Including the collections of private breeders within the overall zoo management of wild animals is highly desirable and very, very difficult. When you are dependent upon understanding how many males and females and a blood genetic lines in order to put together breeding pairs and the private breeder can’t or won’t tell you what he has, you’re stymied. And this has been a frustration for both zoo people and private collectors. After all very few private collectors have whole offices filled with computers, keeping records of their animals. They don’t have significant veterinary and curatorial staffs. So it is very difficult to start with a level playing field. But yet in 2010, AZA decided that banning private participation in SSP might’ve been a mistake.
