# Some more politicians killing snakes



## RoryBreaker (Mar 28, 2019)

https://www.news.com.au/technology/...e/news-story/a847a1438d4a10b4835cf6f59d5e20e4
[doublepost=1553745516,1553745139][/doublepost]And while we are at it, lets not forget this chestnut.

https://www.aussiepythons.com/forum...lls-snake-and-posts-photo-on-facebook.223332/


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## Yellowtail (Mar 28, 2019)

I live for the day one of these redneck neanderthalls gets prosecuted for killing protected wildlife. Where are the Greens, they should be all over this rather than their anti coal, anti civilisation bullshit.


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## Sdaji (Mar 28, 2019)

Yellowtail said:


> I live for the day one of these redneck neanderthalls gets prosecuted for killing protected wildlife. Where are the Greens, they should be all over this rather than their anti coal, anti civilisation bullshit.



The day you live for will never come. What they're doing is not illegal. If you believe a snake poses danger to humans or domestic animals, even if you are wrong, it is legal to kill it. In virtually all countries (other than the ones which openly let you kill anything you want any time), this is the law. I don't think any country in the world has a ban on killing snakes even if you think they pose danger.

In terms of what the Greens should be doing, coal is necessary for the economy and civilisation but bad for the environment. Coal is a very consequential thing. Killing a snake is environmentally irrelevant and generally of no safety consequence. Removing the snake by killing it does increase safety, there is some risk in killing it, decreasing safety. Most snake enthusiasts believe in some myths, and the vast majority of the world believes in other myths, and the truth is somewhere in between, but probably closer to what the vast majority of the world believes (I love the way herpers say that the snake poses no danger and there is no safety benefit to killing it, but also, in the interests of your safety you should pay a snake removalist to remove it for you! Pick one, you can't have both)


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## Herpetology (Mar 28, 2019)

Yellowtail said:


> I live for the day one of these redneck neanderthalls gets prosecuted for killing protected wildlife. Where are the Greens, they should be all over this rather than their anti coal, anti civilisation bullshit.


In their village houses with all the other snake haters


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## TheRamiRocketMan (Mar 28, 2019)

Why no beat every stray dog you meet to death? Dogs kill far more people than snakes do, plus they're not even native.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 28, 2019)

Sdaji said:


> The day you live for will never come. What they're doing is not illegal. If you believe a snake poses danger to humans or domestic animals, even if you are wrong, it is legal to kill it. In virtually all countries (other than the ones which openly let you kill anything you want any time), this is the law. I don't think any country in the world has a ban on killing snakes even if you think they pose danger.
> 
> In terms of what the Greens should be doing, coal is necessary for the economy and civilisation but bad for the environment. Coal is a very consequential thing. Killing a snake is environmentally irrelevant and generally of no safety consequence. Removing the snake by killing it does increase safety, there is some risk in killing it, decreasing safety. Most snake enthusiasts believe in some myths, and the vast majority of the world believes in other myths, and the truth is somewhere in between, but probably closer to what the vast majority of the world believes (I love the way herpers say that the snake poses no danger and there is no safety benefit to killing it, but also, in the interests of your safety you should pay a snake removalist to remove it for you! Pick one, you can't have both)


Many may not want to hear/read it but it's the truth... I work with primary producers, cattlemen and farmers and I'd hear of 20+ RBB snakes and browns getting shot with shotguns every week up here. No exaggeration. Snakes are not wanted in, around or anywhere near these folk and their stock. No amount of talk will change their minds... after all, talk is cheap when some of these folks are in for 15k on their prized working dogs and much much for for horses and livestock.


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## Yellowtail (Mar 29, 2019)

That's the ignorant attitude that caused the extinction of the Thylacine in Tasmania. Why is it that cattlemen and farmers have learned to co-exist with crocodiles which are a far greater danger to people, stock and dogs yet have this primitive attitude with snakes? RBB's are no threat to horses, stock or dogs other than stupid terrier breeds that just attack anything that moves, working dogs are easy to train to leave snakes alone. I have lived on bush properties for most of my life, always had dogs and never had one bitten by a snake, my rainforest acreage now is crawling with snakes and my dogs just call me when they encounter one.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 29, 2019)

Unfortunately the old "only good snake is a dead snake" is very much still preached in these parts. And you'd hardly find a croc around here...


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## Wokka (Mar 29, 2019)

I am sure coal mines kill a lot more snakes than retired mayors wielding shovels, particularly if you consider the consequences of climate change!


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## Sdaji (Mar 30, 2019)

Yellowtail said:


> That's the ignorant attitude that caused the extinction of the Thylacine in Tasmania. Why is it that cattlemen and farmers have learned to co-exist with crocodiles which are a far greater danger to people, stock and dogs yet have this primitive attitude with snakes? RBB's are no threat to horses, stock or dogs other than stupid terrier breeds that just attack anything that moves, working dogs are easy to train to leave snakes alone. I have lived on bush properties for most of my life, always had dogs and never had one bitten by a snake, my rainforest acreage now is crawling with snakes and my dogs just call me when they encounter one.



Wow, do people still believe the Thylacine was wiped out by humans hunting them? Even when I was a kid this seemed unrealistic, and then when I was a teenager and learned that even then (and still today) large amounts of Tasmania are remote wilderness which humans basically go nowhere near I figured that hunting something there to extinction made no sense, and long before I became a qualified ecologist I could see it was just ridiculous, and these days I'm surprised to see the myth still going around. The extinction was caused by disease, presumably introduced with domesticated animals. If humans don't exist in a large remote place, they aren't hunting stuff to extinction there. That is probably the most obvious way to see this myth isn't true.

Snakes do kill horses, don't pretend otherwise. Farmers do still kill crocodiles from time to time, and if it was as easy as killing snakes, and it went as unnoticed, it would be even more common.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 30, 2019)

Sdaji said:


> Wow, do people still believe the Thylacine was wiped out by humans hunting them? Even when I was a kid this seemed unrealistic, and then when I was a teenager and learned that even then (and still today) large amounts of Tasmania are remote wilderness which humans basically go nowhere near I figured that hunting something there to extinction made no sense, and long before I became a qualified ecologist I could see it was just ridiculous, and these days I'm surprised to see the myth still going around. The extinction was caused by disease, presumably introduced with domesticated animals. If humans don't exist in a large remote place, they aren't hunting stuff to extinction there. That is probably the most obvious way to see this myth isn't true.
> 
> Snakes do kill horses, don't pretend otherwise. Farmers do still kill crocodiles from time to time, and if it was as easy as killing snakes, and it went as unnoticed, it would be even more common.


+1


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## Yellowtail (Mar 30, 2019)

The whole point here @Sdaji and @Flaviemys purvisi is members of sites like APS and reptile lovers generally should be trying to influence public attitude towards snakes not make excuses for and justify the deliberate killing of protected animals, especially by people of standing in the community. Thylacine were ruthlessly exterminated by farmers and yes while I don't make a big deal about my experience and qualifications here I am not stupid and understand there were probably other factors in play but all the more reason not to exterminate thousands of the vulnerable animals. Millions of Koalas were shot for their skins, was this also justified. People have been prosecuted and convicted for killing crocodiles and the same thing needs to be done with snake killers to change the attitude where they are considered vermin to be eliminated. Supposedly endangered children should be educated from a young age how to behave around snakes rather than fear them.
And @Sdaji please quote one example where a horse (or a human) was ever killed by a RBB which was the species I referred to in my post.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 30, 2019)

Hi Ken, reptile folk like us live in a different world to many other people... primary producers, graziers etc care about a couple of things in life, the price of fuel, the price of feed, the weather and the price of meat. If snakes were declared extinct in Australia tomorrow, how many farmers couldn't care less?? All of them. Australia would just be like New Zealand... no snakes there. If freshwater turtles were declared extinct in Australia tomorrow, myself along with probably 50,000 other people would be devastated, 23 million other people wouldn't even know much less care. You need to realise the fact that people in this field and on forums like this, reptile enthusiasts etc are a minority and we're shrinking in numbers not growing. That's just the way the world has gone. I've given up trying to collaborate with and change people's ways about snakes... 2 people I went to school with still will argue with me until blue in the face that if a snake is on the road you should run over it. People still swerve to deliverately hit turtles... why?? One regular snake shooter I know of admitted to me to shooting turtles in the dams on his property... does it regularly apparently... when I asked why he said because his dams are stocked with yabbies and shrimp and the turtles invade the dams and eat all his yabbies and shrimp so he spends several hours every month sitting on the edge of his dams firing at any turtle that pokes its head up. Now without hard proof this actually occurs, it's just hearsay but why would someone just make that up? I mentioned that simply fencing the stocked Cray dams with a 2 foot high bird, chicken mesh fence or polybelt would prevent any turtles from accessing your dams and his response was "this is more fun." Half a dozen old cockies that go fishing in these parts that catch turtles on their lines think nothing of just whipping the knife out and cutting their heads off... turtles are nothing but a pain in the a*** for old fishos...
I've tried talking to several producers about the reality of snakes and the whole leave them alone and they're no threat to you, they'll avoid a confrontation at all costs but no they don't hear a word of it... regularly hear about their 4-wheeler patrols of the properties to check fences, water troughs, pipes etc and hear of how many snakes were disposed of. They simply do not care what anyone else has to say about it. Education is only as good as those who want to be educated and if the topic at hand matters to them which I can assure you, reptile conservation does not.

500,000 plus head of cattle recently perished in a fortnight in the QLD floods... how many average people on the streets even know or care about that?? Barely anyone... because it doesn't directly affect them... it's a big deal to those producers though... For a decade now Australians have enjoyed $1/litre milk while the dairy industry literally collapsed... no one gave a damn.. didn't affect them.
Works both ways.

You can only try so much before you realise you're just wasting your breath. If you change the laws so people are persecuted for dispatching snakes then that is all you have done, you haven't changed anyone's attitude, you've just made a rule saying penalties will apply if caught doing it... murder is illegal, you can't just go and shoot someone (legally) you don't like... still happens every day in every country. Snakes and other reptiles are going to continue to be dispatched by those who deem it necessary to do so whether we like it or not and the reality is there's not a great deal that can be done about it when it's happening out there in the sticks.


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## Sdaji (Mar 30, 2019)

Yellowtail said:


> The whole point here @Sdaji and @Flaviemys purvisi is members of sites like APS and reptile lovers generally should be trying to influence public attitude towards snakes not make excuses for and justify the deliberate killing of protected animals, especially by people of standing in the community. Thylacine were ruthlessly exterminated by farmers and yes while I don't make a big deal about my experience and qualifications here I am not stupid and understand there were probably other factors in play but all the more reason not to exterminate thousands of the vulnerable animals. Millions of Koalas were shot for their skins, was this also justified. People have been prosecuted and convicted for killing crocodiles and the same thing needs to be done with snake killers to change the attitude where they are considered vermin to be eliminated. Supposedly endangered children should be educated from a young age how to behave around snakes rather than fear them.



There weren't just 'other factors at play'. A disease wiped them out. Without any hunting it still would have wiped them out. Without the disease they wouldn't have been wiped out. In this case it wasn't habitat destruction, in the vast majority of extinctions it is not hunting. There are several common causes of extinctions. In this case it was a disease.



> And @Sdaji please quote one example where a horse (or a human) was ever killed by a RBB which was the species I referred to in my post.



I tell you what, if you can find one example where I've claimed that a horse was ever killed by a Red-bellied Black Snake I'll stop considering this challenge of yours to have been a really stupid one.
[doublepost=1553918698,1553917745][/doublepost]


Flaviemys purvisi said:


> Hi Ken, reptile folk like us live in a different world to many other people... primary producers, graziers etc care about a couple of things in life, the price of fuel, the price of feed, the weather and the price of meat. If snakes were declared extinct in Australia tomorrow, how many farmers couldn't care less?? All of them. Australia would just be like New Zealand... no snakes there. If freshwater turtles were declared extinct in Australia tomorrow, myself along with probably 50,000 other people would be devastated, 23 million other people wouldn't even know much less care. You need to realise the fact that people in this field and on forums like this, reptile enthusiasts etc are a minority and we're shrinking in numbers not growing. That's just the way the world has gone. I've given up trying to collaborate with and change people's ways about snakes... 2 people I went to school with still will argue with me until blue in the face that if a snake is on the road you should run over it. People still swerve to deliverately hit turtles... why?? One regular snake shooter I know of admitted to me to shooting turtles in the dams on his property... does it regularly apparently... when I asked why he said because his dams are stocked with yabbies and shrimp and the turtles invade the dams and eat all his yabbies and shrimp so he spends several hours every month sitting on the edge of his dams firing at any turtle that pokes its head up. Now without hard proof this actually occurs, it's just hearsay but why would someone just make that up? I mentioned that simply fencing the stocked Cray dams with a 2 foot high bird, chicken mesh fence or polybelt would prevent any turtles from accessing your dams and his response was "this is more fun." Half a dozen old cockies that go fishing in these parts that catch turtles on their lines think nothing of just whipping the knife out and cutting their heads off... turtles are nothing but a pain in the a*** for old fishos...
> I've tried talking to several producers about the reality of snakes and the whole leave them alone and they're no threat to you, they'll avoid a confrontation at all costs but no they don't hear a word of it... regularly hear about their 4-wheeler patrols of the properties to check fences, water troughs, pipes etc and hear of how many snakes were disposed of. They simply do not care what anyone else has to say about it. Education is only as good as those who want to be educated and if the topic at hand matters to them which I can assure you, reptile conservation does not.
> 
> 500,000 plus head of cattle recently perished in a fortnight in the QLD floods... how many average people on the streets even know or care about that?? Barely anyone... because it doesn't directly affect them... it's a big deal to those producers though... For a decade now Australians have enjoyed $1/litre milk while the dairy industry literally collapsed... no one gave a damn.. didn't affect them.
> ...



This is refreshingly honest and realistic.

You're right, if snakes went extinct, most of us would be devastated, but the majority of people would celebrate. There would be no rodent plagues, no ecological disaster, only mild changes to the ecosystem, and the only losers would be the snakes themselves and the people like us who love them.

And yep, people still run over snakes (and yes, I've seen people deliberately run over turtles, shingle backs, etc) and think they're doing a good thing. 30 years ago when I was a kid I remember hearing the snake enthusiasts saying some relatively balanced things about snakes, but they were few and far between. 20 years ago it was starting to change, snake enthusiast numbers were growing, the message was getting out there, and a very small but growing number of people started to respect and admire snakes. About 15 years ago it peaked. The snake enthusiasts started to exaggerate the story and a few people started taking them less seriously. 10 years ago snake people were being taken less seriously, the attitude overall of the public was in reversal. 5 years ago social media was in full swing and echo chambers were the big thing. People lived in their own echo chambers, believing their own bullspit, and assuming their own message was becoming more and more mainstream because their own little echo chamber had like-minded people. The vast majority of people were not in their echo chamber, and when they did get a look at it, they laughed at how stupid it was. That pattern has increased and is currently only getting stronger. The echo chambers are getting more absurd, extreme, and isolated. By making themselves more extreme and absurd, they make themselves more isolated and less able to be taken seriously by anyone outside. I love snakes and would never kill one just because it was a snake, but even though I love snakes as much as anyone else on this planet, seeing the nonsense spewed by herpers these days almost makes me want to kill them. If I am totally biased on the snakes' side and even I can't stand how ridiculous it is, imagine how Joe Average who hates snakes will feel! By being dishonest and clearly believe their own ridiculous lies, the herpers destroy their own credibility, which in many cases literally inspires people to kill snakes.

This is all part of an overall picture which has been occurring over the last 10-15 years, not just herp related but in general. I think we can all see that society/culture/rational thinking in general is in serious decline. Herp is just one example of it.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 30, 2019)

Well put John and dead accurate.


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## GBWhite (Mar 30, 2019)

Sadji is correct in regards to the ultimate cause of the Thylacine extinction in Tasmania being a result of an infectious disease. However, it appears there were other factors in play that contributed toward a major decline in the Tasmania population and it appears most (if not all) were a result of European settlement. Recent scientific evidence indicates Thylacines (along with the Tasmanian Devil) were exterminated on the mainland around 1800 to 2000 years ago which is long before Europeans arrived and it is assumed that this was more than likely a result of competition with dingoes for food. Around the time of European settlement a small population still existed in Tasmania. Because they were considered to be a threat to livestock, a land company and eventually the Tassy government, proclaimed a bounty in an attempt to eradicate them. However despite contributing to the decrease in numbers this was not the primary cause for them going belly up. Habitat loss due to agricultural pursuits, competition with dogs introduced by Europeans to protect livestock and as companion animal and changing fire regimes caused a fragmentation in the population and an epidemic disease similar to distemper (more than likely as a result of the introduction of dogs) spread fast and wide though the remaining population and, because of their limited genetic diversity due to their geographic isolation, they were extremely vulnerable to the disease which resulted in reducing the life span of adults and caused a high juvenile mortality rates.

Now in saying all that, recent research indicates the decrease in genetic diversity began around 70,000 to 120,000 years ago (long before the arrival of humans) so there is a high probability that Thylacines may have eventually became extinct with or without human intervention.


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## TheRamiRocketMan (Mar 30, 2019)

Sdaji said:


> You're right, if snakes went extinct, most of us would be devastated, but the majority of people would celebrate. There would be no rodent plagues, no ecological disaster, only mild changes to the ecosystem, and the only losers would be the snakes themselves and the people like us who love them.



I'm not sure you can state this as a fact. Ecosystems and ecosystem services are so complicated that it is pretty much impossible to say how bad the disappearance of a group would be for the ecosystem. The safe option in my opinion is to try to keep everything extant, the idea being that if we prevent extinctions we don't have to worry about unknown ramifications. Whether or not you like snakes, you should try and keep them around since they're probably doing something important. They are, after all, extremely abundant in this country and without them where will all that energy go?


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 30, 2019)

Several extinctions have already occurred in Australia since the introduction of the cane toad and widespread distribution of the feral cat with several more pending. I'm with John and am of the opinion that the ramifications from snakes going extinct in this country would be negligible apart from there being no more reported incidents of snake bite.


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## GBWhite (Mar 30, 2019)

In many countries were they exist (including Australia) snakes are one top end predators that control the numbers of not only rodents but also species of amphibians, other species of reptiles, mammals, birds and fish and if they were to become extinct it would have a major impact on the ecological balance of many environments. It would dramatically increase the numbers of these species causing a domino effect on the consumption of their own food (not just animals but also vegetation) which would in turn would lead to a major collapse in all population. In addition animals that prey on snakes would have to adapt to prey on other animals to maintain their survival which would drive down the populations of those species. And if the new prey items are reduced or the predator of snakes fails to adapt then this will cause a further collapse.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 30, 2019)

That all reads very well and seems plausible on paper but in reality I just don't see it happening and even if it were the case, the point of the matter in debate is the country wouldn't stop, people wouldn't be crying in the streets, there wouldn't be mass protests and economy collapses and a recession... the latest iPhone would get released, some new scandal on MAFS would be revealed, and snakes going extinct wouldn't even make the news. The point is whether they're here or not, the general attitude of today is regardless of any negative impact "we just don't give a rat's a***."

Sad but true.


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## Sdaji (Mar 31, 2019)

TheRamiRocketMan said:


> I'm not sure you can state this as a fact. Ecosystems and ecosystem services are so complicated that it is pretty much impossible to say how bad the disappearance of a group would be for the ecosystem. The safe option in my opinion is to try to keep everything extant, the idea being that if we prevent extinctions we don't have to worry about unknown ramifications. Whether or not you like snakes, you should try and keep them around since they're probably doing something important. They are, after all, extremely abundant in this country and without them where will all that energy go?



Unless it happens, which it won't, it's hypothetical and thus we can't prove it, but as a qualified ecologist I have no doubt there would be a fairly minimal ecological impact. This doesn't for a moment mean I want it to happen or I would encourage it. I like snakes for their own sake. If they vanished I'd think it was a great shame, not because the world would end, but because those snakes would be gone. For everyone else however, it would probably be considered a good thing. Without any reasonable doubt, we could wipe out a lot of the most deadly snakes and their niches would then be filled by less venomous snakes. This definitely would have virtually no impact on the ecosystem. Again, I don't want it to happen, but if we were to be honest with the general public they would want to take this option.

Anyway, in reality, if we all did our best to kill as many snakes as we could (as opposed to the current situation where only most people do that, which is pretty much exactly the same thing) we'd still be unable to wipe them out. That's why they haven't already been wiped out. Snakes are pretty difficult to find in the wilderness (or even in urban situations) so while a lot of individuals get shovelled, as species, direct human attacks post basically no danger in almost all cases.
[doublepost=1553960478,1553959894][/doublepost]


GBWhite said:


> In many countries were they exist (including Australia) snakes are one top end predators that control the numbers of not only rodents but also species of amphibians, other species of reptiles, mammals, birds and fish and if they were to become extinct it would have a major impact on the ecological balance of many environments. It would dramatically increase the numbers of these species causing a domino effect on the consumption of their own food (not just animals but also vegetation) which would in turn would lead to a major collapse in all population. In addition animals that prey on snakes would have to adapt to prey on other animals to maintain their survival which would drive down the populations of those species. And if the new prey items are reduced or the predator of snakes fails to adapt then this will cause a further collapse.



This myth is even more incorrect than it is common. They're not usually top end predators, especially in Australia. They're always predators, but rarely top end. But either way, they don't play an important role in controlling rodents. It wouldn't cause some crazy domino effect, it would just cause a very minor increase in alternative predator numbers (snakes aren't the only things which eat frogs, rodents, etc, and if you take away snakes, the reduced competition simply allows the other predators to increase in numbers and the system is in balance).

Laymen often believe the myth you are talking about, but actual ecologists understand that while introducing new species is sometimes catastrophic, taking away mid level members of the food web generally has little effect. Many studies have been done to show this, and I've been involved in such studies myself, including reptile examples in Australia.

Incidentally, removing top end predators is the least impact of anything. The stuff at the top can be taken away without it doing much to what's below it. If you remove the foundation, that's what causes the biggest problems, but in the case of snakes in most cases, Australia being a good example, it just wouldn't do much.

As you may know, snakes don't actually eat very much, so they aren't especially good vermin controllers. Things like owls/tawny frogmouths eat far more and are much better at it. Even feral pest species do far, far more for vermin rodent control than snakes.

I know snake enthusiasts desperately *want* to believe the 'snakes are critical vermin controllers' myth, and that makes them repeat the story so many times they generally firmly believe it to be gospel, but in reality it's not true.


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## Flaviemys purvisi (Mar 31, 2019)

^^^ Also true. 

If Ants, flies and mosquitoes went extinct in Australia, the impact would be far more noticeable than if snakes vanished.


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## GBWhite (Mar 31, 2019)

We'll just have to agree to disagree. There's plenty of scientific research available to contradict what you state.


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## Yellowtail (Apr 1, 2019)

This thread has really become an epic.
All I was trying to point out is that it is a shame that politicians and prominent members of the community are killing protected animals with shovels or other means and then boasting about it on social media.
It would also be better if the herp community and particularly members of APS did not go to so much trouble trying to justify and even support this type of behaviour.
Sdaji should take time out from his essays and read my post where I referred to the fact that no horses or people have ever died from a RBB bite, I was not including more dangerous species like browns in this statement although death of any large animal by snakebite in Australia is rare.
I also pointed out that while there is evidence that the Thylacine was in decline before European settlement it was certainly not helped by ignorant farmers killing thousands of them, imagine the Tassie Devil with it's facial cancer problem also being shot and poisoned by the thousands at the same time.


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## Sdaji (Apr 1, 2019)

GBWhite said:


> We'll just have to agree to disagree. There's plenty of scientific research available to contradict what you state.



No, there's not. I challenge you to provide any. Simply saying it exists doesn't mean it does exist. A lot of people hear a myth enough times, assume it to be true, and assume that means there's scientific literature to back it up.

Many people have very vivid imaginations. Tell me, how many scientific papers on this topic have you actually read? I wouldn't be surprised if the number was literally zero!
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Yellowtail said:


> This thread has really become an epic.
> All I was trying to point out is that it is a shame that politicians and prominent members of the community are killing protected animals with shovels or other means and then boasting about it on social media.



We can all probably agree on that.



> It would also be better if the herp community and particularly members of APS did not go to so much trouble trying to justify and even support this type of behaviour.



I didn't see anyone support the behaviour, however, if people lie and exaggerate when vilifying someone or something, people are going to be inspired to defend it to that extent. For example, if someone kills someone and you talk about it, everyone will probably agree. If you say they killed 5 people, you'll likely get people defending them, not because they like what happened to think the person is not guilty, they don't condone the actual murder, but you've actually inspired people who dislike what's happened to defend the person who did it, not from what they did, but from what you've accused them of.



> Sdaji should take time out from his essays and read my post where I referred to the fact that no horses or people have ever died from a RBB bite, I was not including more dangerous species like browns in this statement although death of any large animal by snakebite in Australia is rare.



I'm so sorry my posts upset you to the point that you say I shouldn't be making them! Haha, nah, it's April 1, I'm not really sorry, I find it funny. Yellowtail should take note that I never said a horse was ever killed by a RBB, and consider that I said 'snakes do kill horses', which they do. You can make it a sticking point if you want, but it's peculiar behaviour from someone wanting 'Sdaji to stop posting' 



> I also pointed out that while there is evidence that the Thylacine was in decline before European settlement it was certainly not helped by ignorant farmers killing thousands of them, imagine the Tassie Devil with it's facial cancer problem also being shot and poisoned by the thousands at the same time.



Obviously being hunted didn't help, and neither did people eating tea and scones or the invention of trampoline 2 years before their extinction, but they weren't the cause either. The reality is that the disease wiped them out and would have even if no one had ever shot one. Hunting did not cause the extinction, it was incidental. You could have removed any of the other things impacting them (habitat destruction, introduced animals, etc), or you could eliminate every other one of them, but the disease would still have wiped them out. Even to this day there are large areas of Tasmania which are remote and not affected by habitat loss etc, but the Thylacines went extinct everywhere, including those areas. The disease wiped them out, all other issues were incidental. By saying it was hunting, you are being incorrect. There were no shortage of reports from people shooting them that the Thylacines being shot were looking weak and diseased, which made them easy to shoot. They were going to die whether or not they were shot. But the majority of them didn't get shot, they died of disease in remote wilderness without ever coming near a gun.


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