Biography

During the late 1970's, early 1980's I was involved in the selling and keeping of exotic birds, a hobby since early childhood. By 1983 I was working weekends for John Chandler (Chandlers Birds, Worcester). John, being a bird and reptile importer (and trapper), got my interest aroused in the herp scene. As time went by my interests seriously transgressed into reptiles and amphibians. Around 1984, John moved to Germany, and we took over his business in the UK with animals shipped from him and Helmut Michi (Tropic Haus) in Gaggenau, to our quarantine stations and holding facilities in my home town; Bath. At the age of sixteen I began travelling further afield, in search of fine reptile species to bring back to the UK for both commercial and propagation motives. These early years took me to Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore and Thailand. This time was valuable as it led me to a greater understanding of how reptiles and amphibians live in the wild and how we can replicate these habitats in our captive environments. Time spent with our overseas colleagues also put me in a great position for hands on venomous species training. During this period we were shipping in direct from Country of origin exporters such as Anson Wong (Exotic Skins & Alives, Malaysia), Choosit Nivesanon (Suchino Corp, Thailand), "Dang" Komain Nukulphanitwipat (Siam Farm, Thailand), Denny Wong (China Wild Animal Trading, Hong Kong), Dr Quek (Avifauna, Singapore), Mohamid Hardi (Hasco , Indonesia), The Tolba's (Egypt), to name but a few!

By the late eighties I had set up a business near Swindon, Wilts, called Jungle Fauna, selling a diverse range of reptiles (including a very large collection of venomous species), birds and aquatics, serving customers throughout the UK. At this time there were no more than around half a dozen specialist dealers in the whole of the UK, (apart from ourselves; Dave Lester (The Serpentarium, Walsall), Paul Sullivan & Russell Lee (Paul Sullivan Reptiles, Torquay), Stuart Worth (SW Exotics, Hayes), Bill Adams (Herptofauna, London), The Vivarium (London)....etc. We would spend most of the week sourcing reptiles and shipping to the trade, and then the weekends would just go absolutely crazy with hobbiests flocking to the shop from all over the country. By the late 80's the bird import industry was in serious decline due to lot's of bad press (some justified, but most ficticious).

In 1991 I abandoned all other varieties of livestock to concentrate solely on reptiles and amphibians. We moved to a much larger site located in Cirencester, opened as Tropifauna, and began to stock a wide range of herpetological accessories and books. At this time we were selecting many of our species from the USA with up to 20 good sized shipments a year, consisting increasingly of captive bred individuals. This time was awesome, as we were dealing with some of the true legends of the herp World; Tom Crutchfield (Herpetofauna & Tom Crutchfield Reptile Enterprises, Bushnell), Ray Van Nostrand (Pet Farm Inc, Miami), Mike Van Nostrand (Strictly Reptiles, Miami), Art Bass (Strictly Reptiles), Bill Love (Glades Herp, Fort Myers), Rob Roy McIness (Pet Farm Inc, Miami & Glades Herp). It was like Christmas every couple of weeks, and you never knew exactly what might crop up in some of the shipments. This was a busy time, and we were wholesaling throughout the UK and Europe. We were also accumulating hold backs for our own breeding.

Realising the importance of captive breeding we purchased a commercial building and set up a seperate breeding facility during 1993, in Cheltenham maintaining colubrids, boas and pythons and various lizards. We produced Corns, Rats, Kings, Milks, Leopard Geckos, Yemen Chameleons, Ball Pythons, Jungle Carpet Pythons, Macklott's Pythons, Emerald Tree Boas, Frilled Dragons, Bearded Dragons, Day Geckos, Plumed Basilisks, Red Tail Boas, Coral Cobras, Australian Velvet Geckos, Giant Knob Tailed Geckos, Uroplatus, Uromastyx and various Dwarf Monitor species.  Many of these species were the first of their kind to be bred in the UK or even Europe.

By 1997 we were spending so much time at the captive breeding facility we decided to relocate the retail store to Cheltenham (renamed Aztec Reptiles).  By now we were providing many of our own offspring for sale in the store and supplementing with stock from top breeders around Europe. Our sales of venomous species had also grown and we were working with many exciting species including Collett's Black's, Red Bellied Blacks, Tigers, King Cobras, Waglers, B&W Spitting Cobras, Western Green Mambas, Indian Cobras, Egyptian Cobras, Death Adders and Eyelash Vipers. Our python interests had now expanded into Black Headed Pythons, Womas, locality specific Carpet Pythons and Stimpson's Pythons.  During the 2000 season  we had hatched our first Bredl's Pythons and Diamond Pythons.

We were producing huge numbers of our own offspring, so much so, that during the season, there wasnt a day went by, where we were not unloading new born hatchlings from the incubators. In search of new lines, species and morphs for our facility, and stock for our store, we spent many weekends travelling Europe scouring the expo's and meeting some of the Worlds most dedicated breeders in Germany, Holland, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Russia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. It was interesting to compare the style of reptile keeping in Europe with that of the US. And how thing's had, in some respects, little changed from our early dealings in Germany during the mid 80's, with much emphasis on naturalistic terrarium systems.

By 2002 our reptile store was busting at the seams and needed to relocate again to larger premises. On December 16th 2002 we re-opened at our current site, a brand new custom built unit, again located in Cheltenham and trading as Cotswold Reptile Centre. At this time, my sister in law; Kim Pryce joined the Company. Kim was originally also from a bird based background, but over the years had got increasingly into the reptile scene, keeping Albino Burmese, Ball Pythons, Boas, Pines, Varanus sp, Uromastyx, Ozzy Water Dragons and Bearded Dragons etc.. 5 years later, Kim had a growing collection of Carpet Python morphs and was taking care of our breeding collection, which by now was heavy into the Ball Pythons morph scene, plus Jag's, Angolans, Black Headed Pythons and the like. On top of that, she was now manager of Cotswold Reptile Centre. By 2008 Kim had been having prolific success with her Chameleons and Bearded Dragon morphs, to the extent she founded KK Chamelons with her partner Karen Carter. Between them, they were producing some of the rarest morphs of Bearded Dragon available on the planet. With the culmination of our successes and experiences over the years, we strive at Tropifauna Farms to bring you the finest high end reptiles available.

Our philosophy is:

Over the years our ideas and opinions toward the captive care of reptiles has modified, as has our facilities to propagate and market them. Technologies and information have all come a long way allowing us to give our animals the greatest level of care and our customers the very highest degree of support and back up. It's our goal to provide the very best level of care to our animals and the best level of service to our customers.

Ty Milsom