Introducing Caatanga X Ornata

[SethD]

For the same reason I don't pair up my "extra" A. annae with A. callidryas or produce designer hybrid dart frogs? Because I have a little more integrity than to produce something that could easily contaminate and permanently ruin our captive populations.

Please... lol Don't drag "dart frog ethics" into other areas of the amphibian hobby. Dart frogs are a somewhat unique case in that there are many morphs of the same species in many cases and it could be difficult to tell if a hybrid is a hybrid or a new morph. That was the initial reasoning behind the dart frog hobby frowning on hybrids though it has moved beyond that practical reasoning now into something a bit more visceral I think.

In the case of Horned frogs dart frog reasoning does not really apply for the following reasons.

A: To date crosses of horned frog species have been infertile(or possibly a low level of fertility in some specimens though this has not been proven) due to different chromosome counts. For example Ornata is octoploid while cranwelli is not.

B: There is only a relatively small number of regular horned frog breeders. It is likely to stay that way. They all tend to be knowledgeable. They are unlikely to "accidentally" contaminate "pure" stock. This isn't the dart frog world where there are hundreds and hundreds of different breeders at all different levels of knowledge and experience.

Let's hope that is true and that Brazil will continue to relax their export restrictions.

I hope some more legal stuff comes out of brazil too.

I also hope future exports go to more ethical breeders.

Without those two breeders, and especially Philippe de Vosjoli, horned frogs most likely would not be available as CB in the hobby period. I understand a lot of comparatively newer people in the hobby might not know things like that but before you start calling out people as "unethical breeders" understand that dart frogs are not the beginning nor the end of the amphibian hobby and attitudes towards hybrids are not always the same as they are in the dart frog community for some of the reasons I mentioned. If you don't like them fine, nobody is going to make you buy them, but just because you don't like them doesn't mean someone that produces them is automatically an unethical breeder.