What is illegal in the uk?

Illegal in regards to what? Illegal to keep? Illegal to handle?
 
I think native UK newts are illegal to handle unless you have a special license, I'm not sure about keeping
 
This is what information I have managed to gether on the subject:

palmate newt (Lissotriton helveticus)
illegal to sell or trade in any manner
　
great crested newt (Triturus cristatus)
illegal to kill, injure, capture, disturb, damage or destroy habitat, possess, sell, or trade. The best course of action would be to just avoid the newts and their habitat altogether.
　
smooth newt (Lissotriton vulgaris)
illegal in great britain: sale or trade in any manner
illegal in northern ireland: killing, injuring, capturing, disturbance, possession or trade
 
Unless captive bred !!! .It's slightly more complicated have another read all three are available captive bred .Cristatus cb require papers from the breeder.
 
As far as UK species goes Angie has it right. you can keep smooth and palmate but you can't buy them you have to collect them yourself. Ethical considerations aside keeping WC animals you need to ensure that you are not disturbing crested habitat or the animals when you collect them. Probably the best thing to do is to dig yourself a pond and see what turns up. Assuming you have a garden!

Of course if you just mean what species generally it'd be better to approach it the other way and look at what you can keep. A trawl of the forum and a look at what member have/ what's for sale should give you a pretty good idea.
 
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To be honest I wouldn't even bother trying this. The licences only relate to wild caught animals from specific counties and it's highly unlikely that Natural England would issue it for the pet trade. These kind of things tend to be for scientific and educational purposes only, there are instances where these have been issued and then animals were subsequently offered for sale but you'll need to find a highly reputable breeder.

It's interesting to note that they haven't updated their forms or guidance, still referring to both as Triturus. Whether the intention is to update this I don't know, it'll be pretty low on their list of priorities I'd say.

You can get captive bred animals but from a differing genetic strain i.e. european CB animals, note though you will still need CITES where applicable. The Wildlife and Countryside Act refers to 'wild' animals so any British animals could be taken legally (L. vulgaris and L. heleveticus) bred for a few generations and then sold on legally.However the seller needs to prove the animals captive bred credentials.

If you want to collect L. vulgaris and L. heleveticus you can do so legally depends on which side of the ethical fence you sit. Just make sure if you find T. cristatus you stop.
 
From the research I did, it looks like keeping crested newts altogether is illegal. If you go pond dipping you're only allowed to keep adults out of the pond for a maximum of 30 minutes.

I have heard that for some other native species (such as grass snakes) you are only allowed to sell or trade 3rd generation captive bred
 
rethgar said:
To be honest I wouldn't even bother trying this. The licences only relate to wild caught animals from specific counties and it's highly unlikely that Natural England would issue it for the pet trade. These kind of things tend to be for scientific and educational purposes only, there are instances where these have been issued and then animals were subsequently offered for sale but you'll need to find a highly reputable breeder.

It's interesting to note that they haven't updated their forms or guidance, still referring to both as Triturus. Whether the intention is to update this I don't know, it'll be pretty low on their list of priorities I'd say.

You can get captive bred animals but from a differing genetic strain i.e. european CB animals, note though you will still need CITES where applicable. The Wildlife and Countryside Act refers to 'wild' animals so any British animals could be taken legally (L. vulgaris and L. heleveticus) bred for a few generations and then sold on legally.However the seller needs to prove the animals captive bred credentials.

If you want to collect L. vulgaris and L. heleveticus you can do so legally depends on which side of the ethical fence you sit. Just make sure if you find T. cristatus you stop.
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I know of a very reputible source of cb all three specimens including Cristatus ,who sells the eggs once a year he has rescued colony's of crestie's from chalk quarries back in the 70's.A well known biologist what would be the law on selling the young from the eggs purchased from said source?
 
The keeping of cristatusis possible but under licence for wild specimens but this is generally regarded as a relatively short term activity. My licence allows for short term captivity for educational purposes. Disturbance of animals and habitat can only ne carried out under licence also once presence is confirmed. There is some provision for disturbance where animal welfare is in jeopardy without a licence. Knowing disturbance is a no no though
 
rethgar said:
To be honest I wouldn't even bother trying this. The licences only relate to wild caught animals from specific counties and it's highly unlikely that Natural England would issue it for the pet trade.
Click to expand...

There's no question of 'issuing it for the pet trade', the general licence applies to everyone as soon as it's made. It would be perfectly legal for me to go out now, collect some adult smooth newts from my compost heap, and offer them for sale, without having to tell NE about it.

This might not be legal next October, it depends if the general licence is renewed, and what conditions apply.

Before the general licenses were issued, English Nature had a policy of granting licences on demand for trade in the common species (which was almost exclusively common frogs for lab purposes), and they used licence returns as a means of monitoring the numbers traded. It was thought that this had little impact on wild populations (especially as the use of lab frogs was declining), and this is presumably why the general licences were issued.

mr cyclone said:
what would be the law on selling the young from the eggs purchased from said source?
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If your animals are second-generation captive-bred, then it's legal to sell them within the UK without any paperwork. If you're challenged about this (which is very unlikely), then you'd have to be able to prove they're captive bred. You might want to keep copies of any communication you had with the original seller, just in case...
 
Thanks Caleb that should clear up most of the discussion, so bottom line as always is cb is better than wc as usual .All THREE can be obtained captive bred in the uk
 
caleb said:
It would be perfectly legal for me to go out now, collect some adult smooth newts from my compost heap, and offer them for sale, without having to tell NE about it
Click to expand...

Out of interest. Do you have a general licence for sale and if so is it based on the old taxonomy? I only ask ad I had some correspondence from NE recently and it was still using the old names. The curse of cut and paste perhaps?
 
rethgar said:
Do you have a general licence for sale and if so is it based on the old taxonomy? I only ask ad I had some correspondence from NE recently and it was still using the old names.
Click to expand...

The current general licence is the one that was linked above at:
http://www.naturalengland.org.uk/Images/wml-gl19_tcm6-24167.pdf

and yes, it does use the 'old' taxonomy.

rethgar said:
The curse of cut and paste perhaps?
Click to expand...

For the general licence, the names have to match those in the legislation that the licence relates to, and this uses 'Triturus' for the smaller newts.

Legislation and goverment move very slowly- they're only likely to change the taxonomy they use when it's obvious that a change is accepted by the vast majority of scientific authorities. EN publications are now using 'Lacerta (Zootoca) vivipara' for the common lizard- I think the move to Zootoca was proposed about 15 years ago.
 
Hmm, the perils of taxonomic changes. I know legislation is slow to change but I wish some of the advisory bodies would present a consistent approach NE are using Triturus across the board but JNCC are using Lissotriton.

Last time I looked the proposed updates to the Wildlife and Counrtyside Act had changed to Natrix helvetica, although still having 'formerly' in there, but no mention of Zootoca, Epidalea or Lissotriton. They may be coming I guess as there are always outstanding changes on there.

How do they define the majority of scientific authorities?
 
The JNCC recommended changing to Zootoca, Lissotriton & Epidalea in the 5th Quinquennial review of the Wildlife & Countryside Act, and recommended adding protection for pool frogs:
http://jncc.defra.gov.uk/pdf/5qr.pdf

The DEFRA response apparently ignored the taxonomy changes:
http://archive.defra.gov.uk/wildlif...ldlife-countryside-act-gov-response110805.pdf
though they agreed that the pool frog should be protected, describing it as "Pelophylax lessonae, formerly Rana lessonae". Probably just as well they ignored them, as the JNCC updates included 'Lissotriton cristatus' to replace 'Triturus cristatus'.

This came into law at the beginning of October:
The Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 (Variation of Schedules 5 and 8) (England and Wales) Order 2011
With no taxonomy changes for the newts or the natterjack. The pool frog is protected as
"Frog, Pool (Northern Clade) : Pelophylax lessonae"
which, somewhat oddly, means that the common name is more precise than the scientific name.

I've no idea what criteria JNCC used to determine which scientific names to use, but they do seem to have made rather a mess of it. Presumably there'll be another quinquennial review in 2013...
 
I'm aware this is an old post ,but i would like to contribute an update,i have 3rd generation CB palmate newts ive kept for years( at least 8 ) .
I have now also aquired CB Cristatus 20 eggs have hatched and the rest are dudds,if I am successful raising these into adults,as far as I am aware i will be allowed to sell these or their offspring if iI include a letter of their details and origin? they are CB since the 1970's does anyone believe or KNOW for certain if this is legal?

A licence is not required under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 or under The Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2010 to sell captive bred animals or cultivated plants.​

 
I have now got in writing from Natural England that there are no problems with me keeping and rearing/breeding my CB Cristatus I have the locality/origin of the original colony information and the emails/purchase notes from the breeder also.
So hopefully there will be plenty CB Cristatus juves/eggs in the for sale section ,I will provide my details and covernotes/and photocopies to accompany these newts for tradeing and selling these when they are available
(very happy and excited)
 
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