Panther Crosses... Why is it a Touchy Subject?

Is it?
What makes you say it's a touchy subject?

On a species conservationist perspective, I suppose it would be a bit touchy,
if the breeding got out of hand.
 
I think some see it as playing with mother nature as in the wild, the crosses don't exist so by crossing locals your doing something that nature doesn't do on its own.

Also, if your not careful in your recorded keeping, selling a cross as a pure breed local would end up with some very unhappy customers.
 
Kayla is 37.5% Ambanja x 31.25% Nosy Be x 25% Nosy Faly x 12.5% Sambava. Her lineage goes back 4 generations. I plan on breeding her once to a 100% Ambanja. But I'd have everything on record and sell the babies as Crosses. I wouldn't lie to the buyers lol. There's so many color combinations possibilities.
 
NHenn said:
I think some see it as playing with mother nature as in the wild, the crosses don't exist so by crossing locals your doing something that nature doesn't do on its own
.
Click to expand...

I have a REALLY hard time with this. With the close proximity of these locales, I find it unreasonable to think that one locale would magically stop walking when he reaches that imaginary line separating two areas.

Or, would it be unreasonable to think that a local person, tourist or guide could pick up a Cham from one area and release him/her when they get to their next destination?

I'm not going to pretend to know the geographical layout of Madagascar, but it would seem to me that a Cham from one locale could end up in another, either naturally or by human intervention.

Have any of you ever picked up a stray animal and brought it home? Gone hunting or hiking and find something you thought was cool and transport it to another area. I'm just saying.

NHenn, I'm not directing this towards you. I've mentioned this before and your post just happened to be handy. ;) Nothing personal towards you.

Anywho, carry on... :cool:
 
From a breeder's perspective, I see crosses as a possible way to mess up your blood lines. I don't see anything wrong with wanting to cross 2 or more locales except for the possibility that the females will end up in the hobby being passed off as pure locale. A casual breeder may start a project with the best of intentions and produce some amazing and unique color patterns. They will sell the females as a cross at a discounted rate and do everything with great integrity. Who is going to oversee where the females end up and how do you know from there that those females are not being sold outright as a pure locale or bred with another male and the cross is never mentioned in the next generation? Its impossible to keep locales completely pure but that is my opinion on the subject and why I do not do crosses.
 
reptoman said:
From a breeder's perspective, I see crosses as a possible way to mess up your blood lines. I don't see anything wrong with wanting to cross 2 or more locales except for the possibility that the females will end up in the hobby being passed off as pure locale. A casual breeder may start a project with the best of intentions and produce some amazing and unique color patterns. They will sell the females as a cross at a discounted rate and do everything with great integrity. Who is going to oversee where the females end up and how do you know from there that those females are not being sold outright as a pure locale or bred with another male and the cross is never mentioned in the next generation? Its impossible to keep locales completely pure but that is my opinion on the subject and why I do not do crosses.
Click to expand...

I agree with this. It's almost impossible to identify pure females, let alone crosses. If one breeder or buyer misrepresents a female... BOOM! Multiple generations will be jacked up.

Maybe we should just sell all panthers as "panthers" and they all have the same price tag... $99.99

:D :D :D :D :D
 
Reptoman, I agree with that. I think that we are the future of chameleons, in an environmental sense, because at the rate of habitat destruction we are their best survival chance. It's important to keep the lines clean and avoid crosses, because while you may be a quite responsible breeder and sell them as crosses, there's no guarantee that those buyers won't breed them and sell them as pure locales. I agree that crosses are beautiful, and may own one at some point, who knows, but I guess I'm just a purist at heart. JMHO. :eek:
 
The whole debate over crossing locales is IMO ridiculous. Locales get crossed in the wild daily I'm sure (yes I am aware some locales are completely isolated, but not all are). Breeders are never going to be asked to turn over their collections to repopulate the wild. I think as long as you are honest, and sell your babies for what they actually are, there should be no problems. Many of the most colorful chameleons are crosses. Really when you think about it, if the biggest scandal the chameleon community is dealing with is cross breeding locales, be thankful. Just take a peek at the debate over the new "scale-less ball python" I think we're doing ok so far haha. Do what makes you happy, be honest, be ethical and I feel like there's no harm done to anyone.
Just my opinion tho.
 
This is where my ignorance rears its ugly head. Aren't all furcifer pardalis made up of the same genetics? Are you really "crossing" anything?

In other words: what's the difference in a Chinese man mating with a German woman and a nosy be mating with ambanja?

Homo sapiens
Furcifer pardalis

If I'm totally out in left field, please clue me in...
 
Not a problem Max I understand where you are coming from. Your right, who is to say that different locals don't meet up in the wild at some point.

I personally don't have any problems with crosses and think they make some really cool looking panthers!

I do have a question about breeding crosses though, if you breed a female with a different local male will her offspring always be crosses because of possible retained sperm or would you be able to pair her back up with the same local later and get pure locals again?
 
NHenn said:
Not a problem Max I understand where you are coming from. Your right, who is to say that different locals don't meet up in the wild at some point.

I personally don't have any problems with crosses and think they make some really cool looking panthers!

I do have a question about breeding crosses though, if you breed a female with a different local male will her offspring always be crosses because of possible retained sperm or would you be able to pair her back up with the same local later and get pure locals again?
Click to expand...

Females can retain sperm from one pairing for up to 3 clutches. What you can do is wait until she drops an infertile clutch and then pair her up with your desired male.
 
If a male and female of a different locale find each other in the wild and she's receptive, they will mate. Theres no one around to pull them away and tell them no you can't do that! Yes its great to have pure breed. But there's noways to stop it in the wild.
 
NHenn said:
Not a problem Max I understand where you are coming from. Your right, who is to say that different locals don't meet up in the wild at some point.

I personally don't have any problems with crosses and think they make some really cool looking panthers!

I do have a question about breeding crosses though, if you breed a female with a different local male will her offspring always be crosses because of possible retained sperm or would you be able to pair her back up with the same local later and get pure locals again?
Click to expand...

I have gotten up to 3 viable clutches from a single mating and have heard some people have had 4. You could breed her to another male in between any of these retain clutches so its feasible you would get a mix of both for a few clutches. I have seen this in my own breeding colony and there was definitely characteristics from both males mated to the same female.

"Pure locale" is a relative term IMO. I'm sure there are plenty of instances in the wild where the locales mix. The reason I don't do crosses is not that I want things kept "pure" as much as I would like to have a reasonable expectation of what the offspring are going to look like from a mating. Crosses added to the hobby introduce the possibility of paying for something you did not really want.
 
what we call "pure" in captivity largely isn't anyways. We get wild caught females that are misslabelled, breed for looks, and don't cull the weak.
"true blue" NosyBe Panthers are a good example of captive pure animals that do not look like what the wild ones look like.

anyways, this subject is tired.
There are hundreds of posts on the same subject already. Some of them have excellent for/against comments. So I suggest just reading these:

Panther Hybrids
https://www.chameleonforums.com/cross...panthers-31504
crossbreeding
https://www.chameleonforums.com/why-n...ambilobe-7124/
Why only certain cross breeds?
https://www.chameleonforums.com/cross-breeding-40955
Breeding true bloodlines
 
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CrazyChamLady13 said:
If a male and female of a different locale find each other in the wild and she's receptive, they will mate. Theres no one around to pull them away and tell them no you can't do that! Yes its great to have pure breed. But there's noways to stop it in the wild.
Click to expand...

maxttu said:
With the close proximity of these locales, I find it unreasonable to think that one locale would magically stop walking when he reaches that imaginary line separating two areas.
Click to expand...

Why do you think there are different locales to begin with? If they were just 'imaginary lines' then different locales would not exist in the wild. They would all look the same because there would be nothing to separate populations. There are mountains and open spaces and water bodies separating forests and populations, which is why locales exist to begin with. Populations being isolated from others allowed certain genetics and colorations to be more prominent without outside influence because of geographical barriers, and thus we have locales. I'm sure there are some areas where those barriers might be easy to breach, but if they were all easy then all panthers would look the same because all the genetics would mix. Clearly that is not the case since we have specific patterns unique to regions. So this argument that it happens all the time in nature is flawed because there are geographical barriers to stop them from coming in contact with each other naturally.

Here is a map of the origins of different locales: http://www.chameleoncompany.com/Locales.html
Notice how some regions are islands, or separated by mountain ranges. Not only is that a physical barrier, but panther chameleons are not going to be eager to go above certain elevations with temperature changes and so even if small mountains, still a significant barrier. And there are other factors like large rivers or large open spaces with no trees that can also influence population separation. Don't make that 'it happens in nature' argument so casually.

You are correct that they are all the same species, Furcifer pardalis. But all dogs are Canis lupus familiaris. Think of it like dog breeds. You breed a lab to a lab to get more labs. Breeding to a different breed creates mutts. You can slap any designer labels you want on it, but it is still a mutt. It won't exhibit the characteristics of either breed of its parentage precisely because it is a mix. Still the same species, but you've lost some of the characteristics of the breed. Or with chameleons the locale. Dogs are prolific and there are established lines of breeds to draw from so mutts aren't going to completely muddle the gene pool because you can still get a lab if you want one even with a lot of labradoodles. But we don't have that luxury in chameleons because there are not thousands of each locale in captivity. We may never be asked to donate back to the wild when wild populations fail, or maybe we will. You don't know that can't happen. But if (or when) wild populations are restricted from import then what we have here is all we have. And if indiscriminate breeding causes too much muddling of genes then we won't see locales anymore. There will just be panthers, no sambavas or tamataves or ambanja. I'd like to see locales preserved.

Sandra has provided links to the threads where this subject has been thoroughly discussed. As you will see, the older threads are very hostile toward the idea. The more recent threads are more accepting but acknowledge that certain precautions are needed. If done responsibly then it shouldn't have a detrimental effect on our captive population gene pool.
 
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