also a disconnect in the cultural attitudes towards reptiles versus birds. People relate to birds, relate to the beauty of birds, and thus want to prevent other people from possessing or harrassing birds, including momentary possession such as capture for the sake of admiration. Reptiles seem to be lesser regarded. Sometimes they are feared, but many peopl, including young kids, know the difference between threatening species and non-threatening ones. When I was about ten years old and living with my familiy in the Houston, Texas suburb of Deer Park I caught a wild hog-nosed snake and made a pet of it. I named him "Dennis" and I caught frogs to feed him and I kept Dennis till I got tired of him and eventually let him go back into the vacant field across the street from where I lived. I knew which snakes were poisonous and which ones were not-- that is why when I saw our little six year old neighbor John David carrying a small snake which turned out to be a coral snake (red/yellow kills a fellow) I got him to quickly let the snake go and John David was not bitten by it despite it curling around in his fingers. What would I think if I saw a television show from some other country where someone like me went around the world trapping raptors or invading their nests and mugging for the camera while displaying them for kids to enjoy and admire? What if it were perfectly legal to do so? If there was a talent search for someone to perform in such a show I might be the perfect candidate because I have a huge amount of experience in raptor trapping at all times of year, with many types of traps and many species that I suspect relatively few people in the world can match. But I think I would have to turn it down, even if it stood to make me millions of dollars and made people think I was a heroic conservationist. And I would not do it with snakes or reptiles either, though some people obviously still do and a visit to the television program guide proves it. But I am just talking me and snakes and birds. Other people will do what they will and justify it within the parameters of their own culture and belief systems. It intrigues me though, that so many people are very protective of birds and not so much of their reptilian forebears. Cheers! Stan Moore San Geronimo, CA [EMAIL PROTECTED]
