Leopard Gecko Registry; Unneeded Bureaucracy?

well several people here argued they wouldnt try just because they didnt thin kti would work. well thats the kind of role your setting. think about people like me who can do and will look up to you guys for years to come. just by hearing the first few posts by keeli and jeremy and what not i thought well fack it whats the point if no ones gunna try. then i thought about it a lil bit and decided its the wrong attitude. im not trying to be hostile but the veterans here have to remember what kind of role theyre setting and that wha tthey say really is taken to heart. ive registered because i owuld without a doubt like to see it work. all too often do i see a rather normal looking gecko on reptileauction.com advertised as tangerine. or alot of geckos advertised as urban line. i doubt they are and i doubt craig wants them advertised as his when they obviously arent

In my best Charles Barkley voice " I am not a role model"!

I am not an elitist or trying to say I'm above someone Else's definition of a morph. Heck if there was a published list of morphs, I would most likely reference it. I currently have about 60-70 females ready to breed. If they all give me 10 good eggs that is 600-700 babies. I have another 40 females that will be breeding by spring. I put in a minimum of 2 hours every night with the animals(thats a minimum sometimes it is as many as 8). I also spend 8-12 hours cleaning 1 day a week. Plus, once eggs are coming in steady and babies hatching steadily. You can see where this is going. I do not think it will be worth the effort on my part to participate in this registry.

I am not saying it is not worth doing. If I had the opportunity to take part in it just a few years ago, I would have jumped at the chance. I had a very limited number of animals then and it would have been rather easy. In short I hope it does have a chance to succeed. I hope that everyone who has the chance does participate. I may even just start with my Raining Red Stripe lines. It really depends. When I have some free time I will contact Stef and discuss some of my concerns with her.

Jeremy that 600-700 babies is what meant when I said I could understand one of the many good points you and Kelli have brought to the thread. It does seem hard to fit time in to do all of those. But it could really be cool if the Raining Red Stripe line was there.

Ok, here is what I am most looking forward to as this project gets larger and more & more people are participating: imagine you'd like to start up a little breeding project and you want to start with animals that are not related. You could just buy from two different breeders and hope for the best, but we all know that - especially with newer morphs or a morph that one particular breeder is well known for - that really doesn't mean they won't be related. You could certainly ask both breeders that you'd like to buy from where their breeders (or original stock) came from and if it was the same breeder you could call that breeder and see if (s)he still has the records...... or you could look it up on LGR!

Obviously, it has a long way to go before it would really be useful for this purpose, but I think it will contain some really valuable & interesting info!! I really like knowing the genealogy of my geckos. Besides being useful for breeding projects I just think it is fun!

As an example from the corn snake version, I bought our first corn snake this fall. He is amelanistic possibly het for motley & lavender. I have no immediate intentions to breed him & I couldn't remember when I got home whether he was het or possibly het. By looking up his parents on the ACR I can see they are both triple hets - so my guy is 66% het for mot & lav. Also, by looking at other siblings that have been registered I can see that the parents really are 100% hets because they have produced lavender motleys. By registering my guy, others can see that they've also produced amelanistic offspring. I can see all this without admitting that I forgot an important part of the conversation (until now) and without taking up the breeders time answering questions that he had already answered!

I'm really excited about the possibilities here! It doesn't need 100% participation to be useful but the more data the better!!!!

Now i havent really been around here in the 90's, but had somthing like this come up then, it could work alot better. But now that there are so many more herpers, it may not be big for another decade, but better late then never :eatpointe

Interesting thread...
Something jumped out to me in "Traci's" post on page 11.

If I am not mistaken, the idea of having a corn snake registry was created after certain corn snake forum members created much stink about the “purity” of corn snake lines.

and

I am not aware of there being any “purity” issues with leopard geckos. If not, then obviously the leo registry is not starting up for the same reasons as the ACR

If this is true, then it appears that the success of the of the cornsnake registry was born out of a true need - at least initially. I'm not saying that the LGR is trying to copy the ACR (in purpose or style). I really don't know too much about either. My concern is that I don't see a true "need" for a registry system in the leo community at this point - that's my opinion. Not that it wouldn't be helpful...or fun - but, that's different from a true "need". I think that "need" is the key to getting a project like this to work. It sounds like a neat idea...and obviously a lot of hard work and thought has gone into the project already. I guess time will tell if the leo community sees a LGR as a need or a neat idea. I think "need" will work, "neat" won't. Thanks for a interesting thread everyone

Directly from the ACR FAQ page...

Originally Posted by American Cornsnake Registry

Q- What is the point of a registry?
A- Some people simply enjoy being able to see a family tree. It’s just “cool,” and that’s enough of a reason for many people. Apart from its “coolness” the ACR creates a "chain of custody" for information, which has several other benefits, especially to people whose corns come from registered stock.

1. Anyone can look up the ancestry on their snakes and see what known morphs were in the bloodlines of the ancestors. Many breeders/sellers do not mention hets or possible hets, and these can be researched through a family tree.

2. Anyone can do research on the inheritance patterns of recognized traits, or use the database to discover inheritance patterns in traits that are currently not recognized or even noticed.

3. When a new trait appears, the ancestors can more easily be located, and the spread of the gene throughout the gene pool could be tracked. Ancestors of the first specimen found to exhibit the trait would be possible carriers, and could be located and test-bred to help prove out and propagate that trait.

4. For those who care about breeding animals from specific localities and keeping their bloodlines true to that locality, they would no longer need to directly contact the original breeder to find out the important information about a specific animal.

5. Many smaller hobbyist/breeders come and go. When they leave, their information is often completely lost. A registry allows important information to be accessible forever.

6. Information about a snake can be kept with the snake much more easily. For example, breeder A (who is very well known) hatches a snake and registers it. He later does not need it and sells it to reseller B with the registration certificate. Reseller B sells it to buyer C, showing with the registration certificate that the snake originally came from breeder A. If buyer C then wants to sell the snake, he can show the registration certificate to potential customer D to prove that the snake really is from breeder A’s stock. Nobody has to say, “that’s what I was told” and there is no information lost from the "telephone" effect. Additionally, persons A, B, and C do not have to go to the trouble of telling each of their buyers all about the snake, since that information is available on the registration certificate and through the ACR website.

I love your Avatar, Paul.

Thanks Stephanie...
Can I register an "arboreal carrot-tail"? lol
To add to my previous post, I think a lot of different things lead to "the need". I appreciate Paul's (Sage) honesty when he said that if a lot of "bigger" breeders registered he probably would too...I'd probably be a "band-wagoner" also. It just seems like a lot of work (expecting 400+ hatchlings this year)...putting it back in the "I dunno" category for me...

Originally Posted by bro paul

Thanks Stephanie...
Can I register an "arboreal carrot-tail"? lol

Well, if you really want to...you can put that in the "comments" section of the registration...

Originally Posted by bro paul

To add to my previous post, I think a lot of different things lead to "the need". I appreciate Paul's (Sage) honesty when he said that if a lot of "bigger" breeders registered he probably would too...I'd probably be a "band-wagoner" also. It just seems like a lot of work (expecting 400+ hatchlings this year)...putting it back in the "I dunno" category for me...

It is never a requirement for anyone to register every single gecko they own and produce. I didn't pre-register my hatchlings from last year with the ACR, this year I will be however (mostly due to me expecting a lot more interesting babies to be produced).

If the "bigger" breeders wish, they can simply register a specific "higher-end" line they are working with. Like the redstripes, mack snows and tangerine tornadoes.