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NC serpentarium snake at large
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by tigers9 on April 16, 2008
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Read the comments, some freaks are already using it as reason for more legislation/investigation.
Z
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http://www.wwaytv3.com/snake_gets_loose_in_serpentarium/04/2008
Snake gets loose in serpentarium
Submitted by WWAY on 14 April 2008 - 5:28pm.READ MORE: News | New Hanover County News
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Snake gets loose in serpentarium
WILMINGTON -- The serpentarium on Orange Street in downtown Wilmington has some of the worlds deadliest snakes on display.
A local couple says one of those snakes -- one of the most deadly -- got loose over the weekend.
A snake was loose inside the serpentarium Saturday. A pair of visitors says it was the deadly green mamba snake. Workers at the serpentarium say that wasn't the case.
Sina Norris and her husband got quite a scare Saturday at the serpentarium. They were looking at the exhibit for the venomous green mamba snake but couldn't find the snake.
Norris said, "All of the sudden one of the girls standing next to me said, look up top there he is and there he was on top of the cage -- the green mamba."
Norris told the employees about what she saw, and was quickly ushered into the lobby. "Ten minutes later they came back out and said that everything was fine," she said. "He said it was just a green snake."
Tannith Tyrr works at the serpentaruim. She says the snake Norris saw on top of the cage was a dead ringer for the green mamba but was harmless. She says it was a snake commonly found in our area, that a kid brought in earlier in the week.
Tyrr said, "A few days ago a young gentleman came in and was very proud of his catch and he offered us a rough green snake and I said no thank you. My suspicion is that he decided to leave it here for us and he decided that we were going to adopt it whether we liked it or not."
Norris isn't buying it. "This was not a green snake," she said. "In my opinion the green snakes we see down here are two to three foot long at the most and their slender -- this snake was fatter."
Though the cages look secure, Norris thinks the mamba might have gotten loose at feeding time.
"It is posted on the door that they feed their animals in there at three everyday, so we were in there at four so maybe they didn't secure the cage good enough after they fed them. I don't know if they did feel that one, but I see that that's the only way he could have got out."
Tyrr says every display is opened with a key, and the workers are trained to always lock the exhibits behind them. As for the missing mamba, Tyrr says Norris couldn't find him because he was hiding at the top of his cage.
The serpentarium employees say a snake has never gotten out of a display. They say it was just a coincidence that a green snake got in and was found near the mamba display.
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Snake Feeding Show
Submitted by Marta (not verified) on 15 April 2008 - 4:58pm.
I was one of about fifty people at the enjoyable feeding show at the Serpentarium on Saturday. The green mamba was not one of the snakes fed in the show. There were a lot of tipsy people in there, though, over from the beer tents and wine tastings, and you could smell their breaths. I saw the green mamba and it was in its cage. It was tightly coiled, hidden on top of the light in the cage. My son showed me the green edge of one of its coils hanging down. Otherwise I would have missed it. When the panic started about a green snake on top of one of the cage- buildings, the Serpentarium keeper ushered us out. It was done very professionally, as a precaution, since nobody really knew what the green snake was, it was so dark in there you could hardly see it. After about 3 minutes they let us back in. They announced it was only a harmless green snake, probably from outside. Meanwhile, the green mamba was still in its place on top of the light exactly as it was before. It had not moved an inch. I was amused at how two evidently intoxicated people kept looking inside the cage unable to see the snake. My son told them exactly where it was, but they still couldn't see it! I guess you might say that alcohol and snakes don't mix! By the way, we love the serpentarium, and have been there dozens of times. Good news reporting, too. My son was thrilled to be part of a real news story!
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What do they know?
Submitted by Herp (not verified) on 15 April 2008 - 2:59pm.
If this couple thinks they can tell a rough green from a green mamba due solely to one snake being subjectively "fatter" than the other, then they're idiots. Besides, how could they ascertain the species just by seeing the snake (from the bottom) several feet over their heads? The local news should be ashamed for even reporting such a story.
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The state needs to investigate the facility
Submitted by Uncle Reality on 15 April 2008 - 8:03am.
An adult green mamba is roughly twice the length of a rough green snake and will have a thicker body if it has fed normally. Unless the mamba was a juvenile, it's difficult to confuse the two snakes. Let's face it - the spokeswoman for the Serpentarium would have been a LOT more convincing if she had appeared with the rough green snake in-hand when interviewed.
The state needs to inspect this facility and ascertain if there is ANY chance of these non-native species escaping their enclosure. If this report is true, the Sepentarium needs to come clean and admit, "Yeah, we screwed up and this is what we're doing to make sure it never happens again." The simple fact is that if a snake can get out of its enclosure, it can certainly escape the building.
We don't need a local environmental disaster. The Everglades National Park now has a thriving population of pythons and boas released by people when their "pet" got too big. Guam has seen its bird population nearly eliminated by brown tree snakes that hitched a ride in on cargo ships at the end of WW II.
A Gaboon viper, native to Cenral Africa, was captured in a Chicago garage after it escaped from its owner. He had purchased it at a flea market! A few years ago, several snakes escaped from one of the many small, roadside zoos in Florida. One of them was a King Cobra, thankfully captured a short time later.
It's only a matter of time before some careless collector (or careless keeper) allows a pregnant mamba or cobra to escape and we have a growing population somwhere in the Southeastern U.S. The importation of all non-native species need to be tightly regulated and controlled.
If there's any truth to this story, the Sepentarium would do more good by admitting it and using it as a teaching tool, to discourage private ownership of these snakes.
"If we professionals can make a mistake, so can you."
(In addition to helping avert a potential eco-disaster, it might save one or two of the few dozen "collectors" who are bitten by their pet venomnous snake every year. Some bozo in Indianapolis nearly died when HIS green mamba bit him!)
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Uncle Reality, they're
Submitted by Herper (not verified) on 15 April 2008 - 7:17pm.
Uncle Reality, they're difficult to confuse for someone who knows anything about snakes. But people freak out and say that the snake they saw was at least six feet long all the time. I generally assume at least a factor of two exaggeration, and I've seen more than three: reported as five feet long, the snake was actually just under 18 inches.
I don't know why, but even unfrightened people seem to be amazingly bad at measuring snakes. I have heard countless good old boy stories about seeing six foot long diamondbacks while out hunting. I just not politely and don't say anything, but there hasn't been a confirmed six-foot diamondback seen in the wild in decades. They used to exist in the wild, but these days, with habitat destruction, ones five feet long are very rare.
In this case, there was no escape to apologize for. The snake was not a mamba. The staff there caught it and identified it definitively. The reason it was outside a cage was that it was not one of their snakes and had never been in a cage!
If you doubt this, ask any zoo you like about how many times per month they get unwanted "donations" from people abandoning animals on the grounds. It's annoying for all sorts of reasons, not least of which is you don't know what diseases it might have.
As for species invasion, the Everglades is s special case, being pretty much the only truly tropical habitat in the U.S. N.C. weather is very different. If a mamba were to somehow get out of the building, it would die the first night the temperature dropped below 50; they are tropical African species and simply physically incapable of surviving in North Carolina.
Most of the Serpentarium's collection is Central and South American species that could have walked into North America at any time in the last few million years; they're not present in the U.S. because they're not suited to the habitat.
So even if they got out of their cages, and even if they got out of the building, and even if they got out of downtown Wilmington (not a lot of good habitat at Front & Orange; how many native snakes do you see?), they couldn't invade.
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Uncle Reality, they're
Submitted by Herper (not verified) on 15 April 2008 - 6:11pm.
Uncle Reality, they're difficult to confuse for someone who knows anything about snakes. But people freak out and say that the snake they saw was at least six feet long all the time. I generally assume at least a factor of two exaggeration, and I've seen more than three: reported as five feet long, the snake was actually just under 18 inches.
I get black racers reported as cottonmouths all the time. They're both dark and don't have legs, but that's about the only similarity. I couldn't mistake them from 50 yards in bad light, but I see other people do it all the time. (A black racer is long, really thin, and moves like a olympic slalom skier. A cottonmouth a.k.a. water moccasin is short, chunky, and moves like a bulldozer. If it moves at all.)
I don't know why, but even unfrightened people seem to be amazingly bad at measuring snakes. I have heard countless good old boy stories about seeing six foot long diamondbacks while out hunting. I just not politely and don't say anything, but there hasn't been a confirmed six-foot diamondback seen in the wild in decades. They used to exist in the wild, but these days, with habitat destruction, ones five feet long are very rare.
In this case, there was no escape to apologize for. The snake was not a mamba. The staff there caught it and identified it definitively. The reason it was outside a cage was that it was not one of their snakes and had never been in a cage!
If you doubt this, ask any zoo you like about how many times per month they get unwanted "donations" from people abandoning animals on the grounds. It's annoying for all sorts of reasons, not least of which is you don't know what diseases it might have.
As for species invasion, the Everglades is s special case, being pretty much the only truly tropical habitat in the U.S. N.C. weather is very different. If a mamba were to somehow get out of the building, it would die the first night the temperature dropped below 50; they are tropical African species and simply physically incapable of surviving in North Carolina.
Most of the Serpentarium's collection is Central and South American species that could have walked into North America at any time in the last few million years; they're not present in the U.S. because they're not suited to the environment.
So even if they got out of their cages, and even if they got out of the building, and even if they got out of downtown Wilmington (not a lot of good habitat at Front & Orange; how many native snakes do you see?), they couldn't invade.
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scary
Submitted by guesty on 14 April 2008 - 7:22pm.
And just a coincidence that if you drink enough beer you get drunk?
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Geesh
Submitted by Guest445 (not verified) on 14 April 2008 - 5:57pm.
If they didn't like snakes.. They should not have gone to the snake zoo....
Just another frivilous couple looking for a frivilous law suit..AND.. reporting it to the news like babies..Geesh... get a life..
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by LarryDFishel on April 16, 2008
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Yeah, it only took me about two sentences of the article to say "I know it's going to turn out to be a rough green snake".
As for the theory that no one would confuse the two, I get people all the time at the refuge looking at the 7 foot green mamaba and saying "those are the snakes we used to catch in Florida as a kid" before noticing the label on the cage.
Same for the black mamba and black racers.
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by tigers9 on April 16, 2008
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u would be surprprised how many people can not tell which is lion and which is tiger
Z
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by earthguy on April 16, 2008
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Z,
My five year old is notorious for correcting adults at the zoo. The ignorant stranger looks at his ignorant child and says (rather loudly) "look honey - a lion". My daughter (ever vigilant and very nosy) butts in "no, that's a tiger" I blame it on the 'dumbing down of America'.
As far as John Q. Public identifying snakes - there is a case in Columbia about 15 years ago of a man running three people off the road in an effort to get his daughter to a hospital for her 'green mamba bite'. Of course it was a harmless Opheodrys. Another case in Fort Jackson had one soldier destroy another soldiers arm to suck out the venom from a 'diamond back' that had bitten him. several hundred stitches and a month of rehab later ... they told him that it was a pine snake.
If Tanith says that it was a rough snake, then that's the gospel truth.
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by Cro on April 16, 2008
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It is interesting that the article says that the cages are locking, and that the keepers are taught to lock the cages when they shut them. This would make me think that cage doors could be shut and left unlocked ?
Was the Green Mamba cage opened for feeding or cleaning that day before this incident ?
It is also interesting that the Rough Green Snake chose the Green Mamba cage to perch on top of. Out of hundreds of cages, it picks that one ? What is the statistical chances of that ? Perhaps Murphy's Law, or perhaps the Green Snake saw the Green Mamba and just wanted to play ?
And the question as to why the zoo did not bring out the Rough Green Snake to show the folks and to assure them that they saw was a harmless snake is also an interesting one. How difficult would that have been ?
Of course, if the folks touring the reptile building were inebriated from a beer and wine party as has been suggested, perhaps bringing a snake out would not have been a good idea ?
As far as the general public not being able to identify animals very well, that is very true. Last week we heard that there was a Giraffe on one of the freeways that had fallen off of a truck. After about two hours, they decided to call the animal a Zebra !
Just some idle musings.........
Best Regards JohnZ
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by tigers9 on April 16, 2008
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Cro wrote<<And the question as to why the zoo did not bring out the Rough Green Snake to
show the folks and to assure them that they saw was a harmless snake is also an
interesting one. How difficult would that have been ?
>>
When you already have any chaotic situation, bringing any snake just adds to hysteria, as some folks might not believe the snake is safe/harmless.
Billions of years ago when I got into reptiles, I (wrongly) assumed everybody on planet Earth knew that pythons were NOT venomous.
So one day I take this small 2 feet long Ball Python out of the cage and just hand it to this Asian woman my friend brought with him. I was too busy paying attention to her as I was talking to my friend, then I turn to her, and she has this horror look in her eyes, stands there frozen with this harmless python in her hands, not moving, as she is assuming she is holding a venomous snake, I felt so bad, but I learned not to assume public has any clue.
Z
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by Cro on April 16, 2008
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Humm.... I did not see anything about the situation being chaotic or hysterical.
It sounds like the folks were ushered out in a professional manner.
And it sounds like they were allowed to return quickly once the situation was under control, which is also a good thing.
However, at least presenting the harmless Green Snake to the reporter from the news paper who was interviewing the serpentarium folks after the event would seem to have been a good thing to do. That way they could have published a photo of it, and showed folks just how harmless it was.
More Musing.......
Best Regards JohnZ
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by Rob_Carmichael on April 16, 2008
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I'm a little suspicious. As someone who operates a similar facility, I'm always concerned about these types of things. Our venomous wing is always supervised by an animal keeper and we keep a very close eye on our visitors but it also gives us a chance to educate people in a personal manner. Something is not adding up but its not for me to judge. If it were me, I would have shown the folks the "rough green snake" just so that they knew it was harmless and then use that as an opportunity to teach them about the local herpetofauna of that area. By rushing people out of the area puts up a red flag. There's a huge difference between a rough green snake and a green mamba - even to the casual observer. Hopefully, nothing bad will happen from this. If a young boy dropped it off, it might be possible to track him down. Who knows.
Rob Carmichael, Curator
The Wildlife Discovery Center
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by tigers9 on April 16, 2008
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http://www.wwaytv3.com/snake_gets_loose_in_serpentarium/04/2008
<snip>
As a matter of fact....
Submitted by Tanith Tyrr (not verified) on 16 April 2008 - 1:11pm.
Of course the state has inspected our facility. Our display cages are molded of a single piece of poured material, usually concrete, and it was obvious on inspection that there is no way out.
I have responded to hundreds of emergency snake calls, many of which were initiated by police officers, people who are supposed to be able to observe and report factually even in "scary" situations. Snakes are consistently reported as "six foot long rattlesnakes". Sadly they always shrink to 2' or 3' and change their species by the time I arrive on the scene. I wish that I could actually catch the six foot long rattlesnakes that keep getting reported by terrified homeowners, but unfortunately it is pretty well inevitable that any report from a non-herpetologist involving snake length is not going to be accurate. Please feel free to verify this with anyone who does nuisance wildlife removal. Snakes are *always* six feet long when reported by scared people.
If the snake the lady saw was six feet long and robust, it was neither our green mamba nor the green snake. The sole specimen of Eastern green mamba we have on exhibit is juvenile male who weighed about 200 grams on his last vet exam. He is nowhere near six feet long, and he's quite a slender little boy. The rough green was decently well grown for its species, but they don't get six feet long either.
I was working in the back at the time of the incident. I had just finished vet care rounds and was on my way out. When the green snake was brought to me in the back, my first thought was concern for the frightened animal, and my second thought was that it was funny and sad at the same time that such gentle and delicate little creatures were hated and feared so much that they were seen as six foot long giants with fangs dripping venom. So many harmless snakes are brutally killed by people who feel that way that my sympathy is entirely on the snakes' side. A quick exam showed that the animal was in good body condition and not sick or injured, so I put it back in the wild where it belonged.
Had I known that people were that terribly upset, I would have first pushed through the crowds to find the people in question and asked them to hold up a tape measure to the snake so they could see how big a "six foot long snake" really is when it is in the hands of a competent herpetologist and not in the eyes of a terrified ophidiphobe. However my job is animal care, and there was a stressed and frightened animal in my hands who needed my help to get back home. I did my job and cared for the animal's need first.
It is unfortunately very much routine that people dump wild snakes at the Serpentarium whether we want them or not, though usually they have the courtesy of leaving them in a bag or a box. We refuse them and ask that they be put back in the wild where they belong, but some people decide to leave them anyway.
Zoo Atlanta calls these "back-door donations". Ask any curator at any zoo in the world and they will tell you the same thing - kids (and adults who should know better) constantly bring in wild snakes with the idea that the zoo wants them. Sometimes they don't even bother asking first, or they don't respect it when they are told that the snakes need to be left alone in the wild. Packages get left and we have to deal with them as best we can.
What I was guilty of is just not taking the situation terribly seriously. When you have a delicate little green snake in your hands that you were told that people were mistaking for a six foot Eastern green mamba, when you don't even HAVE a six foot Eastern green mamba, I'm afraid it's mostly rather funny. At this point I regret not keeping the evidence, but my concern at the time was for the comfort and welfare of the snake, not the fears of people who kill the poor little things for no worse crime than being "scary". I wish I had taken the educational opportunity.
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<snip>
Hindsight is 20/20
Submitted by Tanith Tyrr (not verified) on 16 April 2008 - 7:09pm.
Here's a reality view of what it's like being the curator of a reptile zoo and managing the health of a large collection.
Every week, especially in the summer, we get snakes dumped on us whether we want them or not. Some we cannot release to the wild either because they need rehabilitation care or because they are exotic pets. We do not have the space to house and care for them all, even if we could just start keeping them in the same area as our zoo collection.
Quarantine is an important principle in managing any animal collection. An animal that comes in from the outside cannot be kept anywhere near zoo animals, as they can carry parasites and diseases that may be harmless or dormant in them, but deadly to a different species. Even if we did want to keep wild snakes, which in most cases we most definitely do not, they must be quarantined for at least 90 days and preferably longer before they can be introduced to our collection. We have very limited quarantine facilities. Quarantine areas must be well separated from anywhere zoo animals are kept, ideally not even involving the same air flow. They should be vented to the outside. They are rather expensive to build and few zoos, even the largest, have more than a few quarantine rooms.
When a wild snake is brought to a zoo, the person bringing it is generally asked to put it back in the wild immediately. We do not want the snake and we do not want to risk the health of our zoo animals. If they do not respect our wishes and leave a "back door donation" anyway, as any zoo will tell you is not uncommon, we put uninjured wild snakes right back in the wild where they belong as quickly as possible to avoid contamination in either direction. That is standard policy, not just at the Serpentarium, but at all zoos with health management and quarantine protocols.
Those are hard line facts that are true for all zoos. If you do not believe they are accurate, please feel free to confirm them with any other zoo.
I know it is wrong to make light of the fears of others, but when you get handed a 3' green snake that your fellow zookeeper says got mistaken for a 6' green mamba, it's a bit hard to take very seriously. I had no idea that the situation would be escalated quite this far. If anyone plays that sort of prank again, I will make quarantine space in my own bathroom if I have to (and I guarantee that I will have to since we really don't have the room) to keep hold of the evidence.
I am sorry the woman was so frightened, and I am very unhappy with whoever thought it was a good idea to release a wild snake inside our museum. It scares our customers and is a potentially dangerous vector of disease to our animals. I don't know if it was the same "backdoor donation" we turned down earlier in the week, or an irresponsible prank during the Azalea Festival, but either way it didn't turn out to be very funny.
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RE: NC serpentarium snake at large
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by MattHarris on April 16, 2008
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Having visited Cape Fear Serpentarium many times, I can attest to Tanith Tyrr's emails. The cages there are very secure and likely, some of the best designed in the US.
Rob, this facility is really not similar to the Wildlife Discovery Center..your facility uses much smaller pre-fabricated enclosures (e.g., 24-36" Vision cages) that are much easier at verifying the presence or absence of an animal, whereas the enclosures at CFS are more naturalistic habitat vivaria measuring on average about 8' across by approximately 6-14' deep. These massive enclosures are by far the most naturalistic and professional looking enclosures in the US...save possibly for the Jungle World Exhibit at the Bronx Zoo and the traveling exhibits designed by Clyde Peeling's Reptiland. While, it would be difficult to mistake the location of a green mamba in its exhibit, a tiny rough green snakes sitting on top of the enclosure would be tough to spot.
Notwithstanding the possibility of an escape, one can't forget the escape of a green mamba (OUTSIDE of the reptile house at the Jacksonville Zoo) several years ago.
Cape Fear is a top notch facility AND has been under scrutiny, primarily BECAUSE it is a privately run facility, run by one of the leading private herpetologists of the modern era and in a highly desired real estate area of Wilmington.
MH
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