FaunaClassifieds - View Single Post - For Sale Mourning Gecko

09-27-2021, 06:52 PM

"Its been done many times before with success"

So has drunk driving, smoking cigarettes and freediving. That (i.e. pointing at successful cases) is not how you determine if something is a good bit of advice to give either generally or especially to novices, who are this vendor's target audience. Looking at the failed cases, how avoidable they are in real world practical terms, and what the cost-benefit analysis looks like (this is the big issue) is a much better way to determine what is good advice.

I don't know the background behind the photo -- it's been floating around for a while. I'm using it as an attention getting device to bring up the larger point that this is simply bad advice from a vendor who is well known for giving bad husbandry advice of all sorts.

MGs have a preferred body temp of about 86F, which calls for about a 90F hot spot, which is not the sort of thing that's good to have in a dart viv where high temps are a health risk -- especially coupled with this vendor's backwards recommendation to have no ventilation in the enclosure.

MGs are best provided with supplemental CGD, which is a PITA in frog vivs -- the frogs sit in it, it attracts ants.

Pathogen transfer between species is not something responsible keepers take lightly. You may have heard about this little pandemic thing they're having somewhere? Yeah, that happens to caged animals too. We simply have no idea how many pathogens are floating around in captive herps -- they're being discovered regularly (nidovirus is a good example). Also, genetic recombination between pathogens is a big issue -- it is one of the primary drivers of the current spread of B. d. (frog chytrid).

I was negligent in making this clear in the first post, but I'm not getting bent out of shape about one photo. I'm pointing out one example among many of bad care advice given so to sell more animals to unknowing novices. If I had a dollar everytime I read "well I'm following JF's instructions, why is this going so badly"... no, I wouldn't be rich, but I'd have a pocketful.

09-27-2021, 06:52 PM	#4
Socratic Monologue	"Its been done many times before with success" So has drunk driving, smoking cigarettes and freediving. That (i.e. pointing at successful cases) is not how you determine if something is a good bit of advice to give either generally or especially to novices, who are this vendor's target audience. Looking at the failed cases, how avoidable they are in real world practical terms, and what the cost-benefit analysis looks like (this is the big issue) is a much better way to determine what is good advice. I don't know the background behind the photo -- it's been floating around for a while. I'm using it as an attention getting device to bring up the larger point that this is simply bad advice from a vendor who is well known for giving bad husbandry advice of all sorts. MGs have a preferred body temp of about 86F, which calls for about a 90F hot spot, which is not the sort of thing that's good to have in a dart viv where high temps are a health risk -- especially coupled with this vendor's backwards recommendation to have no ventilation in the enclosure. MGs are best provided with supplemental CGD, which is a PITA in frog vivs -- the frogs sit in it, it attracts ants. Pathogen transfer between species is not something responsible keepers take lightly. You may have heard about this little pandemic thing they're having somewhere? Yeah, that happens to caged animals too. We simply have no idea how many pathogens are floating around in captive herps -- they're being discovered regularly (nidovirus is a good example). Also, genetic recombination between pathogens is a big issue -- it is one of the primary drivers of the current spread of B. d. (frog chytrid). I was negligent in making this clear in the first post, but I'm not getting bent out of shape about one photo. I'm pointing out one example among many of bad care advice given so to sell more animals to unknowing novices. If I had a dollar everytime I read "well I'm following JF's instructions, why is this going so badly"... no, I wouldn't be rich, but I'd have a pocketful.