FunkyRes
New member
There is a fairly recently discovered crayfish that is parthenogenic.
No one knows where it actually came from, it was found in aquariums in Germany with no known wild origins, but it is very closely related to north american crayfish, and I suspect it actually is a hybrid (like with whiptail lizards - they normally sexually reproduce, the all female parthenogenic populations are actually hybrids)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmorkrebs
There is some jerk spamming craigs list, fish forums, and fishing forums, trying to sell them.
His website says not commercial, they are private stock he happens to have available - but that's probably just to try and get his spam around the ToS at a lot of places (like craigs list which does not allow commercial live pet advertisements)
Anywhoo - one of the things he is advertising them for is fishing bait. Get a few and they quickly reproduce in large numbers.
The problem, these crayfish are a serious evasive threat. They seem to be extremely hardy and very prolific. The ecological damage that could result from a single crayfish getting off the fishing hook (or the fisherman dumping his excess so he doesn't have to pack them home) is tremendous.
Many of the California Tiger Salamander populations are genetically polluted hybrids now as a direct result of fishing bait escapees and the use of eastern tiger salamander larvae as bait.
I'm generally not in favor of laws that tell us what we may or may not keep as pets, but idiots promoting such an invasive threat to be used in a scenario where there will be escapes is exactly why a lot of those laws get written.
No one knows where it actually came from, it was found in aquariums in Germany with no known wild origins, but it is very closely related to north american crayfish, and I suspect it actually is a hybrid (like with whiptail lizards - they normally sexually reproduce, the all female parthenogenic populations are actually hybrids)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmorkrebs
There is some jerk spamming craigs list, fish forums, and fishing forums, trying to sell them.
His website says not commercial, they are private stock he happens to have available - but that's probably just to try and get his spam around the ToS at a lot of places (like craigs list which does not allow commercial live pet advertisements)
Anywhoo - one of the things he is advertising them for is fishing bait. Get a few and they quickly reproduce in large numbers.
The problem, these crayfish are a serious evasive threat. They seem to be extremely hardy and very prolific. The ecological damage that could result from a single crayfish getting off the fishing hook (or the fisherman dumping his excess so he doesn't have to pack them home) is tremendous.
Many of the California Tiger Salamander populations are genetically polluted hybrids now as a direct result of fishing bait escapees and the use of eastern tiger salamander larvae as bait.
I'm generally not in favor of laws that tell us what we may or may not keep as pets, but idiots promoting such an invasive threat to be used in a scenario where there will be escapes is exactly why a lot of those laws get written.
