Kevin
Archachatina dimidiata
Posts: 2,227
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Post by Kevin on Oct 12, 2006 13:35:44 GMT
I was wondering about Achatina fulica, a large population of them in captivity would be inbred over a very long period of time wouldnt they? especially ones that originate from petshops, siblings would be kept together over a long period of time, could this explain why the ones in captivity are usually stunted now? arent fulica suppose to get to 20cm+? why doesnt any in captivity get this size? all my adult fulica have got on average to 12-14cm maximum, quite a few that ive kept were adult and stopped growing at around 8-10cm, theyre shells remained healthy at that size though.
Ive noticed that no-one on here seems to promote breeding fulica also, this is good for now, because people will be overrun, but wont healthy captive fulica become more hard to find in captivity in the long run if no one breeds them?
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goose
Achatina immaculata
Posts: 311
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Post by goose on Oct 12, 2006 13:51:17 GMT
I think that is true Kevin - I am sure the fulicas sizes are becoming smaller because of inbreeding problems. I think if snail keeping is going to become a viable long term hobby then some kind of organised captive breeding program is going to be required - similar to that for other species for example zoo and farm animals and pedigree cats/dogs. We are going to need to know 'pedigrees' for our snails - their initial origin and their parentage to avoid inbreeding and perhaps loan out snails to others with unrelated individuals for breeding purposes. You would also perhaps need occasional injections of wild caught genes to keep the gene pool healthy.
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Kevin
Archachatina dimidiata
Posts: 2,227
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Post by Kevin on Oct 12, 2006 13:59:45 GMT
I think that is true Kevin - I am sure the fulicas sizes are becoming smaller because of inbreeding problems. I think if snail keeping is going to become a viable long term hobby then some kind of organised captive breeding program is going to be required - similar to that for other species for example zoo and farm animals and pedigree cats/dogs. We are going to need to know 'pedigrees' for our snails - their initial origin and their parentage to avoid inbreeding and perhaps loan out snails to others with unrelated individuals for breeding purposes. You would also perhaps need occasional injections of wild caught genes to keep the gene pool healthy. I agree, thats a great idea about promoting responsible captive breeding of snails, Im trying to find unrelated snails to my ones at the moment, ive started to ask if any seller i get them from know's the recent history of they're snails, or if they are related or not, I'm working on seperating snails also, to avoid inbreeding, and only breeding unrelated snails, and only selling snails in pairs or more, that are most likely unrelated, when bred from wild caught snails its impossible to know, but the liklyhood is that they are. |
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goose
Achatina immaculata
Posts: 311
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Post by goose on Oct 12, 2006 14:02:04 GMT
Also I suppose the problem can be compounded by the fact that some snail species like fulicas are prolific breeders and produce vast amounts of eggs regularly - a genetic strategy that in the wild would mean at least some of their offspring survive to breed, but in captivity means that a large numbers of genetically related offstring survive which unless separated will breed together. Many people also buy more than one snail from the same source - for example I will not be able to breed Ivan and Igor since they are brothers. I think sites like this already hold the information we need to ensure viable breeding populations since those of us with captive snails usually know their origin and parentage.
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goose
Achatina immaculata
Posts: 311
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Post by goose on Oct 12, 2006 14:20:40 GMT
I think that is exactly what is needed - I am sure everyone who doesn't breed snails appreciates all the hard work you guys who do carry out so we can own healthy captive snails.
I suppose also with wild caught species, if they are collected from a small geographical area or location given that snails are not apt to travel far there is a chance those could be related to a certain extent also.
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Arno
Archachatina puylaerti
Posts: 1,493
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Post by Arno on Oct 12, 2006 16:01:05 GMT
I was wondering about Achatina fulica, a large population of them in captivity would be inbred over a very long period of time wouldnt they? especially ones that originate from petshops, siblings would be kept together over a long period of time, could this explain why the ones in captivity are usually stunted now? arent fulica suppose to get to 20cm+? why doesnt any in captivity get this size? all my adult fulica have got on average to 12-14cm maximum, quite a few that ive kept were adult and stopped growing at around 8-10cm, theyre shells remained healthy at that size though. Ive noticed that no-one on here seems to promote breeding fulica also, this is good for now, because people will be overrun, but wont healthy captive fulica become more hard to find in captivity in the long run if no one breeds them? I think 20 cm + would be really big for a fulica.In one book I found the info that the largest shell they found was 171 mm(maybe outdated but still),and that the average length was 110 mm.So smaller shells are not that uncommon and don't have to be a sign of inbreeding. Maybe one of the reasons for stunted shells is that weaker snails which normally wouldn't made it in the wild survive in captivity. Nevertheless it's probably a good thing to get new snails now and then when you're having a breeding program. |
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goose
Achatina immaculata
Posts: 311
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Post by goose on Oct 12, 2006 20:17:21 GMT
That probably true also. Nevertheless my original fulicas - kept about 12 - 13 years ago - I had 3 all reached 16-18 centimetres.
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Post by sezzy5889 on Oct 12, 2006 20:48:21 GMT
there were 2 at the AES, did anyone see them, they were huge fulica, the biggest i've seen! they were as big as my tiger! about 16-17cm shell  Just thought i'd mention, NWE sell wild caught fulica only, if anyone did want to begin a sensible captive breeding of fulica, i think wild caughts would be the place to start, at least you know they are a fresh blood line :-) |
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Post by ness on Oct 23, 2006 16:25:00 GMT
Gosh that's huge! Mine are all 8-9 cm! As for inbreeding it's interesting that I had one batch of eggs that grew to the 8-9 cm snails I have now, and 1 batch that grew only 4 cm or so and died at an average of aged 2 years. Inbreeding perhaps? I don't breed them now (I only bred them then because I was very naive and thought they were rare!).
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