The Registry
For centuries, breeders of horses, hounds, and prize stock have kept their lineage in studbooks, bound volumes that traveled with the animal and held its history. As these traditions matured, public institutions formed to keep them. The Jockey Club. The Kennel Club. The Cat Fanciers' Association. Each one a public body, gathering the records of thousands of breeders into a single register, open to anyone.
No equivalent institution ever formed for reptiles. Breeders kept their own records regardless. Spreadsheets, notebooks, photographs that traveled with the animal. Some breeders kept careful files for decades. Others did not. With no common standard and no body to maintain continuity, many of the earliest lineages faded with the people who bred them.
What these records required was continuity beyond the span of any one breeder. A public register, maintained in common and carried forward across generations.
The Reptile Club Registry
Every animal registered with the Club enters a public lineage that runs in two directions. Backward through ancestors. Forward through descendants. With each new registration, the lineage extends. Animals sold years ago can still be brought into the Registry by their current keepers and attributed to the breeder who produced them. The Registry begins with what is registered now and reaches as far back as the community can collectively verify.
The Registry holds a Certificate of Pedigree for every animal registered, alongside the animal's lineage, its keeper of record, and the audit history of every change made to its record. Every record is governed by the Club's published Standards.
The Registry works exclusively through HatchLog, the Club's phone app and working tool for breeders.