Warning About New Madagascar Quota Species

[Chris Anderson]

<continued from previous post>

I think the updated IUCN Red List/CITES quota system is the way to go and should be seen in West Africa if they want to continue exporting chameleons. Unregulated trade is not the way to go.

No disagreement here. I just have a problem with denying the facts about our history as a hobby. We should call a spade a spade and use that to motivate ourselves to do better, not hide under a veil of BS lies and claim things are better than they really are!

However recent keepers (and some in the past) in Europe and the USA have proven that keeping long term (Me and others) and breeding (Chuck) Madagascar species is possible in the USA and Europe.

Definitely some promising and welcome results over the last decade, but a single hatched parsonii clutch in the US and less than a handful of additional clutches we are waiting on results for over the last decade is hardly established.

Your species list about what is being captive bred in the states is off. I know of multiple keepers that have bred F3 Trioceros deremensis in the 1990's and F2 until recently. As well we have got a Forums member who self proclaims himself a Jackson Farmer with Trioceros jacsonii jacksonii, merumontanus, and xantholophus. There is at least one breeder still breeding Kinyongia tavetana. I have known a lot of great breeder who are just now picking up the hobby again because of the breaking up of the CIN.

And not one of those species (aside from T. j. xantholophus) is established to the point that regular influx of WC blood is not essential to maintaining the species in captivity long term! That is the abysmal fact I'm trying got get across. Isolated success is not the same as established in the trade, which is what needs to happen and has been lacking completely for all but a few species!

It took me until 2009 before I found this Forums and there are many great keepers especially from Southern California, the Pacific North West and back East I have not heard from since the break up of the CIN.

Doesn't change the fact that it has been openly (and freely) available to the public since 2005 nor that other free resources have been available since before 2002 when the CiN closed down (the CiN was not a free or openly available resource).

I have not seen T. fuellebornii available to the US keepers since about 2002.

Also does not change the fact that hundreds have been imported into the US alone since 2002!

I have always stated that I am for conservative quotas and think these high quota for species such as Kinyongia multituberculata and Chamaeleo dilepis, gracilis, should be exported in far less numbers. With the new development with the Madagascar Quotas there maybe prospects that these gross quotas in African countries may change.

I am done debating perceptions of breeding accomplishment. These new quotas are good for the hobby for keepers in North America, Europe, or Asia (regulated exports not black market exports) and may be the start of necessary updated quotas or establishment for chameleons quotas elsewhere. This is a positive.

I've also always stated that I'm for sustainable quotas based on sound scientific backing of these and other species. I too think these new quotas are a good thing for hopefully tackling some of the illegal trade and may be a beneficial framework for other countries. I simply think twisting our track record of establishing species in captivity is ridiculous and foolish! I do not think we should kid ourselves into thinking our track record is anything other than it is because if anything, this should be alarming enough to push us to try harder!

Chris

 

[ataraxia]

Ardi for president. Just sayin'.

Jeremy is optimistic, which is great.
Chris Anderson is a realist.

Here in the US we have the knowledge/capabilities to breed any of these chameleons coming in. We just need dedicated individuals is all.

 

[OldChamKeeper]

Pros and Cons, Pros and Cons.

Neither solution is the best, however I will say that at higher prices, you won't see many pets stores even try to touch them.


I for one will try and get a breeding group going. That is where my level of expertise and my love of my hobby is currently. I got out of the Meru's after not having any luck in getting a small colony going. I'm working on a another species but the issue is the same, the bloodlines available are slim.

Getting many species established is either a labor of love that turns into a business (like Krammerflage Creations) or it takes a dedicated group of peole who can work together instead of trying to "be the primary source" of a given type. Both of those options are harder to find than the animals themselves on average. This website and the community tends to be one of the best sources for our hobby. I'd suggest folks get together that share a common species of interest and work together to establish bloodlines.

Just my .02

 

[rshewfel]

I didn't know this topic was even up for debate. I thought it was obvious to everyone that if imports stopped, we would be stuck with veileds and panthers.

When I left the hobby ten years ago, everyone and their brother was breeding veileds and panthers. There were a few other isolated successes.

Now, ten years later, everyone and their brother breeds veileds and panthers. There are a few isolated successes. Almost nothing has changed.

The sad part is, I'm sure several other species are just as easy to breed. Deremensis and verrucosus come to mind. From my little experience with them, they seem very easy to work with. I think it all comes down to economics. Not whether it can be done.

This is going to be an exciting year for chameleon keepers. I hope I'm wrong, but I don't see much changing. In a couple years, if imports continue, the hype will wear off. Seams to me that campani is already fading with the prices. The last ones I saw on kingsnake, sat there for a while.

If you are serious about establishing chameleons, there are plenty in need right now. Sternfeldi, werneri, deremensis, melleri, etc...

We always want what we can't have. That being said, it's going to be hard for me to not work with at least one of these species.

 

[leedragon]

I think that the reason why panters and yemens are stablished is that beginners pick them, so doesn´t matter how many they are, they will be breed, even if the are no market for them, and that´s why they will be established, and if the one breeding them moves on with their life or with other species, there will be and other beginners who will breed them.


would it be a solution to encourage beginners to start with jackson's melleries, quadricornis and the others?

 

[kameleons jvo]

Ardi for president. Just sayin'.

Jeremy is optimistic, which is great.
Chris Anderson is a realist.

Here in the US we have the knowledge/capabilities to breed any of these chameleons coming in. We just need dedicated individuals is all.

I agree with you ataraxia.
I think Jeremy is seeing things on a very optimistic way,i can understand him in that also he's very exited that after 20 years waiting he can finally work again with Malagasy species(i would be the same i guess if i was in his situation).
But i also wrote before in this threat that if we speak about long therm breeding records"reality can hit very hard" in Europe we had the chance to work with the Malagasy species and i post on regularly base breeding records of Calumma's and Furcifers but please don't forget that it takes sometimes 10 or more years to find out how to breed a specie.
I know breeders that needed 15 or 20 clutches before they find out the key to incubate them and were able to hatch a single young.
That's what i mean with "they are very hard to breed"
Chris on the other hand don't sees things black or with or very optimistic or pessimistic but just the way they are and i can just respect that!

 

[eisentrauti]

So my two cents as well:

If Chris' opinion is said to be realistic, mine will probably seen negative but I highly doubt that the new quotas for those chameleons bring much benefits to the chameleon community.
First of all I would the describe the chameleon market in general as some sort of "consumer market" because so far there is only one species which is breed since decades in captivity, Chamaeleo calyptratus.
Then there's a second category, which includes lateralis, pardalis, some Bradypodions and a few other species, where CB juveniles are available but where I doubt that after a full ban of let's say 5-10 years many species will be still found in captivity or in case of the Bradypodions where the complete availability depends on a handful breeders.
And then there's a third category where the whole availability depends on single enthusiasts or on continuing imports.
When I heard Susans' decision for the first time I was still thinking that her point is a bit exaggerated but with more experience I'm quite sure that the she hit the nail right on the head.
The total numbers of imported animals doesn't lie and if we make a list of the success stories it's like a single drop compared to an ocean.
From my point of view the quota is good for getting some money into a third world country but that's it more or less. I'd like to see some of the animals ending in the right hands but the majority of them will end up in the wrong hands and go the way 99% of the imported animals goes.
So everybody should take Jurgens advice serious, because the chance that people who don't have a huge amount of knowledge and breeding experience can establish those incoming animals is close to zero or in the per mille range.
The next limiting factor is the amount of space/money. People should really just go for those species if they have the needed knowledge and enough space/money to house not just a single pair or two pairs but groups.
I don't know how many threads I've seen here where people present their newest "breeding project", one pair of a species or a 1.2 group. This won't work with chameleons especially not difficult species.
I know that I won't earn reputation points for posts like that, but I'm just describing the reality. I know that some people will present me counterarguments but let's face it, the average level of keeping chameleons is still really really low...

 

[Olimpia]

Eisentrauti, I think most of us will agree with you, we discussed earlier in the thread about how whoever is really genuinely interested in succeeding with these species would have to invest in serious space/housing and in a group of animals, and try to form networks with others who are doing the same thing with the same species. I certainly agree and think it's the strategy that has the most potential to work in the long-term.

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

Interesting perspective on what you and I have both stated in this thread. First, you absolutely were making excuses. In fact, your entire post was a list of excuses about why our success was not better than it was and how given these events we were doing well. You then went on to state that because the US has "not nearly as many species to work with as compared to European keepers (because for the most part we adhered to the 1995 CITES ban)" that we were actually doing alright. My post, on the other hand, never mentioned Europe a single time. In fact, I fail to understand how emphasizing that the US market alone is responsible for more the 64% of the global international trade is in some way covering for why the second smallest continent in the world has more chameleons than we do. Quite the opposite, in fact, as I flat out state that the US alone is responsible for more of the international trade than ANY other country, continent, etc., in the world, and thastill has not gotten us very far! Obviously it seems we have different ideas about what constitutes reading comprehension...



I'm going to once again return to our fundamentally different ideas about what constitutes reading comprehension and state that this was not what I said about the closing of the CiN. Here is what I actually stated:

​

Elementary reading is a good comedy I read your studies on your professional page and I understand what is going on.

Your claim no accountability your overlooking events that happened in the USA and saying that since certain things happened ( the 1995 Madagascar ban or the break up of the CIN) that the lack of results makes them excuses. What about the 10 years of time Jurgen said it took European breeders how to breed many of these Madagascar species. Were we supposed to breed them in 1 year with no quotas no specimens to work with and keep? Somethings and some great things demand time and years to perfect. Even a a great bottle of wine. As well your statement does not hold accountable the under the radar import that happen in Europe. Which is a concerning issue (Endangered species and non regulated numbers) that could be more serious excessive legal documented imports. New updated quota systems should improve this situation though.

Andreas who is at F4 captive breeding Calumma parsonii parsonii (to the best of my knowledge) in Europe. However these species seem to require wild caught imports to sustain captive populations past F4 or F5 as seen with Furcifer lateralis and Furcifer pardalis and as Benny has reiterated and has been stated many times in the past on these forums. That making conservative imports of wild caught specimens necessary. Which is good economically some of these developing nations. However up to the F3 level I think we had done a good start even though this is an aspect that requires more development.

As anyone with an elementary reading level can see, I never stated it was because of a lack of breeders, but rather a multi-faceted reason that included rampant importation of wild caught chameleons and our failure to establish the vast majority of species.

Or failure to establish the vast majority of the species derived meaning is a lack of capable breeders/keepers. That is exactly what you just wrote.

To quote her "Letter from the Editor" from the final issue:

"This is the final issue of the CHAMELEON information Network Journal. This will come as no surprise to many of you, but some of you may not understand why I have made this decision. I decided a year ago that the time had come to close this chapter in my life, and the article CHAMELEONS in Context on page 27 should answer any questions you may have about this."​

Here are a few quotes from this article:

​

Based on those direct quotes of the explanation as to why Ardi shut the CiN down, there is no way to deny that the abysmal track record of establishing chameleon species in captivity was not directly and indispensably linked to the closure of the CiN!

<continued in next post>

I recall that statement. However my statements were not derived solely from her closing of the CIN statements. When the CIN was closing I had many long phone conversations with Ardi weather the hobby should even exist at all. My statements all though some came from her closing statements many of my statements origins were from until this point off the record Personal Communications with Ardi herself.

The rest we seem Okay about.

Jeremy A. Rich

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

Love it or hate it, for better or for worse it is great to have the return of all the great conversation/discussion on the Chameleon Forums again. It has been absent for way to long. I think it is important that it continues.

Jeremy A. Rich

 

[Todnedo]

Jeremy just out of curiosity what species have you bred and produced offspring in the last 5 years?

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

Jeremy just out of curiosity what species have you bred and produced offspring in the last 5 years?

I produced eggs from Furcifer pardalis and Chamaeleo africanus. All were infertile. I am working with Trioceros deremensis as well. I until 2012 when I graduated was mostly concerned with classes at UC Davis. My UC Davis apartment only allowed me to keep a couple of chameleons. I am not breeding chameleons as much as I would prefer such as in the past.

 

[Todnedo]

I produce eggs from Furcifer pardalis and Chamaeleo africanus. All were infertile. I am working with Trioceros deremensis as well. I until 2012 when I graduated was mostly concerned with classes at UC Davis. My UC Davis apartment only allowed me to keep a couple of chameleons. I am not breeding chameleons as much as I would prefer such as in the past.

You say in the past, what species did you breed and produce?

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

You say in the past, what species did you breed and produce?

I have bred and produced Furcifer pardalis, Furcifer lateralis, and Furcifer verrucosus semicristatus. The ranch house would only allow for my brother and I to keep and work with warm weather species.

You should use this app.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/species/experience.php

 

[Todnedo]

I have bred and produced Furcifer pardalis, Furcifer lateralis, and Furcifer verrucosus semicristatus. The ranch house would only allow for my brother and I to keep and work with warm weather species.

You should use this app.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/species/experience.php

Thanks for the link to the app. but I know who the serious breeders are and who claim to be or who "wanna be."

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

Thanks for the link to the app. but I know who the serious breeders are and who claim to be or who "wanna be."

Whatever dude!!! As a matter of detail what species have you bred?

 

[Chris Anderson]

Elementary reading is a good comedy I read your studies on your professional page and I understand what is going on.

I'm glad to hear you were able to read my studies and keep up. Practice makes perfect!

Your claim no accountability your overlooking events that happened in the USA and saying that since certain things happened ( the 1995 Madagascar ban or the break up of the CIN) that the lack of results makes them excuses. What about the 10 years of time Jurgen said it took European breeders how to breed many of these Madagascar species. Were we supposed to breed them in 1 year with no quotas no specimens to work with and keep? Somethings and some great things demand time and years to perfect. Even a a great bottle of wine. As well your statement does not hold accountable the under the radar import that happen in Europe. Which is a concerning issue (Endangered species and non regulated numbers) that could be more serious excessive legal documented imports. New updated quota systems should improve this situation though.

Again, these are all excuses that do not change our track record. There were tons of these species imported into the US before the ban. The fact that the vast majority failed to maintain these species in their collections long after and weren't able to just replace them with fresh WC blood obviously makes breeding them difficult (you have to be able to keep them before you can breed them), but the end result is still the same!

As far as holding the Europeans accountable for the "under the radar import[ing]" that happened since, I've regularly pointed the legality issues of many of these animals out and have published on it! I've also stated multiple times already (and stated the same in publications) that a limited legal quota would go a long way toward impacting the black market trade. That said, I am not comparing the success in the US to the success in Europe in this thread, as it is irrelevant. The abysmal success rate of establishing species in captivity long term in the US is independent of what the Europeans are doing, how they have been getting animals from Madagascar, or anything else. I am saying we should stop making excuses, own up to our track record and use to it push us to try harder.

Andreas who is at F4 captive breeding Calumma parsonii parsonii (to the best of my knowledge) in Europe.

Based on his thread, Andreas had his first hatchlings in 2008 from F1 parents, making the offspring F2s. He got eggs from these F2s in January 2013 and as of January 2014 still had 7 eggs from that clutch, so when those hatch, he'll be on F3s.

However these species seem to require wild caught imports to sustain captive populations past F4 or F5 as seen with Furcifer lateralis and Furcifer pardalis and as Benny has reiterated and has been stated many times in the past on these forums. That making conservative imports of wild caught specimens necessary. Which is good economically some of these developing nations. However up to the F3 level I think we had done a good start even though this is an aspect that requires more development.

We can probably count the number of species that have been produced to F4 or F5 on two or three hands and the number of species that we get there with any frequency is a much shorter list than that. With how many species have been imported in huge numbers, that is the abysmal success rate I am referring to. I have no problem with sustainable quotas, particularly for bringing in imports to refresh bloodlines, but we aren't using them to refresh bloodlines that have been bred to F4 or F5 for anything but a couple species. I simply think we should be honest about this fact and push to try harder to change it.

As anyone with an elementary reading level can see, I never stated it was because of a lack of breeders, but rather a multi-faceted reason that included rampant importation of wild caught chameleons and our failure to establish the vast majority of species.

Or failure to establish the vast majority of the species derived meaning is a lack of capable breeders/keepers. That is exactly what you just wrote.

No, that was you putting words into my mouth and inferring what I meant from what I actually said. As has been stated multiple times in this thread by multiple individuals, there can be plenty of breeders/keepers, but if they aren't putting together large enough groups to actually have a viable breeding colony, they are not going to be successful long term in establishing most of these species. Again, no matter how many breeders/keepers there are, if the species aren't being established long term, it is not changing our long term track record.

I recall that statement. However my statements were not derived solely from her closing of the CIN statements. When the CIN was closing I had many long phone conversations with Ardi weather the hobby should even exist at all. My statements all though some came from her closing statements many of my statements origins were from until this point off the record Personal Communications with Ardi herself.

My personal communications with Ardi prior to the CiN closure were highly consistent with her having deep concerns about our track record and the vast number of individuals imported. Obviously, she made her views on this clear in your printed words as well.

To be honest, this entire argument is completely pointless. You can try to claim our track record is whatever you want, but ultimately the numbers don't lie and we need to do better. If lulling yourself into the belief that our track record is good or even acceptable motivates you to walk the walk, great. I personally fail to see how denial benefits us as a community and prefer to try to learn from the past so that we can try to improve in the future.

Chris

 

[Todnedo]

Whatever dude!!! As a matter of detail what species have you bred?

I think that is well known on this forum. You act like your the spokesman for the breeders in the US but what qualifies you to even think that, with near zer0 breeding experience in the last 5 PLUS years.
You seem overjoyed by the new quotas on some of the hardest to keep species.

 

[OldChamKeeper]

Lol... I never knew there was any kind of debate about how horrible our U.S. track record has been on breeding/keeping chams. I've known how bad it was since before I turned 10..and despite all the decades since it has not moved much towards a net positive. I'd say the ONE thing that has actually evolved and been a huge positive is our use of the internet and coming together to try and connect with our hobby. I still can remember how hard it was to learn anything about these animals..no books... no vets..... pet stores on average had no clue....hell there were almost no reptile products back when I started out.

The internet has been a big help to us.

 

[Motherlode Chameleon]

I think that is well known on this forum. You act like your the spokesman for the breeders in the US but what qualifies you to even think that, with near zer0 breeding experience in the last 5 PLUS years.
You seem overjoyed by the new quotas on some of the hardest to keep species.

Hogwash you much less experienced than me and again you show you are only are out for your own interests as always and your not that great of a breeder. You cannot even put what species you have bred? I have been a part of a program that has produced a captive bred Parsonii in the 1990's. You have not. Again I try to make amends with you however your not worth it. I am ready for the new Madagascar species.

Jeremy A. Rich