SmartTranscript of House Environment-2025-04-17-3:00PM

[Andrea Shortsleeve]: Hey, you're live. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Alright. Good afternoon and welcome to the House Environment Committee. This afternoon, we're gonna continue our discussion of H two thirty and we have four members of the Fish and Wildlife Department with us. Two via Zoom two in person. Welcome back. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Thanks for having us. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Thanks for coming. Do you want to start or do [Andrea Shortsleeve]: you want to just start? I guess. Well, I can start intermissioner Andrea Short sleeve, the department. And we saw the revisions that were made for section six. And we just want to highlight, I think one of the biggest kind of things that we wanted to bring up was just the listing of species in the bill may not be the best, best idea in terms of being able to be responsive to population changes. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Sorry. Hold on a second. Okay. You're not finding highlighted changes. Okay. It's and it says four sixteen. [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: Three point one? [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Three point one. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Four sixteen. Draft I have says three point two. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: My page Let's see. Week version? Yeah. It's not coming up as three point two online. [Representative Robert North]: Pick up the time. Okay. [28 seconds of silence] [Representative John Bartholomew]: Okay. Now We're different. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: I had to close out, go back to our committee, and start over. Refresh doesn't always work. [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: Okay. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: So I went back to the legislative home page and then go to our committee page. [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: K. Under today's agenda? [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Under Michael O'Grady's name today. Today's date. You're just starting to look at the version three point two of h two thirty representing Morris. Page six. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: And, also having, Luke and and Roz on Zoom, can let them kinda weigh in because I know that their time is a little harder to to schedule here. So may maybe [Chair Amy Sheldon]: we should start with that because [Rosalind Renfrew]: Yeah. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: What happened for us is Okay. [Luke Grosvenor]: A testimony from Jim Andrews. We had committee discussion, and we got to his recommendation of you know, his preference [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Mhmm. Was no season, and he had particularly concerns with snapping turtles. And so it would be really good to hear from Luke [Rosalind Renfrew]: Right. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: About just the the status of the three species we've called out and discussed, hear from all of you about your thoughts on it after that, and then go from there maybe. Okay. Makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Representative Sackler, [Rosalind Renfrew]: I'm sorry. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: I'd I'd just also like to say that as a glance at this language, which I'm seeing for the first time Yeah. I don't think it's exactly like what we have What [Rosalind Renfrew]: we have. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Just discussed. So before you start telling us why it's [Andrea Shortsleeve]: a [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: problem, maybe we hear that other stuff. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Sorry. Yeah. I thought it would be helpful. Not trying to fool it that way. But [Chair Amy Sheldon]: If yes. So helpful to just hear where we're at, where you're at, and then the language can fig we match that to what we all figure out. Perfect. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: And, yeah, I will, pass it to Luke to talk about the species. [Luke Grosvenor]: Hi, everybody. My name is Luke Grosff. For the record, I'm a hertop herpetologist with the Wabana Fish and Wildlife Department and ANR. This morning, I I heard I watched the the committee discussion yesterday after the the colonel and and Hannah spoke, and I saw a little bit of Jim's testimony. Just wanna bring up a couple of things. I'm not sure where the leopard frog came from. That was a surprise. And the species that we had discussed possibly being harvestable were the snapping turtle because that is a harvested species right now. I can't imagine a lot of people harvest it. In my going on six years here, I've only run into one case where somebody was harvesting a a snapping turtle, so I don't think it's a big portion of our population. And also frog legs, people do eat frog legs. It's typically bullfrogs because they're larger, so there's more meat on their legs. And in my six years, I think I've had two instances on a wildlife management area where there was evidence of some frog harvesting. So, again, not not happening often. So I'm not sure where the the leopard frog came in from my mind. It was the bullfrog, snapping turtle, and then the green frog because the green frog looks very, very similar to a bullfrog. It's sometimes difficult for professionals to tell them apart, sometimes. So the thought there was to include the green frog just because of the difficulty to discern bullfrog and and green frog. The leopard frog is a species that was commercially harvested up until twenty eighteen or twenty nineteen in Vermont in large numbers, but that is no longer happening or being permitted right now. I also Sorry. Last Yes. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: About leopard frog permitted? You've what about leopard frogs are no longer being harvested because [Luke Grosvenor]: There was one individual. As far as I know, there was one individual up in Franklin County that would apply for a commercial collecting permit, and I think he just aged out. [Representative Robert North]: Okay. [Luke Grosvenor]: Thank you. And these days, I I don't know if we would even if somebody did apply for another commercial collector permit, I'm not sure we would issue that. I also heard something about garter snakes, during, the previous testimony. I'm not sure where that came from. I don't think anybody harvests snakes for food, so you can probably disregard that one. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: No. I think the question about garter snakes was if we go the path of not allowing the the take of any reptile or amphibian other than perhaps the couple that we call out, what happens if someone, either purposely or inadvertently with their lawnmower, kills a guard or snake? That kind of a thing. [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: I see. Okay. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Well so that's maybe for the colonel. But back to the biologist for a second. The couple of concerns that Jim brought up that he doesn't feel that bullfrogs are abundant across the state any longer. Well, I guess I'd like to go back. We we had questions about what a common species was and how you calculate or measure kind of abundance or enough to harvest a a reptile or amphibian. [Luke Grosvenor]: That's a great question. In my mind, abundant ties into our s ranks. So every species has an s rank, which, is associated with their their rareness or commonness. And for an s five species, they're common, widespread, and abundant. So in my mind, an abundant species is an s five species. So [Rosalind Renfrew]: the [Luke Grosvenor]: green frog, the bullfrog, and the snapping turtle are all s five species. The leopard frog is an s four. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: But, well, I guess I'm just still curious, common widespread and abundant. [Luke Grosvenor]: These best ranks, they're determined in part through the scientific advisory group that Jim Andrews chairs. They provide input, but ultimately, it comes down to another staff who's our zoologist in the natural heritage program. And there's risk calculators and things to help calculate the s ranks. But it it comes down to distribution, known population sizes, distributions, things like that, known or threats to the species. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: So it's it is a quantified calculation? [Luke Grosvenor]: It is. Yes. So yes. It is quantified. There's NatureServe, which, our natural heritage database is run through NatureServe. They have an online calculator that's sort of standardized across states. [Representative John Bartholomew]: Okay. [Luke Grosvenor]: So the the I was just gonna say the the bullfrog is one that the the scientific advisory group thought about going [Rosalind Renfrew]: from [Luke Grosvenor]: an s five to an s four species. So we recently ran that through the calculator, and it didn't if I remember, it didn't quite meet the s four standard. So it will likely stay in s five species. [Representative John Bartholomew]: Representative Bartholomew and the the four species we're talking about, s four versus five, can you tell me again? I didn't catch it. [Luke Grosvenor]: Yeah. So here, let me just get you the exact definition right now. An s five is common, pure, wide, and abundant, and s four is common to uncommon. Common to uncommon, but fairly secure. It's locally common or widely scattered to uncommon, but not rare. Uncalled for long term concerns due to declines or other factors or disable over many decades and not threatened be but of restriction, retribution, or other factors. So there's a lot of variability in the s four, common to uncommon. So that's why I was sitting with s five. [Representative John Bartholomew]: All of these are s five including the green frog? [Luke Grosvenor]: The leopard frog is s four. So green frog, bullfrog, and snapping turtle are all are all s five. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: And, Jim, you know, pointed out the longevity and the, tolerance for toxins in the snapping turtle and how we and how how well, I think they don't reproduce till, like, what, seventeen or eight twenty years old or something. And so there's sort of could potentially be a time lag in our understanding of the health of that population because of how long it lives. Can you comment on that? [Luke Grosvenor]: No. That's that's absolute absolutely true. So snapping turtles are long lived, you know, decades and decades and decades. They scavenge on carcasses. They scavenge on, you know, carcasses that are higher up in the food chain. So bioaccumulation is a thing for for snapping turtles. I don't harvest them. I would never. I would not eat them personally. But sorry. You had another question that I'm just I'm missing. But yes. So the snapping turtle. So my position is funded mostly through federal funds. So I am required to focus on species that are and that are, identified as species of greatest conservation need. So rare, threatened, endangered species. The snapping turtle is not one of those, so we don't have data on snapping turtle populations. The Atlas probably has the best data on snapping turtle populations, and I'm I suspect it's it's not an age structure type of data. It's more distribution of of where they occur. So anything about structures of young versus adults at a pond, we don't know. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: I don't know how you would age a turtle. Is there can you age a turtle? [Luke Grosvenor]: Yes. You can. Okay. There's skeletal skeletal skeletal chronology is one way that's lab based. Typically, what people do is count the growth rings or annuli on the scutes or the the plates on the turtle's back or or belly. They get you so far. They're not, you know, they're not exact by any means. And after twenty or so years, those annuli or those growth rings on a lot of species wear smooth, so you can't identify them. So it it is very hard to identify the age of speed of turtles. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: I guess you could, though, determine if they're over twenty ish by that. Representative Tagliavee? [Representative Mike Tagliavia]: With talking about snapping turtles and the bioaccumulation of heavy metals, do we have any data either in Vermont or nationally on any kind of poisonings from people consuming snapping turtle? [Luke Grosvenor]: There is no data in Vermont that I'm aware of. There possibly could be some, you know, across the country. I'm not aware of it, but that's not to say there isn't any. I don't know. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Thank you. [Luke Grosvenor]: Sure. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Do members have quest further questions for Luke? By yeah. Representative Bartholomew. [Representative John Bartholomew]: I remember reading not recently, but that amphibians worldwide were showing an increasing prevalence of developmental defects from e I'm not sure what, environmental contaminants or ozone or something. Is is that still the case, and is that we're seeing that here? [Luke Grosvenor]: So I believe that was an issue in the late nineties, maybe early two thousands, and it it was here in Vermont. You know, there was incidences of frogs with extra limbs, deformities, things like that, and that was, you know, seen across the country. There were some studies. If I recall, my understanding is it wasn't a smoke there wasn't a smoking gun that that came to it. It was a, you know, it came down to pollution, like, several causes, synergies between them, but I I would have to look into that for sure. There was a study here in Vermont in the early two thousands I could share. [Representative John Bartholomew]: Is that not a problem anymore? [Luke Grosvenor]: I don't hear of reports anymore, and I don't see limb deformities myself. But I think it was a period in time that has passed mostly. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Representative North. [Representative Robert North]: Yes. Thank you for your presentation. And wondering, as soon as we started mentioning the list that that we had kinda centered on based on testimony we heard yesterday, the bullfrogs, leopard frogs, snapping turtles, you you immediately jumped to this quantitative list of s categories, s five, s four, s three. Is that is that, like, an accepted standard that we maybe could use to here in in lieu of identifying specific species. I'm wondering if there's a if we can reference that. Is that, like, a long term saying, or is that something that's just Vermont's specific issue or anything like that? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: I'll let Luke answer that. [Luke Grosvenor]: Sure. I I can speak to s I mean, s ranks it's it's s stands for state ranks. So it's something we have, something other states have. There's global ranks too. So s ranks and g ranks are standard. It's not just Vermont that uses those. Whether that would be appropriate to include in the in the legislation, I I would leave that to the commissioner or Raus to to speak to. [Representative Robert North]: And so and what are those levels? The there's, like, I imagine five. One, two, three, four, five. Exactly. [Luke Grosvenor]: S one through s five. [Representative Robert North]: And what what do each of them mean? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: We can Okay. I can I we can make sure that you get, like, the written the written description of them? Okay. That might be a lot easier than Yep. Yeah. [Luke Grosvenor]: Makes sense. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Representative Zakowitz. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Yeah. Thank you. If if I'm understanding you correctly, you are indicating that we we have don't have good information on the population abundance of snapping turtles because they're not considered threatened or endangered. And so those creatures, we have better data data for. So I guess my question then is, how do we go from one category to the other? How do we actually get to, you know, a threatened or endangered status if we don't if we're not keeping tabs on the population sizes and what those what the populations you know, what what the dynamic population dynamics are over time of of a particular species. [Luke Grosvenor]: Yeah. That's a great question. I believe with the I believe the state with the natural heritage database, we start monitoring species at the s three level. So s three, s two, and s one, the rare, threatened, and endangered species. But s four and s five, the more common species, we don't. A lot of the data that we we do know about those species comes from Jim Andrews and the Herp Atlas. They keep records on all s one through s five species, so rare and common. And the number of towns, number of populations, A lot of that data comes through them, which we use to identify s ranks. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Okay. And to follow to follow-up, for a creature like the snapping turtle, which has such a a long lifespan and such a a slow reproductive rate, it would it be possible for it to slip from s five to s four, s three, like, relative relatively quickly, in which case we'd be playing catch up rather than sort of preserving it to begin with? [Luke Grosvenor]: It's a good question. So snapping turtles are pretty ubiquitous across the state, you know, statewide, fairly common. So what I could imagine being an issue more than them, you know, disappearing is earlier recruitment not coming into the population. So like I I talked about in my last testimony is the eggs are readily eaten by by predators and so are the juveniles. So we may have older adults in the population without the youngers coming up to replace them, and that would be really hard to know without data, for sure. But to go from an s five to an s one would likely take some time and, you know, I we see like, I was in the I was surveying a wetland yesterday for for another spot for another species, and I you know, we see snapping turtles all the time. So I think there would be some red flags raised where when we're out in the wetlands and not seeing the snapping turtles, we'd we'd raise red flags. But, yeah, I don't hopefully, that's gonna get your question. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: I guess I'm just concerned that given how how long it takes for these creatures to reproduce that it there's it's so slow that it wouldn't that it would just be it would just I I guess I made my point right there. I just it's just easy for me to it just seems like a a special case where where we might not be as concerned about preserving species at the s five level and not worrying about them very much because we know if we did see problems because of, you know, human, predation that that they would recover quickly once we stop that. But with this kind of creature, it seems like if people were taking these to a point where it it was a problem and we didn't know, it would be really hard for them to recover in the wild. It would take [Chair Amy Sheldon]: you know, it would it [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: would be a a many decades long process. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Can I I'll just interject right now? Like, right now, we don't have any safety net or any regulation protecting these turtles or having any authority to keep them on the landscape. Like, right now, people can can shoot them, can take them, can harvest them at any limit without any repercussion. And they've been [Rosalind Renfrew]: doing [Andrea Shortsleeve]: that, essentially, since snapping turtles have been here, and they are a widespread common species. So I think just to keep that in perspective that like, we're not, we're not asking to increase the harvest or, loosen anything for protections on these turtles. We're actually asking to put some restrictions on. So I think just to keep that in perspective as we're talking about this stuff. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Yeah. This is very specific to these particular creatures in the future. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Yeah. Alright. Further questions on the biology part? Representative Pritchard? [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: You know, one of the things that we talked about yesterday that we tossed around was was, you know, having maybe having regulation [Rosalind Renfrew]: Mhmm. [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: And and something to help with department. And one of the suggestions that I made was, you know, I don't know. I you know, I don't wanna create a a lot of work, but, you know, we're all trying to track things and have rough you know, how many people take snapping turtles? Nobody really knows. As as just having an endorsement on on of on your license Mhmm. You you know, that you can click on and it's doesn't catch you anything and you can say about there's thirty people in the state that take snapping turtles. But I think, you know, along what you said, you know, there has been no limits. There has been no protections forever. And by doing this, it's only gonna make this better for the snapping turtle. And it's still to me, whether it's thirty five or forty, if people do it and the resource is there, it to me, it's a win win. We're protecting the turtle. We're making it better, and we're not denying these people. You know? Just because I doesn't I don't want to take snapping turtles and eat turtle soup doesn't mean somebody else should be denied somebody else should be denied on because I don't like it. You know, if the resource is there and it could be utilized and it doesn't harm the population, I think that's what we should do. I don't think anybody eats newts or, [Rosalind Renfrew]: you [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: know, stuff like that. And if there's really no reason, we we talked about protecting those things, all those other things. And that's how the garter snake came up because, you know, I mean, nobody eats snakes. You know, why not protect these things when we can? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Yeah. And I think having having, as you suggested, some kind of mechanism, whether it's an endorsement or a a stamp or whatnot, would help us understand what people are harvesting. [Rosalind Renfrew]: Can I add something about the s ranks? I don't I don't see a way to raise my hand. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Sure. Absolutely. You don't need you don't need to. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: There's only two of you in the room. So okay. [Rosalind Renfrew]: For the record, Rosalind Renfrew, wildlife diversity program, fish and wildlife department. So the the s ranks, just to go back to the x s ranks for a minute, they're based on things like rarity and threats to the species and their trends. You know, so they're they're not strictly numerical all the time, and a lot of times we lack the data. And, a lot of times it's it's expert opinion rather than hard data because we just don't have it. That said, it's it's expert opinion that have a pretty good sense of of what's going on on the ground. Someone like Luke and and, like, four other people like him in Vermont who, you know, him and Jim and others who have a really good sense. So you have to use what data you have and fill in the rest with your, you know, your, your opinion based on your expertise. And so the I just don't want you to give I don't I don't want you to have the impression that the s ranks are purely numerical and that we have all the information and all the data, and we just run a calculation, and we've got a you know, and then an s rank comes out of it. It's it's more nuanced than that. But but it what it does speak to is how important it is to have monitoring programs like the amphibian at atlas because it does help us gather at least some sense of that information for a lot of species and a lot of those rely on citizen scientists. It also I also just wanna point out how important the scientific advisory groups are, like the one that Luke and and Jim are on, because they are the the the body of experts that that provide the information. And then the state wildlife action plan is sort of that every ten year plan that takes all that into account and figures out what the species needs. So this is sort of the reason why it's so important to monitor a lot of what's out there because we need that information to assess, you know, is it an s five, or is it going up to an s four? It's just really hard. Monitoring isn't very exciting to sort of advertise for or to promote. It's year after year, year in, year out, but it's super important. So I just really wanted to highlight that because I think you're seeing how that comes to bear on decisions like that. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Representative Sackler. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Yeah. And I I apologize to everybody for getting us, like, just a little bit on a tangent here, but it seems does seem pertinent. When we're talking about these rankings, do they take into account, like, declines in species, which as as as being a concern even if the species is abundant? So, like, maybe there's a bird that, you know, fifty years ago, you couldn't, like, walk two feet without seeing, and now you have to walk twenty feet to [Chair Amy Sheldon]: see it. So it's, you [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: know, it's only ten percent as common as it used to be, but if they're still everywhere, like, would that show up in in the ranking somehow? Would that show up as as as a concern when you're thinking about how how to manage these species? [Rosalind Renfrew]: Yes. We look at trends. So whether or not you can detect those trends depends on for how long we've been monitoring. Right? So some of the most robust data we have are for birds. They they have the best data. Everybody's jealous of the bird data because they've been monitored across the country since nineteen sixty nine. And so we have great trend data for the big picture and even at the state level for a lot of species. So you can really look at the very long term declines. If you see a decline, you've only been collecting data for ten years, you know, you still take that decline seriously. You just don't know where they used to be twenty years ago. Right? So you have to take every you take what you get, and then you you work with that. Does that help? [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Yes. But I'm also wondering, like, how does that how does that translate into the rankings? So if there was a bird that was, you know, incredibly abundant in nineteen sixty nine, and now it's only ten percent is abundant, but but there's still lots of them. Like, there's no immediate threat that they're gonna become extinct. Would they how would would that affect their ranking, or are they still s five because they're everywhere, and it doesn't look like they're gonna go extinct anytime, you know, in the foreseeable future? [Rosalind Renfrew]: Yeah. That's a that's an excellent question, and there's a lot of context to that. So for so if if there was a species that had already there's a lot of species out there that have already declined by quite a bit, and now we're just looking at you know, we're we're at a starting point where before we had any hard data, they probably declined or maybe they increased. You know, forest birds here, you know, compared to a hundred years ago, have probably increased. So we're now looking at their declines or increases or changes since about nineteen seventy when we started collecting data. So we're we're we're mostly using that those numbers because that's what we have data for, but they always have to be in the context of what changes have we seen on the landscape. So if we've seen Vermont become reforested and we see black throated blue warblers increasing because they're a forest bird, we can understand what's going on. If the forest is if we're not losing forest in Vermont, but we're still but they start tanking, then that's a problem that's gonna raise alarms, and that might raise the x rank higher. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: Thank you. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Alright. So your thoughts on our changed approach here? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Well, I didn't have a lot of time to kind of to really dive in similar to, I guess, you all. And I asked the major to come with me just from his experience of, of writing rules and the perspective of, you know, regulation. I think the intent of the original language in the bill was giving the commissioner authority to set a regulated season, and that can you know, having that authority with the commissioner with oversight of the species advisory group, the sag, makes that a little more nimble than having it sit in statute. So if if there are trends being noticed, if populations are changing, you know, from either the the Atlas or from from Luke's work, that can be adjusted really quickly rather than coming back and forth through legislation. So I think that that was kind of one of the biggest things that we noticed. Additionally, I think the way that it's written there's, there would basically be a gap between right the commissioner writing a rule. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: If a squirrel who would like to join the test Every year we [Andrea Shortsleeve]: and then just the the, importation and possession permitting authority, I think that language needs to get just needs to coincide a little bit better. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: What does that mean coincide? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Well, it looks like there's a gap. The way that it's written, Hannah highlighted for me the way that the the new draft is written, it would effectively suspend the importation and possession permitting authority, and the ability to harvest the species for food until the department has adopted a new rule. So, in the language that we proposed, the rulemaking authority was discretionary and intentionally did not conflict with the current importation permitting authority. And so it nothing there's no gap in between, until a new rule is passed. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: So but that that's actually because we put a moratorium on the taking of reptiles and amphibians. That's our intent, was to take pause them all until he promulgated rules. [Rosalind Renfrew]: I I think if I may, I think, in in in the original bill, it prohibited taking in collection. And in this recent writing, it's including possession and import. And I think that that's redundant with these other statutes that Andrea was reading. So four seven zero nine and [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Federal ten section eight eighteen. [Rosalind Renfrew]: Such append yeah. Appendix section section eighteen. I I think it's running into the the so I think it might be a matter of mister Grady looking at it and seeing if that's an issue. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Okay. But just the general concept of where we where we intended to go Mhmm. You're open to that, and we can pursue it a little. We'll get a gradient here and walk through it and probably a panel look at it again too and just see where we're at. But Yeah. Wanna make sure we were heading in a direction that and I it's it's definitely our intent to keep the pieces that you mentioned around the importation and the grandfathering of existing Mhmm. Pets. And, and I think the rulemaking is as nimble as it was, although it does you know, he's calling out particular species, which we will change based on Luke's testimony today. But and includes also flexibility around non native and native species that the commissioner finds to be an issue in the future. Colonel, do you have a comment? [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: I was I couldn't see you, so I just [Representative Robert North]: moved over. I know. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: It's good. Other questions, Representative Prichard? [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: Yeah. So I mean, are you okay with, you know, how what our intent was as far as protecting all reptiles and amphibians with exclusion of those three? Because that's what we had talked about. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: In theory, yes. Like, supportive of protecting all of the the reptiles and amphibians. From what I understand, it just with the way that some of these species are trending, that it's the process of having something changed in statute is so much slower than having a rule that goes through the commissioner's authority is. And so if if there's any sort of change in a species that, like [Representative Christopher Pritchard]: Would elevate it to an s five? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Well, no. I would say elevate it to, like or decrease it to, say, an s three. So say there's right now, there's question whether bullfrogs if if they're trend trending downwards. The way that this is written now, we'd have to if if we've decided that bullfrogs were [Rosalind Renfrew]: trending down and we wouldn't want want them to be harvested any longer, we'd have to come [Andrea Shortsleeve]: back and it would have to be original draft, it was a commissioner's rule. It could go through rulemaking, which is can start at any time, go through the public process and then be addressed in a in a much quicker fashion. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Okay. I think though I hear, I hear your concern. We'll make sure we address it. Okay. And I think it's up the line five rules adopted by the commissioner of the fish and wildlife under this section shall be designed to maintain the best health population and utilization levels of the regulated reptile or amphibian. What I'm hearing you say is you want to be sure that also allows stopping the season. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Correct. Yes. And I think in [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Of course, that's what we want you to have. Yeah. That's our intent. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Yeah. And then and then maybe the major can can offer some insight here too. But with I mean, the commissioner can we can have a season of zero, a limit of zero, and that can be, if it, if it sits with the commissioner's authority, it can be changed much quicker. So that's accurate. [Representative Robert North]: That's fine. Yeah. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Yeah. We definitely want to protect all of all of the species, all of the herp species. And we just felt like that was a more nimble, quicker way. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Okay. Further questions? Representative Austin, what happens [Clerk Sarah Austin]: when we're out of season? When we're out of the legislature? What happens with your authority? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: With my authority? It remains the same. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Okay. But [Clerk Sarah Austin]: if something happened with an animal Mhmm. And we had it a certain way and it was the legislature that had to make that decision, what happens? [Andrea Shortsleeve]: My understanding is that we would have to go through the same process that we were going through now. So wait until a bill gets picked up, address. January? [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Correct. Oh, interesting. K. Right. Further thoughts? Thank you all for joining us. Yeah. Thank you. And were there any other Yes. You may. [Luke Grosvenor]: Okay. One one last thing I was gonna say about the bill, potential revision. On page seven, at the very last line, number nineteen, it talks about apply any about waivers for recession for prohibited species legally acquired as a pet prior to July first twenty twenty five. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Yep. So it's [Luke Grosvenor]: there. Yes. I I think it's great great having that waiver, but I chair the import team. So we if this all goes through, we may not you know, there's there's background things we have to do before we we restrict the pond slider, like getting hold of of pet shops and things like that. So I'm just curious what happens to a pet slider that's acquired legally, say, on August first, and then we restrict the species in, say, twenty twenty seven. Like, those species that are acquired legally after July first twenty twenty five and before the restriction. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Yeah. That's language that you all brought us. [Luke Grosvenor]: Yeah. So in my mind, I could just see changing July first to the date the species becomes restricted or something like that. [Representative Larry Satcowitz]: That makes sense. [Representative Robert North]: K. [Luke Grosvenor]: Only only only thing I was gonna bring up is I somebody brought up the wanting waste law, during the discussion yesterday. I don't believe reptiles and amphibians will be included in the wanting waste law because they're not a quad game quadruped animal, which I believe is defined in statute. So something I wanted to bring up. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Yeah. The want and waste bill is definitely for regulated species. It includes furbearers as well, and that was part of how we got to this conversation was that with yeah. That's I don't know if we need to revisit it, but that's part of how we did get to this idea that, well, we should actually not be allowed because because of what the commissioner started out by reminding us of, which is that currently, people can take any of these species. And we're trying to put some boundaries around that now in a logical way. It's so interesting with fish and game fish and wildlife. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: So the following process. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Yeah. Alright. I just want while you're all here, I'm just looking back through making sure that anyone else have thoughts on the bill or I feel like we keep coming back to sections of it and learning more about it as we get closer to trying to move it out of committee. So just wanna make sure anything else that folks have on their minds related to this bill. Alright. Thank you again. [Andrea Shortsleeve]: Thanks for having us today. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: Yep. We are No problem. We are, and, yeah, commissioner, if you could hang on, I'd love to talk to you after Oh, [Andrea Shortsleeve]: okay. After. [Chair Amy Sheldon]: But right now, I wanna just say that judiciary committee is looking at age eighty six right now. So, hopefully, we'll hear back from them. But for now, we're not scheduled again till tomorrow morning after the four. And it's actually at ten thirty, so there's actual time because it's out of I think it's someone joining us by Zoom. Are they joining by Zoom tomorrow? So, anyway, presentation then. I hope we'll have some updates on h eighty six also. For for now, we're adjourned. We're adjourned for the day. Yep. Thank you.

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