Posted by:
jobi
at Fri Sep 1 09:16:50 2006 [ Report Abuse ] [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by jobi ]
Breeding herps is a personal investment, its emotional.
You start doing it out of passion with animals that are high on your interest list, but eventually economics get to you, realising that reptiles generate very little income breeders turn to less interesting species they can mass produce in rack system, 250 breeders in a small room, they get very little satisfaction out of there work but more income, this is the sad reality of herpetoculture.
Then you have keepers that really commits to there animals, they keep species most have never seen, in relatively good conditions (compared to rack system) These breeders are way more emotionally involved, they are deceived when the pet shops offer them ridiculous price for there animals because they don’t know anything about them, of course if its not a lep gecko or a ball python common pet trade species, they don’t get promoted and often waste away even before they left the store.
Needles to say the store owner doesn’t want anymore and even gives them bad press, other times they are sold with bad advise and the wrong products to support them, resulting in death and again bad press, I am telling you reptile breeding is something personal, once the babies go you must forget about them, I ship all my cites animals to Japan. In the last few years iv discarded all my varanids eggs without even thinking about incubating them, peoples aren’t ready for such animals, they just don’t commit to them.
Now days I am working with tree dragons and though I really hope peoples will be interested in them, I know that I personally will not produce many for the pet trade, I will produce a fair number to produce color morphs, but all this is on a personal basis. As with tree monitors, been keeping them 15 years and have collected all locality morphs, I don’t care about establishing them in anyway. Personal enjoyment.
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