MIKE FEZDEN

My only concern with Mike is that he does not quarantine new purchases. He recently bought a very distinctive looking ghost motley that he immediately paired up with a palmetto corn snake.

A) only bought the ghost motley female so I could get a clutch of het palmettos from her this year.
B) had her long enough to trust that she was healthy.
C) my snakes not yours.

For you to even think that Id risk my whole collection for one project is pretty stupid. Ive been around long enough. Just because every snake doesnt get quarantined for half a year doesnt mean anything.

Bob has proven out to let's say be quite unsavory and childish.

Mike, some advice just as a person who reads lots of BOIs and gets first impressions. Megan's post could have been intended as or not defamatory, but in your response you should just state the facts and leave out the "my snakes not yours" and avoid any sort of directed comments.

Not flipping you mud or anything just without those things it comes off much more professional and makes you more appealing to potential customers. (Not saying be fake, just avoid any personal feelings and go fact and information only, emotion it offense while understandable can still rub a bit).

Again not criticizing you just my personal perspective to do with or nothing with as you wish.

The "my snake not yours" part was, to me, a brief way of saying it was his animal to take a calculated risk with within his plans for breeding strategy and therefore solely his call to make.

The numbers for "bare minimum" and "should have" are arbitrary, too. Why 30 and not 29 or 31? Why 90 and not 80 or 100? People picked numbers they felt were applicable and other people repeated them until they became common by that parroted repetition. Unless they link up with particular incubation periods and specific lags for presentation of symptoms of disease, the numbers are really pulled out of cloacas. That does not mean there is a deep basis to the particular numbers people espouse, so things like a stated minimum do not necessarily have the weight to them that many assign. The guiding principle for a quarantine period to be implemented is very sound, but it is up to people to make those timing choices in practice. Sometimes the choices bear out as sound and other times they bear out as unsound. Proof is in the effect. If Mike took a risk and both he and the snakes won, then they won. If there had been an issue, Mike and the snakes would have paid for it. That is what I consider to be the more extensive meaning in that short statement, but I got that from his words without him having to say all of that like I just did. He could have made it less brief and more gentle, but we are different people with different styles of communication.

I've dealt with Mike before and would not hesitate to do so again. I would love to have that leucistic hognose he has but I'm not asking him to prove it to be what he says it is, because I can't buy it.

I've had people buy hogs from me and send pictures the same day they received it, mating with one of theirs. To each his own, I would not do that. If I receive a snake and don't feel comfortable with its health, it won't even make it to my quarantine rack. I'm sure Mike would not endanger his collection it he felt there was a risk.

You had her for a *week*. That seems a very short time to trust that she was healthy. There is always, always a risk and that's the purpose of a quarantine; to help reduce that level of risk by waiting to see if the stress of shipping will cause anything to show up.

My post was definitely not intended as defamatory, but as an alert for buyers who might actually care about the quarantine practices of the people they purchase from. If buyers want to take that risk, then that's fine. But they should know that you don't quarantine.

Originally Posted by Shiari

You had her for a *week*. That seems a very short time to trust that she was healthy. There is always, always a risk and that's the purpose of a quarantine; to help reduce that level of risk by waiting to see if the stress of shipping will cause anything to show up.

My post was definitely not intended as defamatory, but as an alert for buyers who might actually care about the quarantine practices of the people they purchase from. If buyers want to take that risk, then that's fine. But they should know that you don't quarantine.

I'll quarantine the same no matter the source - everyone has their own method and acceptable level of risk. That said, a picture of the animals locking a week after one arrives doesn't necessarily mean he's putting an entire collection at risk. Mike could just as easily have added the palmetto animal into quarantine and will treat both animals, and ensuing eggs, as new acquisitions.

To be honest, in the private sector "quarantine" is mostly a bad joke anyway. Unless you have separate buildings and use totally separate tools and disinfect your shoes/clothes or change clothes totally before going from quarantined animals to the established collection animals then you're going to transfer some kind of biological material between the animals one way or another.

Putting animals in another room or just washing your hands between cages isn't doing squat to "quarantine."

That being said.....sticking a snake you've had for a week with a high dollar snake to breed purely for monetary purposes shows the inclination that you're about the dollars and not the animals' well being at the heart of it. You're right.....its your snake to do what you please, and if you post your actions on public message boards or social media then you may have to answer to opposing viewpoints. Don't like it, keep it to yourself.