Thanks for sharing that Colin, and for the most part I agree 100%. In the pet trade there are two types of the Argentine tegus, the Tupinambis merianae and the Tupinambis rufescens. However I do think tegus from different areas of South America can carry different looks and traits and can be quite different than others found in different locals.

Look at the tegu in this video, it has the markings said to be in the Blues, the teardrop and dark nose, however it is clearly an Argentine black and white:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=A08URe_1CSQ&feature=related

Absolutely that is certainly true. Take your Chacoan giants, for instance. I am not debating at all that there are populations naturally occuring that predominantly display the phenotype you are calling "Chacoan giant". Unfortunately, there is currently nothing to back up the claim that A)all T.merianae coming from the Chacoa region display those characteristics, or inversely B) all tegus with those characteristics are strictly from the Chacoan region. The origin of your stock could likewise be questioned, and I'm willing to bet you couldn't 100% guarantee that your animals are specifically from natural Chacoan populations.

However, I will also state that there is likely good possibility that what is currently recognized as T. merianae can with further investigation be classified into several species. Blues might be a new, undescribed species, as may your Chacoan giants. But until genetic analysis is done, people insisting blues are their own species based on little more than inconsistent colour characteristics (I don't know how many non-blue tegus I've seen, had and worked with - clearly in the hundreds- that had/have the dark nose, same with the teardrop), well, to bring back a similar analogy, is like insisting the model of vehicle you drive is based on its colour.

Right now, all these names, Chacoan, blue...heck even the ridiculous monicker Argentine black & white, all are nothing more than inventions of the hobbyist trade with no documentation backing up the claim. Why do people adhere and insist on "Argentine black & white" when Argentina is only a small part of its geographic distribution and they aren't all strictly black & white? T.merianae are pretty much distributed throughout all of the South American continent east of the Andes. Most of that land is "Brazil", not "Argentina". My committee would consider me an idiot and likely disregard my thesis if I made the claim I researched "Argentine black&white tegus" when the animals I worked on were not from there. And yet I've seen others get up in arms when someone described theirs as Peruvian or Paraguyan and could provide as much documentation to back up their claim as you probably can for Chacoan. These are all just names being thrown around with little to back them up.

Frankly, let the hobbyists create the names they want, but they should drop the geographic reference if they don't have the documentation to back it up. For example, I have no problem with you calling your line "giants". They certainly are. Chacoan I question. Chacoan is a description the hobbyist trade has grabbed onto that in many instances only mean "you want, you will need to pay more for". Chacoan red footed tortoises, Chacoan pac man frogs, Chacoan poptarts. Considering the traits of these that I've seen in other areas outside of Chacoa, it seems silly to classify them as such in the absence of a regulating body.

My tegus are Brazilian: Not only can I document I brought them from Brazil, but I can probably document all their parental lineage back to the original stock and provide the geographic origins for where those individuals were collected. IBAMA is a headache of a bureacracy, but it does have its uses. If I were to put them on the market, why would I stick to the name "Argentine black & whites"? We used to have a male that was all black, and another that was almost completely white. If I had taken those, bred them out to produce more all blacks and all whites, would it be correct/incorrect for me to market those specific lines as Sao Pauloan or Minas Gerais because that's basically the area they came from, despite the fact that those lines don't represent what may or may not (not from what I saw) commonly be encountered in those areas?

This is also true with the ranges/names, however there are so many animals not just reptiles with a local in the name. Many of these do not just exsist in that local but have a much wider range, or have had a much larger range at one time.

American Alligator, Russian brown bear, Texas alligator lizard, California condor, Florida panther, and many more.

Alligator mississippiensis, but found in a few states. Russian brown bears are not just found in Russia. or California condors are only in California. Florida panters were found all over the east coast at one time. There are many more if I think on this, but this is a few that fall under the same that you speak of.

You're quite correct, Bobby, but you overlooked the caveat.



All the examples of which you speak fall under the guidelines of a regulating body, ie. there is a scientific or government group that determines what the official common name is. There is no such body for reptiles of South America. The name "Argentine black & white tegu" is not adopted by anyone outside of the hobbyist arena, it is an invention of convenience only. Yet like I said, when someone else claims theirs to be Paraguyan or Peruvian, people get riled up. Those names are just as official as "Argentine" is. This is why I generally push for people to learn the scientific name, then there is NO confusion as to what species is being discussed, but that's a matter for a different diatribe.

Finally a thread worth investigation, theories, research, and spread of information. Thanks Colin.

This is the very reason I joined this forum . Thanks Colin and Bobby

This is true, however there is also no true Colombian tegus, they are not just found in Colombia. In many areas the two species are both found.

Obtaining a wild caught blue tegu is very possible.

I would be interested in knowing how.

Legally exporting it would be very difficult.

Let us know about this???????

+1 ^^

Tegus are on the CITES list so technically it is illegal to import wild caught tegus to the US. That is why we are skeptical. Not to mention the blues we have in the US actually came in with a shipment of columbians and not much is known about where they actually came from.