jer, ol buddy ol pal, I don't know you from rendered dog food. I don't know anyone in this thread personally. I have been, in a very small way, breeding pyros for about 20 years and active here on the BOI, on and off, lol, for about a decade. I think I'm pretty good at smelling crap when someone takes a dump here.

You STINK. Seems nothing is ever your fault and everyone is out to get you, just as had been mentioned by several posters prior to your proving them correct.

One other thing, if you can't quote a source, name a name, all your crap stinks even worse and is also, like you didn't know, against the rules here. If it can't be directly attributed to an actual source, it isn't acceptable.

Seems you're a crowd of one.

Do the right thing and refund Stu his money. Then do as Tom suggested and take the snakes back into your collection and work your magic. Surely a man of your skill and knowledge can have them 100% in no time at all.

Seriously though, refund the dude's money and go away. You remind me of neal gubitz and sal tornambene. Read up on them and see what's in store for you. It's not pretty.

Olive branch accepted
 

Jerry,

First, let me indicate right off the bat that everything I will be writing here is devoid of any sarcasm, hatred, or ax-to-grind. I'm simply going to state factual information and then take your olive branch and never speak or think of you again.

First, if you were to always use the same tone and adult disposition as you showed in your post above, well, I doubt your world would the way it is right now. Having said that, unfortunately this is really the first time I've ever seen you address anyone, let alone multiple people, in such a manner. While you did a decent job controlling your tone here, it was way too late and it did nothing to address the situation that led you here.

I'll simply outline some of the things I feel (just my personal opinion, so you can listen to it or completely disregard it if that's what you'd like to do) are absolutely wrong with your written work above:

1. The first, and really only thing that should have been discussed, was your situation with Stu. However, after letting all of us know how you've needed time to collect your thoughts, the very first person you addressed was me. Not Stu, but instead, me. Stu is the one who has animals he purchased from you, animals of which 66% of them have come down with zonata disease. Now, I'll say the same thing to you here that I said over at Kingsnake; no one is sure what causes this, but it is real and having only been in his collection for ten days before the first became ill, any successful business would offer a full refund. Having said that, I even went so far as to tell Stu that if I sold snakes to someone for $3100 I'm not in the financially luxurious position of being able to sit on the money from that sales for a month to make sure all remains well with the animals; I'd have paid bills with that money ASAP. Therefore, I think it was reasonable that if you couldn't have paid a lump sum of $3100 back to him all at once, that you could have at least arranged to pay him back over time. Another option would have been to send him your holdbacks, however, because ZD is a condition that no one is sure of it's origins I think all of us would have understood if Stu simply didn't want to take any more animals from your colony. The tragic part here is that given what's transpired, and that you were found out to be finding a way to 'blast' Stu, myself nor anyone else should expect him to accept anything but a full refund now. You see, it's your actions that led everything to this point. If you had simply dealt with Stu professionally when he first contacted you he wouldn't have had to make a post on Kingsnake to ask for opinions. If you had been the upstanding businessman that you say you are, things would never have escalated to this point and you and I would still be in a wonderful silence. However, it was your apparent (once again, my opinion, not a fact) complete lack of accountability for the sick snakes that led Stu to post here on the BOI, a place where people are free to express any opinions, good or bad, that has allowed so many others to mirror the sentiments of Stu, myself, and everyone else you are saying has taken things out of context or simply have an ax-to-grind. If you had simply been a good businessman who demonstrated good customer service, all of this could have been avoided.

2. You still construct a facade for all to see where you're unsure of why we went wrong as friends, and how I went of the deep-end with a snap decision that was unfair to our friendship and you. As do you, I tire of our relationship, bad as it is now. In fact I'd prefer to never have to hear your name again. I say that not with a malicious tone, but one of being tired and having to see and hear my friends and colleagues suffer the same frustrations and anger that I have. Please, I am being clear here with you, so please listen. When you and I were chums, and you were getting animals from me, you were not my friend. I thought you were, but your actions told a completely different story. When we would speak on the phone and I told you of how I wanted my gifting practices to reduce the number of people coming into CA and taking and selling wild-caught snakes, you agreed with me. This whole argument of yours where you say I hate anyone that sells zonata is simply untrue. I don't care if you or anyone else sells zonata. What I care about are the dozens if not hundreds of zonata that are taken out of CA every year and put up on Kingsnake classifieds as longterm captives, when it's obvious they were just caught that spring (seeing that these posts are very popular on the classifieds in April and May). If my gifting practices reduces the market price of zonata to where the trip, with gas and housing, is not worth the return these people would get for selling a wild snake, then in my mind I've done a good thing. Without a good return for selling wild-caught snakes, most of the commercial people would stop coming here, and the only people you'd find looking for zonata would be the herp enthusiast (who would more than likely leave the animal in its habitat; and even if they didn't, and they stayed within their legal limit there is no problem with that). So, as I said, I have a very specific and moral reason why I gift the way I do. Also, as a resident of CA who has a non-commercial permit...that's my only option anyways. That's the only option any of us CA residents with a permit have. We are legally obligated to only gift these animals. It would be illegal for any of us to use our hatchlings for trade, or barter. Even if I were to ever move to another state though I'd still only gift my zonata (after you spend a decade working with them in a non-commercial setting, it doesn't seem proper to switch to a commercial outlook). So, having explained all of that, it should be crystal clear to you why I gift my hatchling zonata. Returning to our phone conversations, during the time when we were supposedly chums, you would retire from our conversations with a smile and a goodbye. But that's when the niceness on your part would expire. Many times I would talk with Paul an hour later and he'd inform me of how you would be blasting me for how I gift my snakes and how you thought I was doing so just to hurt you. Also, after I gifted Joe a male parvirubra, and that directly conflicted with a breeding loan you and him were going to set up together, Joe was told by your friend Doug Mong that I was your nemesis and that you hated me for my practices. All of this was occurring while we were supposedly friends. See, I had time to think about your behavior, behavior you were unaware I knew about, and that coupled with multiple comments you kept making to me regarding my gifting practices led me to believe I shouldn't allow you in my life any longer. Yes, while we were in the field herping I did take little jabs at you about how my gifting was going to impact your ability to sell snakes, but they were the jabs all herpers throw at each other when we're out in the field. If I had known you would be unable to differentiate between been harassed out of friendship or what you thought was mean-spirited behavior towards you, I simply wouldn't have made the comments. Lastly, when you made your comment about me not gifting so you could sell your snakes, coupled with the comments I'd known you'd been making to others behind my back, I made a decision. It was a decision I made, and it didn't need to have your approval. To this day I keep driving that point home to you, but I feel as though you don't understand it. For a friendship to end, or any communication between two people, it only requires one of those two people to cut the tie. I didn't need your approval to no longer be your friend; I was clear about it then, and I'm clear about it now. Your behavior, something completely in your own control, lacked the moral integrity I would like to see in my friends. So, I distanced myself and removed myself from our friendship.

3. Yes, I have deemed the eggs produced from the snake I caught and gave to you in San Mateo Co. the "immaculate conception". Jerry, here's where still to this day you haven't discussed anything that makes any sense or falls within the realm of biological sanity. When I confronted you on the forums, after a two-month period of silence, I did so because you betrayed my trust. Yes, you had still not shared with anyone information regarding exactly where in San Mateo Co. I found that animal, but you did one worse; you took an animal I gave to you, one I confided in you that you'd do no harm with, and instead created non-locale specific offspring (not that there's anything wrong with that, just as long as the hatchlings are disclosed as non-locale when they are sold or traded) that you told everyone were pure San Mateo stock that arose from an incident that no one in the history of keeping zonata has ever had happen to them before. I've asked you repeatedly to have a discussion with me regarding the biology of this incredible instance, and even did the same during our initial back-and-forth when I first called you out on it, but you refused then and chose to name call and avoid the answering the only thing that might prove your claims. Here's why I know they aren't pure animals, and I'll repeat this once again so that if you ever want to tell others why they are you can then address them with the correct biological information they should hear so they might believe your story. First, I collected well over 100 animals from the wild for our breeding study. Not once did any of them ever spontaneously produce viable eggs. Many of them would produce slugs, but that's to be expected from a female that has the proper body mass to her and has not been introduced to a female. Also, no one else has ever found a zonata out of hibernation (out of hibernation and completely devoid of any follicles or sign of having begun her reproductive cycle), not had it introduced to a male, and have received fertile eggs. That says a lot. Furthermore, I had a decades worth of first-hand breeding experience under my belt in the laboratory. For the most part we would always give females a year off between egg production in our lab. At the peak of our breeding trials we had nearly 100 female zonata at reproductive age. I produced nearly a 1000 offspring during that time. Yet, not once during that time did we ever have a female retain sperm from the previous year and produce a clutch of viable eggs the following year. We had dozens of females produce non-viable eggs when they were withheld from introduction to a male, but never once did they lay good eggs. We have however had females lay viable second clutches during the same year, even though they were not reintroduced to a male, demonstrating that sperm retention does occur sometimes over a very short period; but the number of times that's occurred is four. Four times that's happened during a period of time when hundreds of clutches were laid. Also, and most importantly, there just isn't strong enough selection in zonata for them to evolve the ability to store sperm for almost a year. It isn't easy for a female to physiologically maintain sperm so that they remain viable for over a nine-month period. Intense selection in nature would have to exist for that type of system to evolve in females. I might imagine if finding a mate might occur once in the lifetime of a female, might the small likelihood of finding another mate be strong enough selection for that type of physiological evolution to occur, but that's not the case with zonata. When you find zonata, they are usually quite dense. Third, and the final point I'll make about this, is that it was mid-April. It was the coldest and wettest year we'd had in almost a decade. Up until the day I found that female we had only had two days in the seventies, and only a few more in the sixties. The day we found her it was in the high forties, and we were getting rained on. Those conditions, from the beginning of spring, to that very day, are not the type of conditions that promote a female to begin her reproductive cycle. Furthermore, that female had just left hibernation, as we had only found I believe four to six other snakes all day in places farther south along the peninsula, places that usually that time of year produce multiple adults and numbers of snakes that fall in the thirties. Yet, it wasn't that kind of year, and very few snakes had even begun to emerge yet, as the very few we found were all juveniles and hatchlings. Even more telling was that this female had not a single follicle to speak of. I've felt for follicles thousands of times and she was devoid of any reproductive material. There is no way that she was gravid when she was found. However, the timeline from when she was found, to when you got eggs, to when the babies hatch does support a timeline of the female taking almost a month-and-a-half to cycle (this is the normal time for a female coming out of hibernation) and you introducing a male to her. Heck, I don't' blame you for doing so, as a female as gorgeous as her with good follicles would be fun to breed. What I do resent though is that you did it and didn't simply tell everyone that you produced non-locale animals. Furthermore, you went on and sold them as pure, allowing non-locale animals to be thought of as pure. The reason I'm so upset with you about this is because there will be lines out there now that are thought to be locality, but they won't be, and it's all my fault because I let you take that snake. I feel guilty because of your actions. Also, I'd like to end with this. Why, if you produced six pure San Mateo hatchlings, did you later trade Santa Ana hatchlings for three pure San Mateo males? You made that trade with the person who's collection you photographed and represented as your own (whether you were doing that to help him or not, he was in utter disbelief when he was told you did that because you never told him you were going to; furthermore, he was upset at you for doing so) because his stock was pure, and it originated from the same hillside. Why would you trade for animals you already had? You produced males in the 'immaculate conception' clutch, so why would you trade animals you could sell (the Santa Ana snakes) for animals you already had? It's because you knew the hatchlings you produced were non-locale and you wanted a male to pair with your female. To this day, all the biology, coupled with the actions of your trade for more San Mateo males, it all screams that through your actions you produced non-locale snakes. But you can't admit to that because you fought so hard at the time that it was a miracle that these babies were produced. It was a miracle that's never once been recorded in all the experiences anyone has ever had with zonata...but it happened to you? I tend to go with the explanation that makes sense both biologically and simply by the chance of that occurring. However, if you were to ever drop your story and admit your actions then everyone would know you lied and no one would trust your stock and reputation as a breeder; so instead you will simply take this story to your grave, because the cost of finally admitting the truth carries too much consequence.

4. During this time that everyone has been sharing their unfortunate experiences with you, you have found the time to discuss things with others. However, your discussions with them included harassing phone calls (phone calls that were obscenity-laced where you were screaming at the tope of your lungs, and always ended with you hanging up) and illegal threatening texts. This last part you should be aware of would never fly with me or several others here. After my second post here on the BOI, where I used part of an email that was sent to me, you contacted this person and threatened them with a text about the proximity his house is to yours and hinted at consequences to him because of that proximity. That is a blatant threat and is a felony threat in your state. If I, or others here (I presume), would ever receive such a threat, you would be in jail that very day. Threats are never to be taken lightly, especially when they insinuate bodily harm. So, regardless of how calm and adult you appear with your recent post her on the BOI, once again it's your actions that demonstrate to all of us how you truly conduct yourself. Those actions are scary, worrisome, and shouldn't be taken lightly. You are a licensed psychologist, yet you behave like the people you're paid by the state to care for. I am truly concerned for the health and well-being of many of us, including myself, as I fear you simply are not grounded in any type of reality.

Having said all of that, I want to remind you Jerry that these are my beliefs regarding you. Some of what I presented is factual and simply can't be argued. Some however, especially the stuff regarding how someone should construe and deal with the way you consistently threaten people, is how I'm interpreting the situation. They're interpretations of mine that can't be wrong, but aren't necessarily right.

I will take you up on your olive branch and once again say this: I never want to hear your name again. I never want to hear of you speaking about me, nor mentioning my name. If you do that I'll gladly let you disappear from my life like a horrible nightmare, or that wish that the genital herpes will never reappear. I was doing all of this until your post on your blog, the one that once again preceded what should really have been your focus at the time (Stu), was written by you screaming to anyone who would listen that I was out to get you and that I was the leader of the pack to destroy you. No, that's not the case. I just understand you, and I won't allow you to continually try to pull the wool over everyone's eyes. I'll stand up for what I know and believe to be the truth and I won't be sullied by your threats and lies. If you leave me alone, I'll leave you alone.

In the meantime though I'd simply advise you to refund Stu his money, as not only have you probably lost your zonata sales forever, but with Stu's pull in the gray-band community, you've probably lost that group of people forever too.

Mitch

wow im speechless!

refund stu his 3100.00 jerry, those pics say it all GEEZ!

,,,,,,,,,,,,,thomas davis

Shut the front door....that took over 3 hours to type Jerry? And still hardly address the OP? The 1st paragraph was like a care wreck. I wanted to log out but alas like that wreck I HAD to read it. As many already mentioned to Stu sending back the creatures w/o a refund is insane as would be you reselling those creatures after you "worked with them". What "scrubbed" them off til shiney and short sale before the next shed? Na. In that 3 hours the word refund never came up in your thoughts? Many of us want to know a yes or no answer to the refund and it would only take a moment really...2-3 lil letters and however long it takes to hit "post 'quick' reply"...

Lol *car not care sorry

:thumbsup: That's quite the list of viewer down there...

Why is that? If you are claiming these animals are fine, why are you calling risk? You can't have it both ways.

From reading through all of this it appears you claim you have reduced quite a bit of your collection because of wanting to help your family. If the critters you have sold/given away might be compromised, you owe it to buyers/giftees to let them know.

:iagree::iagree:

First and foremost, the negativity doesn't have to continue any further. Most of you know me by what you have heard either over time or via this thread. Those that know me a bit more intimately, well......we can agree to disagree on many things. You think I minimize my behaviors, and vice-versa. But the bottom line is that there are still misconceptions and some element of misunderstanding -- with the way most are acting here I might as well have killed someone and everybody is grabbing at the switch to execute. ANd, in quite a twisted way, enjoying it. That says something too, fyi.

Mitch, like I said....you win. It would've been nice, however, to mention that the person in question with the SM coastal snakes had ALL males on that given year, SO I HAD NO CHOICE but to take some. A couple of which were sold to help out as I'd offered and it was agreed. I kept two males as they were gifted, and I gifted in return other snakes. It wasn't even a square arrangement because I have never known, until now, that they were from the same hillside! Therefore, I was hoping to match up the two males the following year. Once again, another half-truth. I did manage to raise up a baby male from the "immaculate conception", and it's a moot point already to argue this any further. The more I say about it the more you'll throw the textbook at me. So there, I'm done with it. That female, her son, and the two males from your buddy are what remain within a small handful of zonata. As for accepting my olive branch, you did it rather back-handedly. You clearly like to write as much as I do -- all you had to do was say okay. Again we'll just agree to disagree. You've won. Let's move forward. I hope others can do the same and try to be a bit more humanistic instead of behaving in the very same manner that I am being accused of.

Despite what I wrote, which seemingly was a waste of my time, all people want to know is "are you giving him a full refund?" -- like I said, I will be working this out with Stu privately and HE can come back and report to you. My responsibility is to him, not anyone else. And sadly, because everyone is so damn impulsive it doesnt seem to be understood that I DID NOT ABANDON STU. But I also did not react as quickly as he would've liked, and in this extremely unusual situation, I wasn't about to be too hasty about anything given the variables that were present. Yes, the snakes developed a dry skin condition.......but had this been another type of snake I don't think things would've come to this the way they have. So you want it to be zonata disease? Then I guess it is zonata disease "just because" we see a single symptom DISREGARDING the quickly-degenerative neurological & motor functioning components that have NOT been seen even up until this point.

As for you BobO, you really are a piece of work yourself by demonstrating nothing more than provocative commentary the entire time. I'll tell you why there have been 14 pages of this BS -- because Stu became impulsive in not getting his immediate way and panicked thinking, for whatever reason, that I would ditch him. Nowhere was there ANY indication that I would ever do such a thing. And I would NOT have. But, of course, I'm sure you are somehow convinced that I would. You're prerogative Bobbo, but a sad one for only having met me once at a show whereby I know our exchanges were nothing short of pleasant. And you know it.

Lastly....Stu.....I have tried to call you twice and text you once this evening however to no avail. Your cell phone has a message that states that you are not available at this time. You have my # -- perhaps you could call me later on. I will be up.

That's a lot more than a yay or nay i (can't speak for the group veiwing down there) weren't askin for details of a payment arrangement) fact is Stu stated "I want a refund" and the animals are not healthy. And quite a few people were wondering.