To us
enthusiasts it seems such a big hole to be filled, social structure in lower
vertebrates - one I know that interests me concerning geckos. The
problem as I see it is that not too many grants are awarded for pure science
anymore and especially when that concerns herpetology. Likewise there
aren't too many non-scientific venture capitalist firms set up by
herpetoculturists yet so gekkonid ecology for it's own sake may
have to wait. There are much better :) (read "normal") orders out
there to whom us cognisant mammals can better relate, thus it is Bonobo and
Dolphin ecology that garners the limelight (obvious logical fallacy).
Maybe Steve Erwin is making some headway to change this?
:)
It
would be difficult to say that Sphaerodactylus are ignored in an academic sense
but I agree North American's seem to gloss them over culturally.
Unfortunate. If frog people are willing to breed and feed Dendrobatids and
Atelopids we should be capable of dealing with Sphaerodactylus. I found
they were pretty robust feeders and breeders in my limited experiences with
them. Extremely interesting little guys and quite different in
behaviour from most species we keep. The Interessengruppe Phelsuma
voted at their meeting in (98?) to include Gonatodes and Sphaerodactylus
into the fold since most of the keepers interested in Phelsuma had a few species
here and there of the neotropical version. Maybe a testament to their
popularity on the continent? Maybe also a harbinger of things to come as
we follow along...
I
suspect a proper resource partitioning study would find P.gracilis and
U.phantasticus to divide their preferences between food selection and strata
occupation. No first hand experience though...
It's
nice to see someone willing to commit to species rich vivaria in a meaningful
way. It's also nice not to hear the usual banter against
them when clear it can be done well :)
Jamie
-----Original Message-----Interesting idea for the Uroplatus, but it would be useless to use species that do not occur in their habitat.
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Wednesday, September 19, 2001 6:49 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [Gecko] Gecko social structures
I'm not aware of any Brookesia imported from U. phantasticus habitat and where those milipedes come from is unknown to me. You could use U. henkeli with Brookeisa ebenaui (legenderi?), B. stumpfii, even B. thelii (spelling?), and B. minima.
You might try this, because this would clarify something for a lot of us. Keep Paroedura gracilis and U. phantasticus together because they do inhabitat the same place and to my understanding, the same microhabitat. How you can have to similar sized animals with the same parameters in the same area and presumibly the same niche is a mystery to me.
And the Spharoedactylus puzzle is going to awesome. They are such an amazing gecko, and AMAZINGLY common in wild... It's a mystery to me why people ignore them.
--Daniel
