Can our t survive in nature?

goliathusdavid

Arachnobaron
Joined
Oct 27, 2020
Messages
487
I disagree for particular reasons. The most glaring issues - you simply cannot control this. It's not gonna work. I agree that sentences should be a lot more severe in case of abuse, mis-husbandry, illegal collection and the like, but ultimately you're probably just worsening the situation overall. Like children, people tend to try find ways around regulations whenever they don't agree with them.
Should all animals require licensing? Certainly not. Do we nevertheless need a substantial overhaul of our wildlife regulation system that would include stricter regulation and additional enforcement? I for one think so. For both the good of the fauna, and, at the end of the day, the people.
 

Jess S

Arachnobaron
Joined
Mar 10, 2019
Messages
572
Mexico has a farm (the brainchild of J. Mendozas) where their local species are bred (eg. CITES listed Brachypelma). A proportion are legally sold and exported to the hobby and a proportion are released into the wild to support local populations. These facilities also educate local people to care about and not fear these beneficial creatures.

If only all countries did this!
 

Swagg

Arachnoknight
Joined
Nov 15, 2019
Messages
262
Edit: Wasn't it Florida that has C. versicolor population thanks to ppl having set them free / having had escapees? Small, but I seem to remember someone mentioning that some years ago...
[/QUOTE]

The population in the Orange grove is a vagans population I believe.
 

JZayn99

Arachnopeon
Joined
Feb 6, 2021
Messages
37
Should all animals require licensing? Certainly not. Do we nevertheless need a substantial overhaul of our wildlife regulation system that would include stricter regulation and additional enforcement? I for one think so. For both the good of the fauna, and, at the end of the day, the people.
and how we do it?
easy, all your species must be known by police, with a sample ceck in the houses. U don't like it? don't keep exotic animal, but a dog or a cat.
 
Last edited:

goliathusdavid

Arachnobaron
Joined
Oct 27, 2020
Messages
487
and how we do it?
easy, all your species must be known by police, with a sample ceck in the houses. U don't like it? don't keep exotic animal, but a dog or a cat.
Police, no. The USDA and FWS. But to have them be able to actually enforce the legislation we need to DRAMATICALLY expand both of their enforcement programs. There are only 261 FWS agents tasked with combating wildlife trafficking in the entire county. And it took them YEARS to nail Joe Exotic (in the end for a murder for hire charge). I'm all for more wildlife enforcement but it needs to be organized and come from the federal level. And it should target big time traffickers (of which there are SO many) before individual keepers.
 
Last edited:

viper69

ArachnoGod
Old Timer
Joined
Dec 8, 2006
Messages
17,851
The question in itself is valid and while ppl often recount "the hobby exists to ensure we can keep species from extinction and create possibilities to re-introduce them as backup", personally I don't think that's the main reason. The reality is the hobby exists because people like us can't travel to those habitats all the time to look and watch those awesome animals, but instead try and keep them ourself. Frankly, the entire subject is a can of worms really. For one, a great majority of the species in the hobby nowadays are there, because someone (likely illegally) took them from their natural habitat (without which we wouldn't have all these species in the hobby at all most likely), thus diminishing natural population (which goes against the initial arguement) - all for the sake to make money of a highly-sought after (and likely newly described) species.

That said, to my knowledge, there is not a single "farm" with spiders kept just for the sake of preserving a certain species in case wild populations go extinct. Why? Because for one I don't believe for a second that aside arachnologists and us hobbyists, anyone gives a **** about tarantulas really, and more importantly, a lot of species in the hobby are probably not 100% pure anymore. Which is another can of worms.

As it has been said before - don't even think about setting any T's out into the wild. If any such projects will ever come to live, perhaps those responsible will turn to the hobby and ask for specimens. But to put it into Tolkiens words "But that day is far away..."


Edit: Wasn't it Florida that has C. versicolor population thanks to ppl having set them free / having had escapees? Small, but I seem to remember someone mentioning that some years ago...
They have a nice established vagans pop.

Never heard of versi, maybe
 

Rozwyrazowana

Arachnopeon
Joined
Apr 16, 2020
Messages
35
and how we do it?
easy, all your species must be known by police, with a sample ceck in the houses. U don't like it? don't keep exotic animal, but a dog or a cat.
In Poland, some exotic animals need to be registered with local authorities, I don't know specifics but I know that some snakes (maybe all - I'm not sure) require registration. I've heard that people who sell CITES species (Ts, reptiles or others) are often visited by authorities and asked to show documents confirming that they were captive-bred.
 

Storm76

Arachnoemperor
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 30, 2012
Messages
3,797
In Poland, some exotic animals need to be registered with local authorities, I don't know specifics but I know that some snakes (maybe all - I'm not sure) require registration. I've heard that people who sell CITES species (Ts, reptiles or others) are often visited by authorities and asked to show documents confirming that they were captive-bred.
Not much different in Germany. I can tell from my own experience. Someone in my acquitance circle with no whatsoever knowledge about T's thought it funny one day to contact authorities accusing me of mishusbandry and desolate keeping conditions. Still have no idea who exactly, but I got a pretty good idea. Anyways, I received post from the authorities over here at first asking for a statement on the accusations made. After I sent them a couple pages including pictures they showed up at my door. Police, district vetenarian and someone from the court. They inspected my entire collection, asked for the proof you mentioned on my Brachys that they were captive-bred (which I showed them of course), drilled me with a bunch of specific questions, made a ton of pictures themself and left. About an hour later I was informed everything was fine and there would be no whatsoever lawsuit.

Goes to show that, at least where I live, when it comes to things like that authorities do their work just fine. Funny enough, that entire thing became necessary for them because in those accusations it said I would've been keeping my T's in cardboard enclosures and small lunchboxes. To make you laugh - the lunchboxes? Yeah, at the time those house my H. chilensis dwarf slings. Not gonna put something like that into a 5gal glass enclosure for gods sake!

Anyways, regulations for "potentially dangerous animals" over here usually are made based upon toxicity and/or behavior really and it varies from region to region. There is no unified system. Bavaria has banned Poecilotheria spp. because of too many idiots that got bitten resulting in them deciding the species would be too 'dangerous' in the hands of hobbyists. To prevent things like that, I'd wish there was some kind of certification you'd have to get before being allowed to own them, but alas that, too, would just punish those that do know what they're doing. Like the majority of us on here.

Bottom line - it's not an "easy to fix" thematic. It's a lot more complicated than just putting some harsh laws out there, said it before.
 

JZayn99

Arachnopeon
Joined
Feb 6, 2021
Messages
37
Not much different in Germany. I can tell from my own experience. Someone in my acquitance circle with no whatsoever knowledge about T's thought it funny one day to contact authorities accusing me of mishusbandry and desolate keeping conditions. Still have no idea who exactly, but I got a pretty good idea. Anyways, I received post from the authorities over here at first asking for a statement on the accusations made. After I sent them a couple pages including pictures they showed up at my door. Police, district vetenarian and someone from the court. They inspected my entire collection, asked for the proof you mentioned on my Brachys that they were captive-bred (which I showed them of course), drilled me with a bunch of specific questions, made a ton of pictures themself and left. About an hour later I was informed everything was fine and there would be no whatsoever lawsuit.

Goes to show that, at least where I live, when it comes to things like that authorities do their work just fine. Funny enough, that entire thing became necessary for them because in those accusations it said I would've been keeping my T's in cardboard enclosures and small lunchboxes. To make you laugh - the lunchboxes? Yeah, at the time those house my H. chilensis dwarf slings. Not gonna put something like that into a 5gal glass enclosure for gods sake!

Anyways, regulations for "potentially dangerous animals" over here usually are made based upon toxicity and/or behavior really and it varies from region to region. There is no unified system. Bavaria has banned Poecilotheria spp. because of too many idiots that got bitten resulting in them deciding the species would be too 'dangerous' in the hands of hobbyists. To prevent things like that, I'd wish there was some kind of certification you'd have to get before being allowed to own them, but alas that, too, would just punish those that do know what they're doing. Like the majority of us on here.

Bottom line - it's not an "easy to fix" thematic. It's a lot more complicated than just putting some harsh laws out there, said it before.
Hopefully u hit him and his family.
Anyway, in Italy we don't know if we can keep tarantulas or not, so it depends on who does the inspection... yeah, Italians laws for this and more are soo funny guys
 
Top