Our Ambilobe breeding project has been ongoing for five years now, and we are now in to our third generation of animals. We produce Yellow Body Blue Bar, Red Body Blue Bar, and rainbow Ambilobe - Panther Chameleons. Within the first bew years of our fist project, we began to notice that many breeders were working within the same lineage / family trees. Although there is more genetic diversity within the captive bred / raised Ambilobe locale within the U.S. there are still many breeders that continue to work within the same fmaily lines as others. This creates an influx of related animals within the community. If care is not taken to ensure family lines, it is very easy to breed related animals to each other.
We decided to bring in fresh genetics through the purchase and inclusion of Wild Caught, Imported males into our projects. Like the populations of captive bred Nosy Be's, we are currently seeing a decrease of biological diversity within the captive bred Ambilobe Panther Chameleon population in the United States.
There are some within the breeding community that are knowingly "line breeding" within their projects.
This is breeding known, related animals together in order to increase chances producing animals with more sought out after traits. Line breeding / inbreeding increases the likelihood of genetic deficiencies and weaker animals.
A lot of these breeders will only provide limited detail in regards to the family lineage of the animals that they are selling. We will not name/oust them but we feel that it is imperative that the next generations of the captive bred lines incorporate fresh genetics. We implore potential customers to thoroughly research an animals family lineage before making a purchase. Although breeders will be unable to provide lineage for their Wild Caught animals, they should be able to provide at least a few generations of information on their animals. At the very least, a breeder should request that customers give them some time to contact the breeder from where they acquired their animals and then provide potential customers with the details once they obtain the information. If they can not provide you with information beyond the Sire (dad) and Dam (mom) of the animals they have for sale, we highly suggest taking your business elsewhere.
There are other breeders within the U.S. that see the current problems in the same light that we do and have been introducing Imported animals into their projects as well as creating detailed familial lineage reports of all of their breeding animals.. We urge you to consider purchasing from like minded members of the community who are putting ethics, quality, sustainability and love of the animals over income.
