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Academic, Zoo, and Pet Collecting and Collections
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by Snakeman1982 on July 29, 2008
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This topic is in response to a previous forum “Crotalus ericsmithi (new species!!!)” in which there was an excellent debate about academia, museums, zoos, and collecting. This is a subject I generally don’t discuss online, due to some narrow-minded people on the internet who abuse constructive debates, however with the previous topic being so beneficial it appears it might be worth discussing here. My objective for this is to have a constructive debate on the ethics of collecting and to help people understand a part of the academic perspective of field collecting. I would like for this forum to be equally as constructive as the previous forum and therefore if you are a hobbyist, academic, or zoo personnel, I would greatly appreciate constructive comments and politeness towards each other. I apologize if I have or do offend anyone, it is not my intention.
First, I think I stated previously that pretty much everyone at the University of Texas at Arlington from Dr. Campbell, the graduate students (currently 16), to our collections manager has worked some time in the zoo field and keep a couple of personal pet herps. So we know the various sides of the issues.
1. When most systematists at large museums collect in the field they take GPS coordinates, habitat and specimen notes, photographs of the specimen, DNA samples, etc... In the tropics, these are often the only data known for these species. Many scientists also bring recorders to listen and analyze frog calls and video cameras to document behaviors. The DNA samples are sent to researchers around the World working on particular questions such as evolutionary relationships with other species to population and conservation genetics (we often conduct this research as well). The specimens are carefully preserved where studies can be conducted on their musculature, reproduction systems, diet, external morphology (including morphological phylogenetics and evolution), etc... for centuries to come. We have no idea how long specimens will last in museums as properly prepared specimens from hundreds of years ago are still in excellent condition.
Without these types of data scientific research would not be published and therefore books such as Venomous Reptiles of the Western Hemisphere, Amphibians and Reptiles of Costa Rica, Hylid Frogs of Middle America, Biology of the Amphibians, either Herpetology textbook, Amphibians and Reptiles of Texas, and nearly all others would not exist for us to know about the animals we enjoy.
2. Our collection at UTA houses nearly 150,000 specimens (largest in Texas!) that have been collected over the past 50 years, mostly in the last 25 or 30. Most of our specimens are from the tropics (Mexico, Guatemala, Bolivia, Honduras, Venezuela, Indonesia, Cameroon, etc...) and I believe we have described around 200 new species/subspecies (with a lot more to come!). Many species are only known from our specimens. Obtaining these two critical components (the specimen and DNA) are what has given us the ability to understand as much as we know about these species, at least in the tropics. These collecting trips are very important and often help us understand biodiversity so that it can be saved, I don’t know any field systematist who doesn’t care about the species or environments in which they collect. And in the great biodiversity crisis that we are going through right now, where more species are going extinct than are being discovered, it is paramount to understand as much as we can and gather as much data as possible before these species go extinct. Again their extinction will not be caused by scientific collecting.
3. In addition to scientific articles, many of the people on our staff write or contribute to popular and scientific books about herpetology.
4. Additionally, our collection has allowed students (both at UTA and abroad) the opportunity to conduct research required for their undergraduate, master’s, and Ph.D. degrees in biology.
I believe that most museums around the country have the same goals and experiences as we do.
5. Again, the impact of scientific collecting is next to nothing compared to the pet and food industry. Another example, the impact of our collection is minimal compared to the millions of Texas turtles that are exported to Asia (mostly due to one guy who I believe lives less than 20 miles away from our institution). Not sure if you have heard about the turtle ban that Texas is trying to start but we are a big part of that fight. Our collection's manager Carl Franklin has a good website discussing the impact of the turtle trade in Texas (http://www.texasturtles.org/).
6. Just a few miles away there is a reptile wholesaler that probably sales more wild caught herps in one month than we collect in a year. We are one of the most active collections in the country, they are likely not one of the largest wholesalers. So we don't have near the impact that other pet collecting outfits have yet all of our collecting is about protecting the species (believe it or not), learning about the species, and finding out new and interesting things for science and society.
7. Additionally, the number of rattlesnakes collected over the past 50 years for our institution is probably not as great as a single year at the Sweetwater Texas rattlesnake roundup. And we have found several new species/subspecies of rattlesnakes (as well as other pitvipers) and may have more New World pitviper species than any other institution in the World! What benefit do the roundups have? Besides slightly boosting the economy of some small towns in Texas.
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Now the previous statements are not to say that the treatment of animals by members of academia, university, and museum is always positive or beneficial... nor that zoos and hobbyists are destructive (though I will let others more experienced than I discuss those matters on this forum).
8. The study of biology is not necessarily about protecting plants and animals and often demands killing them in order to study them (for example: anatomy, physiology, etc...). I wish this were not the case and rarely thought it was useful in most parts of my education but you wouldn't want a person becoming a vet or wildlife game officer who hadn't dissected an animal to identify organs, diseases, etc... My wife is an amphibian parasitologist and when she was an undergraduate, they just found roadkills and dissected them (she still does this), which is what parasitologists do a lot. In my first herpetology course we preserved only a few salamanders. I believe learning about preserving animals is important for some students but is a waste for others. But when getting a degree it is believed that a person should be able to perform many aspects of that field, such as dissections and understanding physiological studies. However most of the biology majors I graduated with were certainly not "biologists" after they got their degree and many of the animals they dissected was probably a waste. However, most dissections do come from biological supply companies.
9. I have seen some really bad Ph.D. herpetologists out there. Many just throw animals in the freezer making the specimens nearly worthless for preservation and DNA extraction. Not to mention what I consider a crappy way to kill animals! I even know an herp-ecologist how leaves herp traps and drift fences out for years and when people came back to clean up after him they found tons of dead amphibians and reptiles that had died in the traps. This is just a waste and we don't learn anything about the animals in these conditions. I know Ph.D. herp-physiologists who kill dozens of animals for a single scientific paper and then just discard the specimens in the trash, leaving no room for future use of the specimens or any evidence for their research, except their publication.
Therefore, scientists who go in the field to collect specimens and deposit them in museums often get criticized because we leave evidence for everything that we kill (museum or collection) while other fields that just throw animals in the trash (pet trade, zoos, other sciences) often don’t get as ridiculed while contributing equally or more to population declines and ecosystem collapse.
Thank you again for the constructive forum,
Robert
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RE: Academic, Zoo, and Pet Collecting and Collecti
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by pictigaster1 on July 29, 2008
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First off there is not enough money to get me to sell a box turtle.Yet I locality collect reptiles.In places that are far from the reach of the average road hunter I do not care what any one thinks nor will I ever stop.I do not sell thesae animals very often and only to a good home.I wont collect garters or hog noses bullsnakes where I learned to hunt as a kid why these places are now houses apartments all destroied by urbanization .Private collectors zoos collages can not compete with mans quest for more.
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RE: Academic, Zoo, and Pet Collecting and Collecti
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by Cro on August 2, 2008
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Robert, I would like to reply to your latest post.
Overall, you do a good job of explaining about the value of scientific collections.
However, I still have a few constructive criticisms to the whole University, Museum, or Acedemic Collections "industry."
Your topic #1 makes a good argument for the collecting of a "Certain Number" of animals for your collections. And those collections do serve to help in the publication of books like Venomous Reptiles of the Western Hemisphere, and in the publication of scientific articles. Those animals also help to find the relationships of animals when you use mDNA and nuclear DNA to trace their evolution and ancestors.
Your topic #2 is a bit more difficult for me. You state tht UTA has described about 200 new species / subspecies. So, you should have about 200 Holotypes, in the collection. And lets say, that you have two Paratypes additional for each of these animals, that would create a collection of about 600 animals.
However, the UTA collection has killed and pickled over 150,000 animals ! ( I know some were road kills.)
That is a huge number of dead animals. Can you really justify killing that many animals ???
If we take that same 150,000 dead Reptiles and Amphibians, and multiply it by the 10 or so institutions in the US that are similar to your's, we wind up with about a million and a half dead, pickled Reptiles and Amphibians. You have stated in your topic # 5 that your collecting is "nothing" compared to the pet and food industry. I would not consider 150,000 or 1,500,000 dead animals to be "nothing."
As far as Texas turtle collectors and Reptile wholesalers, those could be changed with legislation fairly easily if someone wanted to.
Your argument that the Sweetwater Roundup kills more rattlesnakes in a year than UTA has in 50 years means little also, as Sweetwater is damaging the population of one type of rattlesnake, while your collections is damaging a large number of types of rattlesnakes, many that are very rare and very poorly known. How do you know that the you are not killing and pickling the last few of a critically endangered rattlesnake ? Perhaps there are only 4 or 5 Ivory Billed Woodpeckers left in the world. How is killing them for a collection going to help them survive ?
Here is the problem. UTA will find an new rattlesnake like the Crotalus ericsmithi, and turn it into the Holotype. And if you locate more of them, you will kill them also, and justify it as a "backup" incase something happens to the Holotype. And, of course, your buddies at the other 10 big museum collections will want a couple of ericsmithi for their collections also. So, the next 50 or so of these snakes that are found will be killed and pickled.(If you are lucky enough to find that many, and if there are that many left in the world). That way all the museums can brag about having an ericsmithi in the collection.
The great mistake that you museum / university folks are making is that you are not keeping some of these animals alive. Some of these animals should be placed at Zoos that have a reputation of breeding rattlesnakes. You mentioned some zoos did not follow throught in getting animals back to you when the animals died. Well, the solution is simple. Find a better zoo. Or, keep the animals alive at your museum.
Jonathan Campbell states "Our knowledge of the activity patterns of the long-tailed rattlesnakes is sketchy at best." Well, perhaps that is because you have killed and pickled all of them that you found ???
Lets take a look at Crotalus stejnegeri. We find that about 16 of those animals have been found over the last 100 years. All were killed and preserved. What if just one pair had been sent Texas Zoo ?
By now, there could be 50 or 60 of these animals alive in captivity, and spread over a dozen zoos in the US. And we could be learing something about the behavior of these animals. And the offspring that died in the zoo collections could supply all of your museums who are anxious to add another pickle to the collection.
There is no excuse that all 16 stejnegeri wound up dead in a pickle jar.
Robert, I hope that as younger scientists like yourself and Thomas replace the old farts who have breathed too much formalin, that you will consider the value of living specimens in good zoo collections.
The value of a "living" Crotalus ericsmithi, or Crotalus lannomi, or Crotalus stejnegeri far exceeds what ever value it has as a pickle.
Do not follow by Rote the mistakes that your predicessors have made.
Best Regards John Z
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