Restrictive Bill effecting sale of animals in California (Please read)

[cassandra]

Holy cats...just saw this on the cornsnakes.com forum and I guess it's been posted on KS as well.

There is a bill in the California Assembly called AB 2862 which would apply lots of restrictions and new requirements on pet stores and the sale of animals (many of which look good, but several are NOT good).

- Require that animals be weaned for two weeks prior to sale. This means that it will be illegal to sell pinkies, fuzzies, and hoppers.

- Require 1/4 of a square foot per mouse. Reptile stores will need hundreds of square feet to house their mice!

- The sale of California native species will be illegal, even if you have a California Native Species Propagation license.

- All dealers of animals must get the name, address, and telephone number of the breeder or origin of every animal, and must provide this to whoever that animal is sold to and must also surrender this information to an inspector or officer if asked to do so. In essence, they want to keep track of who is breeding and selling animals.

These are the main parts of the bill that would affect all of us California reptile keepers. Here is a link to the actual bill: http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/...introduced.html

Here is a link to Amazon Reptiles page: http://www.amazonreptile.com/
Amazon Reptiles is a reptile store in Montclair, CA; it looks like they are organizing folks to help make the Assemblypeople know reptile sellers and keepers are not happy with the above bits of the bill.

Please everyone in California, write to your assembly person!!! Check out the Amazon Reptiles link for more information on how to get involved.

[cassandra]

Here's the letter I'm sending to my Assemblyman:

Assembyman Bill Emmerson
10681 Foothill Blvd
Suite 325
Rancho Cucamonga, CA 91730

State Capitol
Room 3149
Sacramento, CA
94249-0063


1 April 2006


Dear Assemblyman Emmerson,

My name is Cassandra G--- and I am a constituent of yours in the city of Redlands. I am writing in regards to Assembly Bill number AB 2862, which relates to retail animal sales.

I am very concerned about the following points in the proposed bill:

- The age requirement for the sale of animals; Section 122340 Letter q states that the animal be weaned for at least two weeks prior to sale and Section 122347 Letter d states “A retail animal outlet shall not sell, offer for sale, trade, or barter an animal that is under the age of eight weeks.”

- The increased size rodent enclosure requirements; Section 122345 Letter d Point 4 requires a huge increase in the floor space and available exercise equipment required for all rodents.

I am concerned because I am a reptile pet owner. I own two harmless and non-venomous snakes, a ball python (python regius) and a boa constrictor (boa constrictor). Snakes are carnivores and feed on small rodents, preferably clean, healthy live or pre-euthanized mice and rats. My snakes are young animals and currently eat very young mice, from just a few days old to 24-30 days. I currently purchase live rodents from one of two local reptile/pet stores in Redlands, Daryl’s Pet Shop, 860 W. Redlands Blvd. Redlands, 92374, and Tribal Reptile Co, 110 Orange St, Redlands, 92373. Both stores breed rodents in house for sale as “feeders” for pet owners.

As my snakes get older, they will eat larger and older rodents, but with the above language in AB 2862, I will not be able to feed my snakes because it will be illegal to obtain the proper aged rodents.

I am also concerned about the proposed increased space requirements for rodents in animal retail. While I can not provide specific measurements for the current environment for rodents at the two shops listed above, I know that they are the rodent breeding industry standard size for the breeding and keeping of mice and rats for sale into the rodent feeder market. If these proposed size increases are made law, local shops will not able to accommodate the increased space requirements and will most likely discontinue selling the food I need to keep my pets healthy and fed.

I appreciate and thank you for taking the time to read this. Please do not allow these points to be become law in California. Please feel free to contact me if you would like more information.

My sincere thanks,

Cassandra G---

[daniel1983]

Cass....Good letter....and great job about bringing up these issues. Search around for a Cali herp society, contact them and see what they have to say....a few hundred voices are better than one

The 'weaned' rule is probably being put in place for puppies and cats most likely. It would actually be a good rule for those two animals...but for "feeder type" animals like rats and mice that rule is completely unneccessary.

I see the point of the housing rule though. Pet stores sure do know how to cram as many of any animal in an enclosure as they can.

[cassandra]

Looks like the hearing has been moved back to April 18th. Check out the PIJAC write up. Committe contacts are on page 3. I'm going to send my letter to my county Committee representative as well. PIJAC Pet Advisory

[cobredos]

:eek:!!! That is ridiculous!! Although for certain animals space and a weaning period is neccesary. I wish you Californians the best of luck in changing the bill!!

[cassandra]

Yeah, this passing in CA would be bad since it would set a precedent for other states. =P

I would hope the big chain pet stores are lobbying hard against various points in the Bill, especialy PetCo, which is a California company headquartered in San Diego. I plan on calling the headquarters on Monday to see if they are doing anything.

[cassandra]

*bump* for other California-based readers - contact your Assemblyperson!

[Vomitore]

Holy cats...just saw this on the cornsnakes.com forum and I guess it's been posted on KS as well.

There is a bill in the California Assembly called AB 2862 which would apply lots of restrictions and new requirements on pet stores and the sale of animals (many of which look good, but several are NOT good).

- Require that animals be weaned for two weeks prior to sale. This means that it will be illegal to sell pinkies, fuzzies, and hoppers.

- Require 1/4 of a square foot per mouse. Reptile stores will need hundreds of square feet to house their mice!

- The sale of California native species will be illegal, even if you have a California Native Species Propagation license.

- All dealers of animals must get the name, address, and telephone number of the breeder or origin of every animal, and must provide this to whoever that animal is sold to and must also surrender this information to an inspector or officer if asked to do so. In essence, they want to keep track of who is breeding and selling animals.

These are the main parts of the bill that would affect all of us California reptile keepers. Here is a link to the actual bill: http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/...introduced.html

Here is a link to Amazon Reptiles page: http://www.amazonreptile.com/
Amazon Reptiles is a reptile store in Montclair, CA; it looks like they are organizing folks to help make the Assemblypeople know reptile sellers and keepers are not happy with the above bits of the bill.

Please everyone in California, write to your assembly person!!! Check out the Amazon Reptiles link for more information on how to get involved.

So I cant feed my snakes pinkies, fuzzies or hoppers? What am I supposed to feed them? Tofu? ... What next? All snakes must wear a collar? So in a way, and im being sarcastic, if a snake in the wild eats a pinkie, and a police officer finds the snake eating the pinkie, that snake will be arrested and sentenced to 20-30 hours community service. Well now you'll have more snake owners breeding mice and rats for feeding. I can see a restriction on snake size, so only experienced owners can have an anaconda ect. However, this is just plain stupid. You'd need a store the size of a super market to have the space for mice now.

[cassandra]

You're preaching to the choir, 'mano...get your letter sent in! =)

[frankykeno]

But rats are able to impregnant as early as 5 weeks of age??? So are they saying that a pet store must keep these rats till 8 weeks of age prior to being able to put them out for sale? I can see this becoming a problem unless all pet store employees are carefully seperating male/female rat siblings or there's going to be a lot of preggo young female rats around during that 3 weeks.

Otherwise a lot of the proposed legislation is very fair. If a pet shop has to be forced to give proper care and housing that they should have been providing in the first place, all the better for it. I don't think they addressed the needs of reptiles as much as I would have liked to have seen but at least they were mentioned for a change.

The only specific mention of feeder mice and rats I could find was this:

"1) Routine inspection of the animals, including feeder mice and
rats, in the retail animal outlet's custody for signs of stress,
illness, or injury."

Again I wish they had defined "feeder" clearly. They mention pet stores breeding for replacement stock but do not mention the pet stores that breed feeder mice and rats.

It'll be interesting to follow this.