CornSnake in the wild.... :)

Originally Posted by bfreewally1

I was just stating my opinion. It also much colder in north fl. than s.fl. where I live..It never freezes here, and that brings the chances of survival down. At least try to keep it til the spring and let them grow up in warm weather...

Considering that the natural range of the cornsnake is all the way up to just south of New Jersey, I think they'll do fine and dandy.

Originally Posted by bfreewally1

If those captive bred morhs could talk they would say, Please don`t release me! Give someone a chance to let me live..

I'm sure they'd have more to say than that! haha and I'm pretty sure rich wouldn't lie about finding a wild lavender motley or whatever it was on his property.. just sayin'..

Originally Posted by RobbiesCornField

Considering that the natural range of the cornsnake is all the way up to just south of New Jersey, I think they'll do fine and dandy.

I haven't repped anybody in weeks, but apparently that's too often.. sorry! haha

Originally Posted by dave partington

I'm fresh out of pandas.

Bummer! We need a panda!

I have yet to see bfreewally1 ever post anything of use or intelligence. Apparently the trend continues.

And on the topic.... ceduke and I have decided that we need to visit you sometime in the near future and go herping on your property, Rich. :P I promise to only take home any charcoals I find. *giggles*

I have to admit...it'd be pretty darn cool to find a motley lavender in my yard. While I am pretty sure some will succumb to predation, some will make it. At least Rich gave them a shot at survival. It is also important to note that nobody is "messing" with mother nature. Most of the mutations discovered in the cornsnake genepool were already presesnt. They just had better odds of expressing themselves in smaller populations (collections) than in the wild. Think about that....dude.

Originally Posted by Shiari

And on the topic.... ceduke and I have decided that we need to visit you sometime in the near future and go herping on your property, Rich. :P I promise to only take home any charcoals I find. *giggles*

Only if I don't find them first! But I will pay for them in slave labor if I do.

Originally Posted by bfreewally1

Odds are all your released snakes will die. It`s cruel. Let the wild ones live there and stop trying to change mother nature. Sell them and make a few bucks. Morphs don`t do well in the wild. Maybe one in a million will survive..

Do you have any facts at all to substantiate a wild claim like this? Any studies you have done, or perhaps even a quote from someone who actually has done such a study?

Originally Posted by bfreewally1

If those captive bred morhs could talk they would say, Please don`t release me! Give someone a chance to let me live..
"The chance of them surviving are like hitting the lotto.. I think the photo is a scam anyway unless it was recently released and found again.

Yeah, right.... Open up a cage with a corn snake in it and watch what happens. And again it appears you are just pulling a statistic out of your nether regions that you most certainly can't substantiate..

As for the photo being a scam, if you ever call me a liar again, I will boot your ass out of this site so fast that it will make your head spin.

Originally Posted by bfreewally1

I was just stating my opinion. It also much colder in north fl. than s.fl. where I live..It never freezes here, and that brings the chances of survival down. At least try to keep it til the spring and let them grow up in warm weather...

Obviously you know absolutely nothing at all about the natural history of the corn snake. Matter of fact, so far from your postings within this thread, I'm having trouble finding anything at all that you have stated that contains any facts at all.

I know I shouldn't speak my mind on this, but I just can't resist regardless of how unpopular my opinion is going to be. I frown on this practice of releasing captive snakes, especially morphs. If the property is completely isolated in such a way that these snakes can't eventually spread their genes throughout the surrounding populations (essentially an outdoor enclosure) I can live with it. I'm pretty sure that's not the case here though.

Rich, I'm not trying to be disrespectful and hopefully you won't take offense to this and ban me forever, but since you've posted it so publicly I thought a public rebuttal would be appropriate. This is a forum after all and hopefully I can express my opinion in an appropriate way whether it's in line with yours or not. This is your site and plenty of people here look up to you and try to follow your example in the realm of snake keeping. That much is obvious from this thread alone where so many members have praised your practice of releasing your snakes. I can't imagine anyone here would honestly be praising Joe Nobody if he posted that he released his trio of amel stripes and found two again behind his house years later. It's a different situation if you, Don, or Kathy make such a claim though because so many people look up to you herpetocultural celebrities and assume you must know what you're doing if snakes are involved.

I acknowledge that a large part of the way I feel is my personal opinion since I feel that natural herp populations should be as undisturbed and...well, natural as possible. I won't say that many of the morphs released will not survive, since I feel like a decent percentage would based on my personal herping experience. For a short time I cared for a wild caught albino ringneck snake that was discovered in my region. There are also many examples of albino, leucistic, etc snakes being located as adults in the wild. Sure it can hinder them in some cases (bird predation especially comes to mind since birds orient to prey visually) but not every snake that looks different is more prone to predation. If you disagree, consider how much time they spend concealed under cover and how many predators locate snakes largely without the use of vision. Kingsnakes would be an example since they follow scent trails to locate prey.

The point I'm trying to make is that some of these snakes will survive and reproduce with each other as well as the naturally occurring snakes. There's also the question of the purity of many captive corns. Creamsicle descendants would have some emoryi influence, ultra morphs may pass on gray rat influence (depending on your thoughts about the origin of this morph). There are also negative traits like stargazing to consider-these could be introduced to wild populations through release of captives. I'm fine with hybrids in captivity, but many people aren't. Where are all of these purists now? If they're so outraged that future generations of captive corns might not be completely "pure," should they not be more offended that future generations of wild corns could be tainted?

Basically, this is needless meddling in my eyes. Even if it leads to nothing other than a fair proportion of corn morphs being produced in the wild, how is it ethical to tamper with the wild stock based on what one person enjoys on his property? Unless contained somehow, these snakes can easily spread and, given enough time, perpetuate genetic anomalies over a much broader range. It could take decades or longer, but what if the entire state of Florida eventually became such a genetic hodgepodge due to the release of captive corns that only half of them appeared normal (and many of those normals would be hets) and the other half was a mix of various mutations? It may be unrealistic to expect such an outcome from one breeder releasing some snakes, but we don't know how many have been released. It could be hundreds or more. Also, imagine what it would do to the captive breeding market if anyone could go out on a collecting trip and snatch up a butter motley or a striped charcoal for free.

There's also the domino effect to consider. If ignorant breeders look at this example Rich has set and think it's such a cool idea, why wouldn't they follow suit and do the same thing in their areas (magnifying the effects of this practice)? Some here might take offense to my use of the word ignorant, but unless you have a background in ecology, you really don't know the possible effects such an action could have. Personally I have a master's in biology which I acquired in a lab focusing on herpetological natural history. I don't claim to be an expert on the possible effects of releasing these snakes, but I have enough knowledge to understand that these actions WILL affect the natural populations in the area, and potentially in a negative way.

Even if every snake released was a locality animal descended from stock collected on that property, releasing them in sufficient numbers would affect the carrying capacity of the ecosystem if nothing else. On that note, can anyone provide a single example of humans tampering with an ecosystem that was beneficial? If so, make sure it wasn't in response to a previous man-made change in the ecosystem (repopulating wolves that were extirpated by humans, etc). That's how I feel and I welcome any thoughtful, informed counterpoints.

Just answer a rather simple question for me Kevin. What exactly is mutation and what is it's assumed purpose within a species?