Ebony Uromastyx (U. alfredschmidti)

Ebony Uromastyx Male	Ebony Uromastyx Female

 

The Ebony Mali Uromastyx is currently the rarest species in herpetoculture.  A few pairs were imported into the Unites States during the summer of 2004 in a small group of Banded Uromastyx.  Many of the individuals in the Banded group appeared to be intergrades with the Banded Uromastyx and none of the group may prove out to be pure U. alfredschmidti, but at least 3 pair are at the very least high percentage U. alfredschmidti.   We kept back the purest looking trio plus one intergrade male and have them set up for cycling the winter of 2004-2005 for possible breeding in spring 2005. 

Little is known of the species since before now, none have been kept in captivity.  Adult size is comparable to the Mali Uromastyx.  Adult  coloration of  adult males is solid black including the belly.  Females start out similar to an extremely darkly pigmented  Mali female but also go predominately if not also solidly black.   The temperament of the few individuals that came in was very similar to the Banded Uros.  Slightly skittish at first and slightly more aggressive than a Mali but less so than the average Moroccan.   This distinguishes them from the very few near-solid black Mali's (at least they were assumed to be Mali's at the time) that have come into the U.S. over the years.  Those have without exception being of extremely bad temperament and all have died within a few months of entering captivity.   The near-solid black Mali females that came in at the same time as the black males were also characterized by being excessively aggressive and short-lived but otherwise looked to be simply black Mali's.  The current Ebony females look much closer to a Banded female in physical structure and temperament and clearly are not Mali's.  Differences in the number of tail whorls is one means of separating the two groups (dispar species - (Bandeds, Mali's), and Ebony's.  The counts of these newly imported Ebony's is right on the dividing  - the extreme high end for dispar and the lower end for alfredschmidti (21 whorls).   Odds are these individuals are part of a remnant population from when the parent species form which alfredschmidti and dispar emerged was split into reproductively isolated populations.

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