The\nillegal wildlife trade has generally focused on species such as rhinos,\nelephants, and pangolins which are trafficked and killed for their use in\ntraditional medicines, or for other consumptive practices, but the global trade\nin live animals is also considerable, and reptile species are particularly\npopular. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The\nresults of a study led by researchers from the University of Adelaide into the\nillegal smuggling of live reptiles such as lizards, snakes, and turtles, published\nrecently in Conservation Letters, <\/em>suggest the unregulated pet trade of\nreptiles in the US is influencing the illegal wildlife trade in other Western\ncountries, including Australia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lead\nauthor Oliver Stringham, a Postdoctoral Fellow at the UA\u2019s School of Biological\nSciences said much less attention had been paid to the scale of the wildlife\ntrade on large Western markets despite its long-time occurrence in countries\nsuch as the US.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe\nUS markets drive many aspects of Westernised culture, such as fashion, music\nand fast-food, so the influence of the US on the reptile pet trade has the\ncapacity to be substantial. Our interpretation is that the recent demand for\nillegal species in Australia has therefore originated from species already\npresent in the US pet trade rather than new emerging or exotic species,\u201d\nStringham said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Scientists\nused US trade data, US reptile pet store inventories, and other trait, taxonomy\nand trade-based variables to model the probability of reptile species being\nsmuggled into Australia. Of the 75 reptile species reported as smuggled here\nbetween 1999 and 2016, all but one were found in the unregulated US trade. On\naverage a species arrived in Australia illegally about six years after first\nappearing in the US. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Three\nreptile families had the highest probability of being smuggled: Elapdae<\/em>\n(such as cobras and mambas; all venomous), Kinosternidae<\/em> (small turtles\nsuch as mud turtles and musk turtles), and Testudinidae <\/em>(tortoises).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stringham\nsaid the research provided the first evidence that market-level indicators of\nlegal wildlife trade in the US has a strong predictive power to discern which\nspecies are smuggled illegally into Australia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOur\nstudy also provides the first risk-watch of desirable reptile species\ntrafficked into Australia, and a framework for anticipating future trends in\nwildlife smuggling,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Co-author\nPhillip Cassey from the UA\u2019s Invasion Science and Wildlife Ecology Lab said\nWestern countries play a prominent role in the legal and illegal wildlife\ntrade, particularly in exotic pet keeping, and hopes these findings will assist\nand anticipate the risk of exotic live animals being smuggled in Australia and\nelsewhere, as well as encourage further research into the patterns and drivers\nof live animal smuggling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nillicit transnational wildlife trade poses a severe conservation threat, increased\nbiodiversity loss, and biosecurity and health risks to trading and recipient\ncountries from the harvesting and transporting of wildlife. The exotic pet\ntrade is also a noted leading pathway of new biological invasions for vertebrates\nand presents a risk for panzootics. The global chytrid fungus outbreak was due\nto the live trade of pet amphibians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n