The so called hatchlings show up at about 2-4 inches STV at a few times throughout the year, they are as you said hatched in the wild and imported then distributed then sold to pets stores and customers at reptile shows at low prices ($5-$50, depends how much money they want to make off of you, they buy them for $1 or less each sometimes). Of course if you have a few left in your reptile business after the initial sales are over in spring, then wait until shows or sell them as a second group a few months later it doesnt pay to feed them much at all or have them grow, once they start growing they sell alot slower, after all you cant sell them as CB hatchlings now if they grow. They are imported around the same time and sometimes they are probably imported a few times a year, your right they are mostly the same ones, the torture victims that survive a few months after not selling earlier.
The problem is they do grow and fast if offered the right set of tools to do the job, they need as Andrew mentioned a set of conditions that are somewhat close to good to allow growth, to allow egg production, after all they can do that very young, 6 months to a year. If a female never produces eggs, you have alot of problems to fix, if your animal dies young you have alot of problems to fix. Food is a big part of growth, if it doesnt happen you need to make alot of changes. I see alot of beardies like that, some their owners refer to them as dwarf beardies. I gave some examples of older monitors that grew up fast when they were placed in conditions that gave the animal the ability to grow, my male albig "Shadow", my fiends banded WT "Zeus", his old ornate nile (which is another friends collection), a few boscs that a good friend has now from other former owners that had non-growing boscs (in a few months they double, and triple in size), the timor "Sqirt" I had (now in a good friends collection), he was only 16 or so inches when I bought him but he was around 3 or more years old, in a years time he was 30 inches long. A good friends red tegu went through a problem with not growing, but a change in environment allowed him to grow, in a years time he went from a few inches long to 3.5 feet. I could name many examples Ive seen helping a friend with many many reptiles period, a local rescue contacts him alot. of course some animals hes bought needed rescued at first, they all grew and thrived some reproducing afterwards (snakes of all species, turtles and tortoise, lizards, and some amphibians).
in herp shops later in the year, does it indicate they are actually much older than one would think by their size? If their growth is stunted from not being fed much, could they be expected to grow much more (another foot or two) if they did start getting more to eat (proper food) after 8-12 months of minimal growth (under 12"
