Our encounter with Pythons.net

The fact of this post that disturbs me is that the breeder noticed that the animals was sub par prior to shipping and shipped it anyway.

Me too.

You have to give the "breeder" credit for the quick refund and honesty, the snake should probably not been shipped in that condition although it sounds like it would have gotten better care with the new owners since the breeder admits that he went away for several weeks and no one was feeding his animals.........

Thankfully you got your money back and found out it was nothing that could endanger your other animals but you should've never been put through that. I had a baby from last year that refused to eat from birth and offers of it being adopted at the adopter's risk but that animal never left my home. The same should have been done with that albino.

Has pythons.net been informed of this thread?

Much appreciated for the understanding. We couldn't help but feel guilty about posting such an issue, publicly. Stuart's reputation was quite honorable, from everything that we had seen of his past transactions. We really don't want him to take this personally, since the majority of the concern is around the animals themselves who may also have been sold with possible health issues.

Yes, the snake was listed at a very enticing offer. Upon the price, the reputation, and the slight imperfection, we were willing to give her what we think of as a good home. We didn't want to believe the whole "if it seems to good to be true" notion, so we took a chance. I know that Annie and I pride ourselves on the health of our animals and their ability to grow into a healthy environment. We just felt so helpless that we couldn't do anything for Kink. The only resolve that we would like to see out of this entire experience, is that other animals (and owners) don't have to go through any of this again.

I personally would like to believe that Stuart will do the right thing and make an inquiry into his current stock, as well as anything else that may have been sold, and attend to any potential issues that may be out there. With such a good reputation, I think he might.

Optimism at it's best.

- Liam Sevier

John, thank you for focusing on my total and complete failure to read the entire post prior to responding to it and in doing so help me to look even more retarded than I normal do if that is at all possible. With that said, (I was kidding, I like John), good for the guy refunding the money. The animal should have never left his house and should have ended up in his freezer or become a problem for his vet to deal with. I have several very anxious customers right now who have money in to me on ball pythons that I produced that have either not yet eaten or not eaten well enough to reach my standards to ship them to my customers (not that I could ship even if I wanted to as it is about -2 F outside right now). I know that those people may be troubled by the thought that the snakes are actually just figments of my imagination and that I am on some lovely sunny beach spending their money. That could not further from the truth though. I am sitting in my living room at my new house (livingroom full of boxes still) freezing my goodies off watching the snow outside laugh at me. So with all that said and done, I do not ever ship an animal until it is a monster of an eater. It makes people insane, I know. But in the end they will either be much happier with me for sending them better product or refunding their money and keeping my problem eater.

Well after over 15 years in the business and hundreds of happy customers and scores of albino boa babies I guess you make one mistake with some one and things get out of proportion. I wasnt going to post here at all but I would just like to point out a couple of things for people to consider.

1.- In my e-mail you can see I was honest and admitted the snake was thin on shipping , ok that was after the fact. She was not that bad when I took her photo and posted her for sale trust me, she was feeding and had NO PROBLEMS WHATSOEVER when I got an e-mail from Liam saying he wanted her.

2.- The same day she was received by him and after a phone call from Liam I refunded his money in less than 2 minutes and HE DIDNT EVEN ASK FOR A REFUND AT THAT POINT! I got off the phone and immediately refunded the money. I called him back immediately and said I refunded your money, if she starts eating and doing well please paypal it back to me when you feel shes doing ok. I even stated that even if she died a month from now I would still refund his money 100% and I was so confident she would do well because she was just thin before sending her out and had no other problems and I stand behind my animals 100%. And let me be honest and you dont have to believe me. She was not as bad as the photots represent when I put her in her container. She was crawling around my hands and doing well. Only thing I can think of is with two heat packs and little air in the box it made her look way worse when she got there. Trust me Liam I would not have even sent her out in that condition in the photo. Everyone here can believe that or not. I admit she looked horrible and felt very bad about it when I saw the photos. Also note I refunded the money BEFORE seeing the photos. And Liam said he wanted to talk to me first about it and NOT have to go to the BOI with a bad post and he didnt want to put anything here. I appreciated that fact.

3.- Liam called me the next day and said she wasnt doing well and they took her to the vet and euthanized her. He said they were getting a necropsy done. Told me I was endangering his 10 thousand dollar collection that the cage had to be destroyed and everything. I was like that really isnt necessary. Necropsy isnt necessary. I told him I havent bought a new animal in 3 years, I have no mites, no diseases and that the other animals were fine and that she was not showing any signs of neurological disorders at all. He told me I should want to know if I was "endangering" the herp community and I should want to know about my animals such and such. And I should be checking my animals and all this. Well I wasnt really interested in his ranting because I knew that there was nothing wrong with them or her except that I neglected to feed her enough due to traveling the last couple months. Plus this albino came from animals Ive had for 10 years! And had 3 clutches of babies with them. In fact I have animals breeding from these same parents now and so do others. There are no problems with ANY of this generation or the albinos and hets they have EVER produced Or ANY OTHER BOA I HAVE EVER PRODUCED AND SOLD IN THE LAST 10 YEARS!!! After Liam was "talking" to me he said that he didnt even want to put the results of the necropsy up on the BOI he just wanted it for his peace of mind and Documentation that was the second time he said he wouldnt post here. I never heard from him after that. I just stumbled on to this because I had a feeling it would be here.

4.- The necropsy basically says the snake was underfed/malnurished yep she was thin and thats about it. Thats why I knew a necropsy wasnt worth the money nor was I very interested in the results because I knew what they would be. However I suppose Liam not knowing me and the condition he received the snake in warranted his fears. So I understand. I shouldnt have shipped her out. I lost my job and needed to pay my mortgage which is due in the next three days. So I figured when I looked at her upon shipping yea she was thin but she will eat and do fine for him it would be worth the risk. I guess I was wrong, my mistake. Not withstanding I still have no way to pay my mortgage I still refunded the money to Liam which was 100% deserved to him. Sorry Liam I appologized before and I will say it again. But after I held the animal for 3 weeks while you tried to come up with funds, And after I refunded your money within 2 minutes of our phone conversation and after I was a man of my word in backing my animal 100% like I said I would you didnt keep yours, I didnt even ask for you NOT to put this here you offered it TWICE. You said its not personal? I have no hard feelings, I was in the wrong completely sending that snake, I appologized. But I dont feel I was treated with the same "Word" and Respect I gave to you. No hard feelings though.

so was the snake euthanized (as told to Stuart ) or was she found curled up and dead in the morning as told by the buyer?

Just wondering as it doesn't add up.

And are there pictures or the dead snake or the acutal Vet's report?

And why does the Vet's report keep mentioning swollen ankles and feet??(LOL) I would think a vets report would be more geared towards ......animals, and in this case reptiles.

I just never seen a vet's necropsy report that had such "general" information.

Also, for future references...a animal that arrives in this condition shouldn't be "handled" several times. It should be given the right temps, humidity, water and hide and LEFT ALONE.

This snake might very well have been beyond help, but to keep handling it, turning it over and around, holding it by its tail etc...well, that would be extremely stressing to a already compromised and weak specimen and should not be attempted. ESP. when funds had already been refunded.

I would like to see pics of the perished snake and the actual Necropsy report by the Vet...with letterhead and date.

AND what was it??? Euthanizia (should be on the report then) or was it found dead in the morning????

Before any conclusions are jumped to, Stuart is correct. He absolutely refunded the money without provocation. He did it completely on his own accord, and THEN he called us to let say that he had issued the refund. A clear sign of good business ethics. We felt that this individual offer was an admirable gesture and that it further stood by his good reputation. We did not ask for a refund at that point because we wanted to be optimistic. Stuart seemed so certain that she would be fine after a meal and some care, we felt like asking for a refund was premature. After all, how does Stuart know that we're not the type to claim that something is wrong, and then state that the snake died; demanding a refund, all the while, the snake recovered completely? He didn't. He went out on a limb and without question, he made the right business decision.

As with any and every single BOI thread, there will always be two sides to an issue. It's inevitable. In this case, for the most part, Stuart is correct. Every statement that he has made has been true. Upon revisiting our conversations, Annie pointed out to me that he is correct in another issue. I myself generally try to avoid excuses or backpedaling in a statement, but again as it has been pointed out by my other half, I agree that I must have said euthanasia; rather than necropsy as the reason we were going to the vet. I suppose I'll attest that to being upset at the moment, late for work, and trying to navigate Seattle traffic. Euthanasia must have been on my mind, even though it was too late for that. So yes, I made a mistake in words. I hope that will clarify any question regarding that issue.

Repfriend: The report from the vet included links to basic terms that he was describing. It was meant for us to have a more clear understanding of the terms he was using. As you can tell from the link, it is more related to common terminology (more so used for humans).

She was handled a total of three times. Once when she arrived at our place of employment. She was taken out of the packaging to verify that she was alive. Fairly common thing to do when you receive an new addition. Second time was when we arrived home, we took her out of the original packaging again to get a better look at her and place her in a cage. Hence, the images that were posted. And thirdly, just before we went to sleep, curiosity must have gotten the best of us and we wanted to check one more time to see if she was alright. This is when she had the seizure. Each incident of handling was to further diagnose (visually) any potential problems that may need to be relayed both to the breeder, and to a vet.



And now to address the issue of giving my word. Yes. Yes. Yes. Stuart is correct. I had told him, twice I believe, that I did not want to post this information publicly. I loathed the idea of starting a potential "he said, she said" issue. When it comes to business, it's a smart thing to try not to allow yourself to be influenced by the thoughts and notions of others. And this is where we must have failed. Talking with acquaintances both in and outside of the community regarding the issue, everyone seemed to have the same consensus. By not disclosing this information, we are not being honest with the community and those who may also have been or later become affected by a similar issue. Was this most likely a fluke? Something so far from the norm that it was completely unforeseen based on Stuart's reputation? I sincerely believe so. Our concern was not the business ethic. We ALL eventually make mistakes. Even after 15 years of consistent good practice, for which whether it means anything or not, we applaud Stuart on. And in spite of all of this, Stuart has CLEARLY recognized the mistake. His apology was accepted from the very beginning. Yes, it came at a high price (and not monetarily), but you cannot learn from a mistake if you do not make the mistake in the first place. This includes the mistake of making public something which was told would not be made public. Twice. I personally feel as though we may have stabbed Stuart in the back by blindsiding him with a public post directly related (negatively) to his business. Odds are greatly that this may not even affect Pythons.net. But then again, there is always the known phenomenon that 100 people can say nothing but good things about someone. All it takes is for 1 person to say something potentially negative, and people start to forget the 100 positive remarks. I guess that makes us the bad guy. Because of his apparent lack of interest in the internal condition of the boa, we felt as though this really wasn't a big deal to him. Only now is it made (publicly) obvious that this was not a normal situation for him or his business practice. We've all fallen on hard times before and sometimes the first thing that starts to go is rational thought. We've been guilty of that ourselves in times. Stuart, if we would have received this kind of concern from you over the phone, I'm sure a lot of this potential bad blood could have been avoided. We're not here to make enemies or provide public humiliation to someone, and the very thought of that happening in this case sickens us. We truly hope to avoid any negative impact to your business, or your name. As stated in the original post, our primary concern is for the animals. And the entire point of the post was a call to anyone else who had possibly been exposed to any kind of potential internal health problems.

I don't think we have any bad guys here, only people who have all lost in this deal.

I know that young animals can have their health turn suddenly. Missing a couple of meals makes a difference in babies. Shipping can exacerbate any negative condition. Stuart may have misjudged the animal's health, or mishandled the feeding schedule, but I see no indication that it was intentional.

I don't believe Annie & Liam did anything wrong. They were concerned and made responsible choices.

If Stuart was attempting to scam, he's pretty bad at it. He sees pictures that reflect an animal in much poorer condition than he believed it was in, and refunded the money with only an agreement that if the animal recovered he would receive the payment back.

Sorry for the loss of the snake. It's a terrible shame when that happens.