Ilian Velikov wrote:The cons I think are pretty relevant on an individual level (viper vs photographer) - if handled the wrong way both could get hurt. Would you disagree with this and would you disregard such situation as not important?
I would regard such situation as not very important, yes.
Ilian Velikov wrote:I was simply asking about vipers in particular and catching them for just a trophy photo in particular. I didn't say anything about research or conservation.
I was trying to put things in perspective. Not talking about catching or handling for research or whatever so-called higher purpose (because is it really 'higher' and who's entitled to label it as such...?) either.
Ilian Velikov wrote:Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:We can probably all take much more meaningful action to benefit conservation than deciding not to handle snakes.
Yeah, sure and we can probably all take much more meaningful action to benefit conservation than snapping photos and showing them to our friends online
I do both. I try not to care too much about whether this pleases other people or not. Although I'll try to spread a positive interest for herpetofauna, I also try not to care too much about whether other people do the same or not. To each his own.
Funny how a somewhat similar debate in the US is about collecting or not. Yet another perspective, in which a lot can be said about how limited the impact of collecting is. So catching vipers......
To offer perhaps some perspective, I'll add that I am a below-average snake hunter and that finding vipers is a fairly rare event for me. Last week, I personally found 4 in the Pyrenees in a very short time, which maybe never has happened to me before (that's how bad I am). I caught 3. If I would have found 10, I would probably only have caught the ones that look different. I'm surely not going to catch all, because the in situ thing is starting to look like a fun game to me too. This is my perspective. It's not any worse or better than anyone else's. I would never call someone brave because he 'admits' to like the hunt. It's just what it is, and at the end of the day we all probably are much more similar in our views towards nature than 99.9% of the world population.
I do not feel like doing a lot of back-and-forth on this, because to me it's a worn-out debate. I suppose it's impossible to state this without coming across as elitist, but it is what it is. I accept your potential contempt.
Jeroen, stressing out hundreds of fire salamanders for nearly 10 years and not really ashamed about it.