Hey Adam,
Somehow I missed the last few posts in this thread when they first came up. First off, I see nothing in the pictures of your juvenile Ankaramies to suggest that they are not Ank's. Chris' photo also looks like the real McCoy, and you have to applaud him for having one from the field, as that is not an easy place to hike in to. One other thing, that Chris has eluded to, is the lack of experience which exists with this locale. One thing that experience has shown us with other locales, both with WC specimens and captive breeding of good bloodlines, is that its hard to be conclusive about what a locale should and shouldn't look like (look at Ambilobe). There's certainly a bell curve to it, but there's critters on the fringe that are as pedigree as the next, just not a-typical in appearance. Remember, we are not talking speciation here, just locale designations as assigned by men (and women .. sheeeesh), and we do disagree and make mistakes. Head shapes can be all over the place within any given locale.
One last consideration, about the "fragile" nature of this locale. Chris can shed light on this, as he has been there, but Ankaramy is a difficult place to get to. All panthers being shipped out of Mada have been through hell. Those from Ankaramy, and other fringe locales such as Nosy Mitsio, have been through worse. Less of those animals are going to make it here, and those that do are going to have two feet in the grave already, whereas other locales usually only have one. With a high mortality rate on import, do you think that maybe an importer might substitute females from another locale, worth maybe $150 each, so as to now get $300-400 ea ? And if you are the unsuspecting buyer, and do have success breeding and hatching, you find out you've been had 12 months later !! Nah ... can't happen !!!
As for captive propagation, F-1 generations are possible with any group of imports. Now look for diverse bloodlines to produce an F-2 generation ?? In-breeding chameleons guarantees a quicker demise than a kiss of death. Again, thanks for the input.
Jim Flaherty
The Chameleon COmpany, LLC
Well, we'll see if we can get Schmedlap to pull the international Ankaramy breeding file. I'm sure its somewhere between the Nosy Be and Ankify file ... in other words, they're panther chameleons !! Who would be the keeper of this info, and who would care ? Plenty have bred them in recent years, but there is no where near a sustaining population. To be honest, the number of people in the U.S. who will pay silly money for an Ankaramy can be counted on two hands at best, even after a serious table saw accident, and most serious breeders realize that there's not much point in putting much money in to trying to set up a small colony of them. No one is trying to bring in Mitsio's anymore for the same reason .. a very finite market and exceedingly high cost of time and money to try to maintain a viable breeding operation. Without a considerable input of more animals from the wild, those currently in the U.S cannot sustain themselves. And with less than honorable importers able to shake down those with money to burn, their money will be burned. This thread could stand to sink into oblivion in a hurry. Maybe any further questions can go to the Chameleon Discussion forum of this website, where it should have gone long ago.