Australian geckos in Canada?

[lexx]

i thought australia had a ban on exporting native australian lizards. so why have there been an increase in australian species in the hobby for the last couple of years?

i was thinking about this the other day, could all these animals be related to all the animals that were imported back in the 70's when reptiles in the pet trade were big? or has australia lifted it's exporting bans?

this question was really bugging me the other day and i can't seem to find any info to scratch it. do you guys know anything about this?

thanks,
lex

 

[DDReptiles]

There is a lot of them because they are relatively easy to reproduce and some species are very productive, they have also become a lot more popular in the last few years as like I said they are easy to breed (for the most part) and so more are available.

As far as bloodlines go, from everyone I have talked with, everything is pretty much related to everything, may be a few exceptions but for the most part they are all pretty much genetically similar.

Hope this helps,
Derek

 

[Palex134]

ya Derek pretty much summed it all up. The aussies in Canada are producing, plus other aussie geckos are being imported into Canada from other countries, such as the European countries and the US.

 

[Hilde]

I'd say that the best we Canadians can do to get new blood is to import European stock. Importing from the US doesn't guarantee unrelated animals, since a lot of our Canadian founder stock was originally from the US.

There are a lot of Australian species in Canada, and I'll admit that many, or even the majority of them are related. However, some of us go to great lengths to import animals that are unrelated to any of the existing ones (or to the best of our knowledge). I've got 2.3.5 Underwoodisaurus milii, Eastern form, which I know are unrelated to any others here in Canada except for 2 other geckos. I also know of a few other breeders here in Ontario who have imported Australian species from European stock, so there's a very good chance that they have added new genes to their breeding projects.

If I were to keep knobtails, I'd definitely get at least one of each pair from Europe. Knobtails are so inbred here in North America, it's starting to create problems. About 7 years ago when I first looked into getting Nephrurus, I was told to look to Europe for new blood.

 

[Riverside Reptiles]

I've got 2.3.5 Underwoodisaurus milii, Eastern form, which I know are unrelated to any others here in Canada except for 2 other geckos.

Hilde, speaking of your U milii, have you hatched out any of those super hypo tangerine babies yet? I seem to recall you getting eggs a while back. Would love to see pics if they've hatched out yet.

 

[Hilde]

No super babies yet, unfotunately. This is the first breeding season for them and as luck would have it, Murphy's Law applied. The first clutch was infertile, the next 2 were fertile but died. However, I do have 5 babies from the father and a different more 'normal hypo' female.

This is the palest one of the bunch so far:

The rest hatched normal looking, but are getting lighter.
If the tangerine hypo is recessive, I'll have lots of hets, if it's co-dominant, then UGH.
Link to the picture of the parents: http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f368/1derfool/hmftbfcclupPrC.jpg
http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f368/1derfool/hmftbckclupA.jpg
http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f368/1derfool/hmftbfcclupA.jpg

 

[DDReptiles]

There is a lot of them because they are relatively easy to reproduce and some species are very productive, they have also become a lot more popular in the last few years as like I said they are easy to breed (for the most part) and so more are available.

As far as bloodlines go, from everyone I have talked with, everything is pretty much related to everything, may be a few exceptions but for the most part they are all pretty much genetically similar.

Hope this helps,
Derek

I should have clarified on this more, there are species in Strophurus, Diplodactylus, and Nephrurus that are fairly difficult to reproduce then there are like Phyllurus and Saltuarius (though I wasn't really refferring to these as they aren't all to common).

I also was not trying to say all the geckos are inbred pieces of trash (I keep these geckos too ) I was just trying to say their isn't to much variety, I mean there must be a couple thousand or so wheeleri now that came from a small handfull of original animals.

 

[Michael_Hance]

It seems that the answers that are being offered are in some cases dancing around the question and in some cases just avoiding it entirely. The increased availability of a wide array of Aussie geckos is due to successful reproduction of species that were most likely smuggled out of Oz. Sure some may have come out legally to zoo etc but in reality the majority of the bloodlines that are around are from smuggled founders.

Michael

 

[Sarah]

And just to clarify, Australia does not allow reptiles to be exported (other than on the odd occasion to zoos, and apparently it's harder to have authorised than a green card, hehehe!), so anyone claiming to have 'new blood' would have gotten animals that had been illegally smuggled.

It's a worry for you guys though, do many die in the egg over there? Are there many deformities?

:0)

 

[oli]

I'm pretty sure there's a good amount of smuggling going on ensuring new blood becomes available occasionally. I know it happens in Europe more frequently, but those animals can be imported rather easily as well to the US. In one way it sucks, but it is good for the future success of reptiles in this country.

 

[Sarah]

You don't want to get caught doing it, anyone caught smuggling reptiles in or out are not dealt with lightly!

 

[mat.si]

That's why CB animals are still rather expensive, even though there's really not so few of them being bred outside Australia.