Good Post Sam,

This may not have much interest to keepers, but it can be useful! When looking over museum specimens of a single species, you can see variety among them, which is to be expected.

As you see variety in V. albigularis, you see the same thing in all the people you meet everyday - they all have slightly different features, behave differently, approach solutions to the same problems differently, and yet when you look at their skulls (in an Anthropology museum, or a local 'bone store') you see that their skulls are remarkably similar, if not virtually identical. The variations in the skulls, i.e. width, length, teeth, eye sockets etc...determined the seven races of people, and also Phrenology, and even eugenics....but their skulls are all basically the same, only slight variations of a theme, due principally to where on the Earth you live = the same is for V. albigularis; so if you wish to call different local V. albigulais different species go right ahead, but by the same application you also call humans different species too (but that is not politically correct! Oh no!) - and then the next questions comes to mind, "Who came first?" and then it becomes a hotbed of contention (for Homo sapiens anyways), and then they dismiss this idea of 'race' or subspecies for Homo sapiens, but not for other zoologica. Why? ...for V. albigularis, they are a species diversifying, adapting to their habitats and niches, but they are still the same inside; if your bones are the same, but your features vary, your still a V. albiglaris.

When you, or anyone, and this is easy to do: walk into a Natural History Museum or University Museum, you can examine their Varanus specimens yourself, and see them, hold them, photograph them, see where they were from, and this gives you a chance to compare/contrast what you hold from a pickle jar to what lives with you at home, and you can learn alot from this.

Many insights can be gained from this, and gives you knowledge and 'hands-on' experience with the animals there; if you keep them in captivity, you can see them, smell them, and watch them do things you never see in a museum or in the field; and in the field you can see other things, like 25 of them under a single rock - oops, that was 1 animal wasn't it? You have more to compare and contrast, and you learn more.... and that is what it is all about, learning something new everyday...

I once recieved 20 or was it 25 V. albigularis from Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania that I was told were 2 feet total length = they were 2 foot SVL! They were right off the boat, covered in African soils, poop, and hundreds of ticks. I bathed and watered the animals, removed the dirt and each tick. Years later, I had the ticks identified, and 2 of them were very rare, 1 not having been seen on Varanus since 1905. The other was a possible vector for a deadly pathogen. That little paper taught me alot, and you can do the same (Jody) with the animals you get - even little things like this can help offer insight into their World otherwise not known....Doing 'Science' can be fun, and not as hard as it seemed in high school biology class.

So the 'evil' scientist is not so evil, and the keeper can contribute and enjoy their animals, and we can help one another more than you imagine....I was given a very generous gift from the local pet shop here: a deceased male 7 foot V. salvadorii that they would have otherwise thrown in the trash. In examining it up close, inside and out, I learned many things about it, and will be sharing that soon....among other things of this most mysteriously impressive varanid.... you can do the same... it is all about passion for the animals and curiosity.

Cheers,
mbayless

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