Petition to boycott serpent spectacles and other abusive animal treatment along with the exploitation of Morocco’s biodiversity.


North African cobra (Egyptian Cobra).  "The habitat loss and the continuous collecting by the snake charmers make this species increasingly rare."  (P. GENIEZ et al.)
©Michel Aymerich

 “Turtles, chameleons, bell’s dab lizards and serpents are in danger as a result of their disappearing habitat and business. Tourists should be thrilled to visit countries where they can admire protected indigenous animals and plants” (Marrakech petition, the first Congress of Mediterranean herpetology, April 16-20th 2007 / Marrakech, Morocco)

 
In Marrakech, the Jemaa-El-Fna place owes part of its fame to traditional “snake charming” séances. These spectacles occur at many other places and in hotels of Morocco. The perpetration of these problematic middle-age practices incites cobras abuse. Spiting cobras, Puff adders, Montpellier snakes and other serpents are replaced by other soon to be victimized prey after a few months or weeks because they are all condemned to certain death.

This parasitic consumption of the biodiversity involves too many captures as well as retention in putrid boxes (without water, food and with arrogance to hygiene). Being trafficked in deplorable conditions provoke a high mortality rate in captive snakes.

The majority of the beautiful species concerned are threatened with extinction in North Africa or are in alarming regression. This contributes to the particularly deplorable impoverishment of the ecosystem of Morocco. Our generation worldwide has been marked by a dramatic massive extinction that will accelerate and worsen. Disastrous human self-centerness is directly linked to all of the catastrophic phenomenon effecting extinction, deforestation, the decreasing of water, over farming, global warming, etc.

We cannot continue to turn a blind eye on these “spectacles” under a pretext that is an ancestral tradition and that the animals concerned are nothing more than “vicious beasts”, snakes condemned to general disapproval.  

This is why, we undersigned, engage to no longer encourage these spectacles of another time that mistreat snakes. We refuse to make discriminating choices that threaten the very heart of biodiversity. At the same time, we discourage monkey dressers who tie-up and confine and hit monkeys in order to get them to do sad pirouettes.

We equally discourage a form of sordid open-air markets that propose for the majority, protected species that are alive or dead.

 Furthermore, we call upon the multitude of tourists to open their eyes and abandon these practices or even better to protest to the authorities in order that Morocco can rise up to the level of the stakes of our time, marked by serious prejudice that threaten the very limit of all life on earth and that of our children.

 

Mograbin Viper  and  Puff adder... "This parasitic consumption of the biodiversity involves too many captures as well as retention in putrid boxes (without water, food and with arrogance to hygiene). Being trafficked in deplorable conditions provoke a high mortality rate in captive snakes." [Petition...]
 "The relict character of its distribution, the systematic destruction of the macaronesian vegetation along the coast and the continuous capture of specimens for members of the brotherhood of the Aïssaoua make this viper [Puff adder, Bitis arietans] increasingly rare. "  (P. GENIEZ et al.)
Barbary Macaques are today considered an endangered species (classified in Appendix II of the Washington Convention). ©Michel Aymerich