Ethics in the Dart Frog Hobby - start thread

[heyduke]

I think it was just old and buried and most of this has been discussed in other hijacked threads. Perhaps in a round about way but still covered.



Sean

[Philsuma]

I don't think so.....take a CLOSER look. Look at the poll numbers in that other, related thread.

There' still about 50% of our hobby that would buy ANY frog, illegal or legal from ANY person (Jack the Ripper, for instance).

We have our work cut out for us, it seems.

[heyduke]

I see what you're saying.

It could be the tap talk issue that you can't see polls or vote on them.

Even so... That number is higher than I thought it would be. I was thinking 10-20% at most. That's pretty sad.


Sean

[Rusty_Shackleford]

It's worse than just buying frogs from sketchy sources. I could show you a two threads by the same poster, in one thread he says he has a sick frog an doesn't have the money to take it to a vet, then in another thread posts that he's looking to buy a group of A. bassleri. You know A. bassleri starts at about $90 a piece. More than enough to cover the cost of a vet visit. To may people these frogs are disposable animals. That is certainly a lack of ethics.

[Philsuma]

Let's hopefully just chalk that up to a young kid with childish priorities. Hopefully they will 'mature' and grow.

[Chuck Lawson]

Not just young kids; one reason you see even animal rescue operations charge money to place cats / dogs is because if it's "free", some people don't value the animal enough to take it to the vet.

[Rusty_Shackleford]

Let's hopefully just chalk that up to a young kid with childish priorities. Hopefully they will 'mature' and grow.

I wish I could say that were true, but nope, not a young kid at all. Absolutely someone who got into dart frogs and immedately had a "business name" and started mass producing tads.

[heyduke]

I just checked the 'views' of this particular thread. I wonder if people are either scared or showing disdain for this topic as evidenced by the small number of views. Interesting....

I think you may be on to something here.

A 7 year old thread started by MP similar in discussion on DB was brought back to life. It only had 6 original responses.

Once people started to add to the discussion it was locked. There was no heated anything going on. Just talk about why people would keep questionable animals. Not sure why they found it necessary to close and bury the thread. Guilt?


Sean

[Philsuma]

I think people are indeed scared. You see a LOT of the older guys decided not to post anything, and you see a lot of new people confused by the strong arguments and discussion.

In the end....talking about the unsavory stuff is the right thing to do, I'm convinced. If 'old heads' refuse to post or the hobby experiences a slow-down do to all the talk.....then so be it, as far as I'm concerned. We went way too long with the status quo jamming their heads in the sand and refusing to take on big-boy issues straight on. Not now. Not here.

[Rusty_Shackleford]

Phil why are people scared? Are new hobbyists scared of being ostracized? Are old hobbyists afraid of being caught and called out? Everyone has to have their own code of ethics and should live up to them. I don't care if I lose friends over this. My own code of ethics says I wouldn't be friends with anyone who has illegal frogs. I don't care if I'm ostracized by the old timers and called an a**hole. I have no problems sleeping very soundly at night with my actions in the hobby and I'm damn proud of that. We all should be, but can everyone say that?

[Sally]

I am thinking you won't really have many friends left, or maybe you can still be friends with all the people that own "greyish" frogs ... they could be greyish friends. Just a caution that things are not black and white. Personally I think most people are not "scared" they just don't want to talk smack or add more drama to the drama.

[ChrisK]

I am thinking you won't really have many friends left, or maybe you can still be friends with all the people that own "greyish" frogs ... they could be greyish friends. Just a caution that things are not black and white. Personally I think most people are not "scared" they just don't want to talk smack or add more drama to the drama.

Exactly - like Ed always says, auratus is the most smuggled dart year after year by a long shot, but how often do you see someone who posts pics of their auratus being attacked for having questionable frogs? Never. With so many thousands being smuggled annually, they're making their way into the hobby. With that kind of "logic", it just makes no sense. And that's just one example.

[Philsuma]

Ethics in a small, niche hobby where we splurge and overspend big money on frogs all in the face of a horrible economy is like herding cats (no offense Chuck). Pushing water around. Very hard to do.

The thing we CAN do is out and ostracize the offenders - but even publicizing info leads to sales for these guys, so it's truly an epic battle.

Banning people is not very effective either, as it's been shown that they will just create fictitious screen names and be potentially MORE dangerous by being underground.

If we want to make a dent:

Lead by example.

Be vociferous in your views and feelings - post often on them,so that the hobby soons gets a 'base' opinion'.

Don't support the few people that the hobby uncovers and don't support the others that do support them.

[Philsuma]

If they are not scared to post, then they must be showing disdain for the topic. That's worse IMO, as in means they are ok with the smuggled animals.

I DO believe in the 'Grey' classification, incidentally.

[Rusty_Shackleford]

I am thinking you won't really have many friends left, or maybe you can still be friends with all the people that own "greyish" frogs ... they could be greyish friends. Just a caution that things are not black and white. Personally I think most people are not "scared" they just don't want to talk smack or add more drama to the drama.

Exactly - like Ed always says, auratus is the most smuggled dart year after year by a long shot, but how often do you see someone who posts pics of their auratus being attacked for having questionable frogs? Never. With so many thousands being smuggled annually, they're making their way into the hobby. With that kind of "logic", it just makes no sense. And that's just one example.

Thanks for your thoughts everyone. I personally appreciate everyones thoughts on this matter.
As for auratus being the most smuggled frog..well who's buying them all? How could it be more cost effective than captive bred auratus? How about buying auratus only from someone who breeds them in their home. Those aren't smuggled, those are captive bred.

[Ghostvivs]

I know some people won't talk/ do business with me because i call people out. Do i care? Nope...
I don't care who it is, how much $$ they have or how many people like them...

For me it's all about the truth, not the who.

[Chuck Lawson]

Ethics in a small, niche hobby where we splurge and overspend big money on frogs all in the face of a horrible economy is like herding cats (no offense Chuck). Pushing water around. Very hard to do.

None taken -- I'm a reformed cat herder :mrgreen:

Okay, at the risk of opening the can of worms, one thing that's been bugging me for awhile about the whole periodic smuggling discussion is "where do we draw the line?"

Edit - removed 5 paragraphs of not only rehashing-the-same-old-questions, but ones that were just rehashed elsewhere. I'm guessing there aren't answers forthcoming in the hobby as currently constituted, other than "stay way from the very obvious very bad stuff".

[RichFrye]

There is a HUGE difference between those who CLAIM to be ignorant {sic} or surprised that So-And -Sos (Taron, and others) are selling illegal frogs, and those of us who have terribilis or intermedius from two decades ago...
Some a-holes keep on getting their frogs from whomever , however , and their colors are showing more and more, and more and more. Some get their frogs from nations of question (Panama/others) , then preach not to buy from them, after their frogs are acquired from said nation/s...
They are not fooling anyone but the newist of the newbs. Period.

For those who want to go into details about exactly who has been and who continues to feed the smugglers and put on two faces as a habit, call or email me. Most have my numbers and all should be able to dig out my email addy.

[cbreon]

Ethics in a small, niche hobby where we splurge and overspend big money on frogs all in the face of a horrible economy is like herding cats (no offense Chuck). Pushing water around. Very hard to do.

None taken -- I'm a reformed cat herder :mrgreen:

Okay, at the risk of opening the can of worms, one thing that's been bugging me for awhile about the whole periodic smuggling discussion is "where do we draw the line?"

Edit - removed 5 paragraphs of not only rehashing-the-same-old-questions, but ones that were just rehashed elsewhere. I'm guessing there aren't answers forthcoming in the hobby as currently constituted, other than "stay way from the very obvious very bad stuff".

Personally, I draw the line/speak up when I see large numbers of adult frogs come in via EU import or other, from countries that generally export in small numbers or on research permits only. So when I see a bunch of adult Grannies or Sylvaticus pairs available, its pretty obvious that they were WC and therefore smuggled. Its hard to be vocal about gray-area frogs, since its difficult to speak with certainty about their legality. But the above situations/imports were pretty obviously wrong and easy to criticize. Furthermore, they were the type of brazen illegal activity that has to be shunned if we would like to remain a self-policed community.

Frogs realeased from a research project, lab, or zoo are less of a concern, seeing how they were legally collected and likely done so with the wild population's health in mind.

[Chuck Lawson]

Personally, I draw the line/speak up when I see large numbers of adult frogs come in via EU import or other, from countries that generally export in small numbers or on research permits only. So when I see a bunch of adult Grannies or Sylvaticus pairs available, its pretty obvious that they were WC and therefore smuggled. Its hard to be vocal about gray-area frogs, since its difficult to speak with certainty about their legality. But the above situations/imports were pretty obviously wrong and easy to criticize. Furthermore, they were the type of brazen illegal activity that has to be shunned if we would like to remain a self-policed community.

Frogs realeased from a research project, lab, or zoo are less of a concern, seeing how they were legally collected and likely done so with the wild population's health in mind.

Yeah, I should have excised either more or less of that post -- some of the discussions (here and elsewhere) have gone a ways towards conflating the "obviously bad" issues with the "okay, this is complicated" provenances of some of the long-term lines in the hobby, and I edited that post after seeing (in that elsewhere thread) Ed do a nice job of explaining some the reasons why many of those old-line frogs probably are just fine.

I still think this is an issue that isn't going to get solved any time soon; discussions like this are probably mostly useful for helping newbies (like me) understand things like just why the sudden availability of adult pairs of hard-to-breed and eggfeeders from countries with little or no export is likely suspicious.