D3 through the diet only?

[leedragon]

to be clear I do not critizies you or SMCNARY or anyone in this forum.


I am not against owning a chameleon, what I am against with and I don´t like is the waste of animals, I would love for people to commit to their chameleons the same way you commit to a dog or a child, when adopting a dog you are taking responsability of the 15+ years the the animal will live, it would be nice that people who get chameleon, planned for having an animal who is going to live in some cases 20 years.
That those people commited and took care of the animal for those( probably) 17 or so years that the animal has left to live.

If I ( now talking about myself) start owning chamelons again I am gonna have to count with 70 (ish) dollar less of my salary for each animal each month, with the cost of lighting, gutloadning, eventually vet visits, water, electricity bills.
If each animal is gonna cost me that much each month then I can not own a amount of animals that would exceed the amount of money in my salary
I may not be the sharpest tool in the box but I don´t expect the animal t pay for it self, when I get an animal I know that the animal is an amount of less money in my salary, as a dog or a child would be, there is dogfigthing for making money of the dog but that is an other subjec and I wouldn´t like myself doing..

And for the same reason that I don´t expect an animal to pay or take care of it self in captivity that I am too against of private individuals owning animals that exceeds the human life span, like galapagos turtles, you are responsible of they life of that animal and you are not going to be there for 100+ that that turtle is going to need someone to look after then. zoo and organisation can do that because new people are been hire or take places of the one who leave.

on that subjec I don´t know how there is any legal galapagos turtles in captivity if their export of galapagos is ilegal

breeders just mate their animals but don´t take responsability of where their offspring is going to end up, it would be nice if people take the responsability all the way( I am not calling any of you irresponsible, due I have seem by the threads the awesome work you have done with your animals) like chuck and other have done with their parsoniis offsprings, I recall reading on his add " the animals won´t be sell to people without the knowledge or experience to keep this animals, I don´t mind keeping all the youngs myself".

Really making sure that the offspring don´t go to waste, if this would be applied to all chameleons their would be no need to breed 200 panther just so 5 could end up living their full lifespan, breed those five so so those five can live their full lifespan.
the same would be with WC, if those are preserved and their offspring are taken cared they probably won´t be a need to export more than 100 animals to establish a CB

and I actually not really that against how the US handle WC, of what I see here in the forums is that the animalss the come up are the one of the CITES quotes, you don´t really see animals that are no under CITES quotes. well in other parts of the world where it is no allowed with wild caught, it pops out so many wild caught animals, whatever they many be in CITES quote or not, and there again how many animals don´t go to waste?.

the same goes for veilds, I have mix opinious about how they are handled how many of us have keep their starting veild ? they are just send around and what happen to them in the end? veild are stableshed in captivity but how many of them don´t go to waste? and this is one of the reason why they are an invader species in the usa, because people won´t take responsability of the 8 + years that they may become.

No all the people needs to own a chamelon and no all the people who are chamelon keepers need to own a F minor( and no jurgen no judging you here either just taking an x chameleon species for example) there is no need to breed it larges number so those just so a few can establish a CB populations, the answer of a CB populations lays in not having chameleons go to waste.

and for those reasons I am too interested in how D3 can replace the use of uv light bulbs, due for example exo terra has changed their luv light tubes for the worse, causing even skin burns by the light, a use of d3 could help in reducing the waste of chameleons

Leedragon...do you know Bjorn Tuvesson?
He used to post on a forum I was on a long time ago and was working with pardalis and starting into parsons at that time. I think Kevin Becker was working with him on the parsons project.

I have meet him at a show in stockholm, and asked and recived advice from him from time to time, but I don´t know him personally, yes he was one of the main breeders in sweden of pardalis, if I recall from his webb site he breed a clutch of parsoniss orange eyes, but he has move on to pitbull geckos, I think he still breed those but as far as I know he don´t breed chameleons anymore, his webb site http://www.pitbullgeckos.com/

 

[Mike Fisher]

Breeders can control who they sell to, but the bottom line is that anyone who wants a chameleon will buy from someone whether it is WC or CB, from a breeder or pet store etc. If they have bad husbandry, that animal will suffer and die. Individual breeders can refuse certain customers, but in the end, they will get a chameleon, like it or not.

Here's the reality: If the demand for chameleons exceeds the amount bred in captivity, the difference will be taken from the bushes. Better that the demand is met by captive breeders than the collectors pulling them out of the trees.

Don't get me wrong, I really care about what happens to the chameleons I produce. But I care more about the ones still in the wild that may not be collected because of my efforts. If we as breeders can get better at more variety of species than just veiled and panthers, we could really make a difference.

 

[Mike Fisher]

If we care so much about the chameleons, we would just leave them in the wild and no captive animals at all. Like when the CiN disbanded. Unfortunately, even the wild animals are suffering from human deforestation/encroachment. Many of these species will be lost before they even get classified. I can see a time coming when certain species of chameleons will only exist in captive populations.

As good as many keepers and breeders are, we are all still learning. Hopefully we can learn enough to keep species from disappearing forever, but ultimately it comes down to the people and governments where the chameleons originate.

 

[junglefries]

Probably not directly but I was up to 3K veileds a year when I burnt out.

My record for veils at one time was 165+|- in one day, and about 275 for the year. Drove me INSANE. Cannot comprehend 3,000 in one year. Makes brain hurt , must stop thinking, now! Uurrgghh! Mine kept me busy nonstop from 6am-8pm. Can't imagine the amount of work needed for 3,000. I used 5,000 crickets in six days. Mr Fisher, you are certifiably insane. I too, got out of veils, all together. My last 26 eggs will hatch around November, and are prepromised to someone. Cannot wait until they are out of here. (P.S. I found the window clips you told me about. I had to use the clear ones from Lowes (Home Depot doesn't sell), as only those would reach the coroplast on Reptibreeze. Thank you for the idea. I no longer hear my kid screaming at me that is raining in the house, when I spray the loft cages. Thanks.)

 

[Mike Fisher]

My record for veils at one time was 165+|- in one day, and about 275 for the year. Drove me INSANE. Cannot comprehend 3,000 in one year.

Yeah nuts...

Francois Le Berre agreed to buy all I could produce, so I ramped up. It was like the wild west back then. Before people jump all over quantity breeders, that is what it takes to establish a species in the pet trade. Before then, there was no demand, we created it.

I had over 3K eggs in incubators when a construction contractor killed power to my incubators thus stopping production. I was devastated and dropped out. It took five years of litigation to get my money from the insurance company. I swore I'd never breed chameleon again.

Anyway, this thread took a big detour from the original topic....

 

[kinyonga]

Worthwhile and interesting thread even though it deviated from the original post.

Although the demand may have increased faster because they were bred in large numbers, I think it would have happened eventually anyhow....and if it hadn't been for breeders a lot more would have been taken out of the wild.

I was more interested in learning about them than breeding. I bred and raised the babies as "proof" that my husbandry was okay. I figure the more we learn from breeding and keeping them the better the chance of us keeping them from extinction...maybe.

 

[Mike Fisher]

I figure the more we learn from breeding and keeping them the better the chance of us keeping them from extinction...maybe.

Well stated.