UPDATE - Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

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OregonFieldHerper550
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Joined: August 20th, 2018, 5:06 pm
Location: Southern Oregon

UPDATE - Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

Post by OregonFieldHerper550 »

Just about every time we go to use our gas grill, we go through a ritual search for the Pacific Chorus Frog who's made his home there for the past 5 years. We have relocated him dozens of time but he always finds his way back. We've decided he's good luck and now my wife worries when we don't see him. We haven't had any spiders around the grill in years!


Along the same lines, last month we had a big beautiful Northern Pacific Rattlesnake that kept returning to our house. She has only one eye and a broken rattle. We relocated her several times - going further and further away each time, but within a few days she was back at the same location. My wife, always good about such things, relocated her to our nearby Savannah-Oak woodland where hopefully she can be safe:


These are the first efforts with my new GoPro Hero 5 Black - Enjoy!
Jimi
Posts: 1955
Joined: December 3rd, 2010, 12:06 pm

Re: Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

Post by Jimi »

Awesome little vignettes, I really like the grill-frog, and the time span of your being neighbors. Though I suspect that, as long as you're not applying direct flame to the frog, that it will move itself out of harm's way ASAP upon ignition! I think it would take a little while for the heat to conduct to all parts of the grill, and that "the wrong direction!!!" will be quite clear to the frog. It will go the other way, I mean.

As for the snake - good for you guys, for tolerating the animal so well. I'm totally unsure the legality of the hands-on interaction and the relocation, for your state. I only point it out to give you another opportunity/motivation to verify whatever the situation might be, and then to consider the advisability of posting/removing what might be - in the eyes of some - evidence of something or other. I honestly do not know for sure, but feel you'd be best-served by knowing for absolute sure, and then proceeding according to your own fully-informed judgment. For all I know you have already done all that, but OTOH, maybe you're just enthusiastic, well-intentioned, and asking for a visit and a conversation.

cheers
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OregonFieldHerper550
Posts: 7
Joined: August 20th, 2018, 5:06 pm
Location: Southern Oregon

Re: Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

Post by OregonFieldHerper550 »

Thanks for the kind comments. I'm relocating from one location on my own property (next to the house) to another location on my own property - I can't find any regulation that addresses that. Most of my neighbors just kill snakes - venomous or not. I recall a study from AZ that showed rattlesnake relocation programs were problematic - the mortality rate for relocated snakes was high - but I think our snake has been relocated within it's own original home range. If anyone is familiar with such a study I'd be interested in re-reading it. Clearly pythons in FL don't have issues with relocation. OFH550
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OregonFieldHerper550
Posts: 7
Joined: August 20th, 2018, 5:06 pm
Location: Southern Oregon

Re: Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

Post by OregonFieldHerper550 »

UPDATE: After doing some research on the relocation of snakes issue in Oregon I discovered that it is indeed illegal without a permit “Relocation of any wildlife, including snakes, for any reason requires a permit from ODFW. However, you can move a snake outside on the same property if it is in a building or if a one-way door can be installed that will allow the snake to exit but not reenter.” Who comes up with this stuff? So you find a rattlesnake on your front porch and you hope it’s there when you return from the ODFW with your permit so you can lawfully move it away from your house?

Oh yeah, and I guess the poor little frog gets BBQ’d since I can’t move him either...
Jimi
Posts: 1955
Joined: December 3rd, 2010, 12:06 pm

Re: UPDATE - Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

Post by Jimi »

Ugh. Sorry, it's how I suspected. So sorry.
Who comes up with this stuff?
I know, right? People, just people. It didn't come on tablets off some tall mountain.

ODFW staff (one person, or a small team) would have drafted it. State lawyers (probably "embeds" from the state AG's office) would have reviewed it. Stakeholders may or may not have been given a chance to review or even co-write it. The state Wildlife Board or Commission would have approved it. There may have been some kind of "road show" regional process - dunno what you've got there. In other words there's a formal process, with defined roles and steps in a particular order. Consider it, hmm, a low-to-medium complicated, bureaucratic project. Yeah, that works.

It has the power of law. Violating it is probably some minor misdemeanor. It isn't statute (passed by a legislature and signed by a chief executive), it's administrative law. (I doubt admin laws can have criminal penalties - i.e., no felonies.) In my state all admin law (called "Rules" here) have a 5-year lifespan. They need to be reauthorized every 5 years, by the same body (usually appointed, sometimes elected) that passed them in the first place. There's provision for public participation, but how well that happens (or if it happens) is up to individual initiative on both sides (agency and stakeholder).

I doubt OR is extremely different from my state. You might call your regional office and ask for clarification or interpretation for your situation. Or, just demand a permit. If you're passive aggressive, with time on your hands, you could make a real pain out of yourself and help motivate the agency to fix the Rule on its own. Better yet, ask if you can help with re-writing the Rule, or at least make a constructive suggestion. Relocating an animal on the same property seems like a no-brainer no permit needed situation. Unless it's a giant ranch or something. Anyway, I suggest you get off the internet, and get on the phone or show up in person. Make a human connection. Who knows, it could go Great!

Best luck -
Jimi
Posts: 1955
Joined: December 3rd, 2010, 12:06 pm

Re: UPDATE - Sometimes the field herping comes to you...

Post by Jimi »

One more idea - you could offer them your video, as an Outreach tool. Are you in an area of OR where rattlesnakes have been almost wiped out? Or are they still fairly abundant there? Looking at your habitat, I can see it both ways, it just depends on your general location. Anyway ODFW might like to use your example to help educate people on what they can do. And that would help with the "dumb rule situation" too. Motivate its change I mean.

Just a thought. Could be dumb, sounds like something I'd try! Ha ha ha.

cheers
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