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Snakes stolen
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by AquaHerp on November 17, 2009
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This is from a friend who worked for me a ways back. He's a dedicated researcher and has put a lot of time and effort in to this collection. Be on the watch folks. Let's burn these lowlifes.
>>>>>
Hello everyone,
Last night, 33 montane Mexican rattlesnakes were stolen from my collection housed in Alpine, Texas. Among the snakes were Crotalus willardi amabilis, C. w. silus, C. lepidus maculosus, C. l. morulus, and C. p. pricei. Most were juveniles, except for 4 adult C. w. amabilis and several C. p. pricei. Adults were legally collected and imported from Mexico...the juveniles were offspring from these adults. Despite being in a hurry and working in the dark, the thieves knew which adult
C. w. amabilis to take...they left the oldest adults, and stole 2 adult females and 2 adult males. They also knew not to take the ESA-listed C. w. obscurus. They opened several cages containing baby C. w. obscurus, but did not take any. A police report was filed, and numerous sets of fingerprints were obtained from the glass doors on the Vision cages housing the adults. Furthermore, and perhaps more importantly, I have an extensive collection of shed skins from all snakes in my collection. You can remove pit tags and hide snakes in dark basements, but you can't change a snake's DNA. I have been saving sheds for exactly this reason (theft). I can use DNA fingerprinting technology to track both the original C. w. amabilis and their offspring (through paternity testing) when they turn up (and they eventually will...be it one week from now or ten years for now). I will also pursue filing charges in a federal court of law since these snakes were of international origin, and can be identified as such. Lastly, I have photos of most snakes (definitely all the C. w. amabilis).
Please let me know if any of you hear anything related to this theft, and pass along the news. The rattlesnake community is pretty small, and these snakes are high profile (especially the C. w. amabilis).
Thanks!
-Rob
Robert W. Bryson, Jr.
Ph.D. Candidate
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Section
School of Life Sciences
University of Nevada, Las Vegas
4505 Maryland Parkway
Las Vegas, Nevada 89154-4004
Phone: None entered Email: abyssus@hotmail.de
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RE: Snakes stolen
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by pictigaster1 on November 17, 2009
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Sounds like some one was shooting for a quick buck.Both Ray and Buzz are down there and have simmular collections.They will be cought for sure those are very high profile snakes.I hope they are found before any are lost.
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RE: Snakes stolen
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by herpboy on November 17, 2009
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Sounds to me like it may be someone you are well in touch with... They sure did seem to know exactly what they were looking for. I hate to hear this kind of thing. I hope that your animals turn up, and that next time they try it you greet them with the end of a 1911.
Sorry to hear,
Bryan
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RE: Snakes stolen
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by Cro on November 18, 2009
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It has to be a short list of potential folks who were involved.
Sounds like they knew exactly what was in the collection that they wanted to take.
How many people was the collection shown to ?
Possibly a X employee ?
Also, would probably be someone who knows how to ship them out of the country. Someone with a Delta license and connections to overseas importers, etc ?
Those snakes are too high profile to keep in this country.
Sure hope they find the persons responsible.
Best Regards
John Z
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RE: Snakes stolen
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by AquaHerp on November 20, 2009
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Ray Queen and Rob Bryson jointly owned these animals.
Not only were they valuable in a monetary sense, they were of great value from a scientific standpoint. Rob has been working for years on Mexican endemics and I beleive that these were also a part of his PhD efforts.
DH
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