Written by Andrew Smart, Conservation and Science Manager
In response to a recent BBC News article.
Under Australian law its illegal for any Australian native animals to be traded with markets outside of Australia but smuggling is frequent because of the high market value of Australian reptiles in other countries. The main illegal trade is in Australian reptiles such as the shingleback lizard (Tiliqua rugosa),[1] which are taken from the wild, and other species that can be bred legally in Australia [2]. In 2023, a paper was published by Toomes et al in the journal Biological Conservation[3] which found that 186 native species of reptile and 16 species of frog were legally offered for trade in Australia.
Australia also regulates the import of non-native species to minimise the risk of invasive species or disease impacting native Australian fauna. In 2016 Garcia-Diaz et al published research in Conservation Letters that indicated that at least 28 non-native reptile species are traded illegally in Australia and have the potential to become invasive species,[4] . The illegal trade in Australia appears linked to species bred and traded in the USA and other western countries, with 74 of 75 illegally smuggled animals between 1999 and 2016 being bred and traded in the USA. The general trend was that reptiles were first detected as smuggled approximately 6 years after first appearing in US trade[5].
Outside of Australia, the trade in reptiles and amphibians is extensive and raises a number of issues about welfare and mortality through the process of capture and shipment, welfare and mortality in shops and in the home, risk of invasive species and risk of disease or parasites impacting native species. There was some suggestion that wild caught reptiles traded legally on CITES Appendix II may have declined between 1996 and 2012 because of an increase in records of ranched reptiles from sub Saharan Africa, Asia and South America[6]. Some of these ‘ranches’ or ‘farms’ export to the UK with Green et al[7] identifying 16,458 reptiles imported by the UK from farms in Ghana between 2014 and 2018[8]. Green et al also estimated the extent of the trade in non-CITES wild animals (other than fish) imported into the UK between 2014 and 2018; 48 million individual animals. Of these 48 million, 73% were amphibians and 17% reptiles; imported from 56 different countries. Also in 2020, a paper by Marshall et al[9] looked at reptiles offered for sale on the web between 2002 and 2019 and found that 35% of all reptile species are traded online and that 90% of traded species and 50% of traded individuals were listed as wild caught.
Recent work by Valdez[10], aimed to make predictions about the common reptile species kept in captivity and which species are likely to increase in popularity. In 2021, the most popular pet reptiles were bearded dragons, followed by ball pythons and leopard geckos. Robinson et al (2016) found[11] that 7% of snakes, 87% of lizards and 69% of chelonians acquired by respondents over five years were reported to be captive bred and results suggest that mortality rates may be lowest for captive bred individuals but that Overall, 3.6% of snakes, chelonians and lizards died within one year of acquisition.
Summaries of recent papers are available as Froglife Croaking Science articles by Prof Roger Downie [12], [13].
References:
[1] Strengthening protection of endemic wildlife threatened by the international pet trade: The case of the Australian shingleback lizard – Heinrich – 2022 – Animal Conservation – Wiley Online Library,
[2] Stopping the illegal trafficking of Australian wildlife.pdf (austrac.gov.au).
[3] main.pdf (sciencedirectassets.com)
[4] The Illegal Wildlife Trade Is a Likely Source of Alien Species (wiley.com)
[5] Live reptile smuggling is predicted by trends in the legal exotic pet trade (wiley.com)
[6] Dynamics of the global trade in live reptiles: Shifting trends in production and consequences for sustainability – ScienceDirect
[7] Animals | Free Full-Text | Risky Business: Live Non-CITES Wildlife UK Imports and the Potential for Infectious Diseases (mdpi.com)
[8] Snakes and ladders: a review of ball python production in West Africa for the global pet market – ORA – Oxford University Research Archive
[9] Thousands of reptile species threatened by under-regulated global trade | Nature Communications
[10] Animals | Free Full-Text | Using Google Trends to Determine Current, Past, and Future Trends in the Reptile Pet Trade (mdpi.com)
[11] Captive Reptile Mortality Rates in the Home and Implications for the Wildlife Trade | PLOS ONE
[13] Croaking Science: The International Trade in Reptiles and Amphibians (froglife.org).