Saikrett has the answer. Roughies were only discovered in the wild and scientifically described in 1980 or thereabouts. John Weigel of the ARP worked on (then) CALM in WA for years to get permission to collect a breeding group of this species. He eventually succeeded and ended up with five wild-caught animals, and I believe he bred them in all combinations, with each of the five participating productively in the program. Eventually, once John had met his obligations to provide animals to various other organisations and institutions, a few went onto the open market, with a price of around $25,000 a pair if I recall.
Way back in the day (2004) I obtained the entire CALM file on RSPs via an FOI application. CALM was actually very cooperative, and the only info that was redacted was the GPS coordinates of John's collection sites, which I think was reasonable at the time, and I had an interest only in the political machinations and bureaucratic processes involved. In his submissions, JW predicted that RSPs would be a $200 snake within 10 years. It took a little bit longer than that, but he was basically correct.
So that's a long-winded way of explaining why they are on the cat 2 list to this day. Wildlife bodies are notoriously slow to recategorise animals, it's usually a matter of years before action is taken to make these changes - the Woma in NSW was a similar story a few years ago.
The history of the RSP, from initial collection of one animal in the 1970s, to John's captive breeding successes, and the change in status from rare and exclusive in captivity to a $200 snake in 2016, is unique in this country, and probably the world. This is a snake with a very limited distribution in specialised habitat in the Kimberley region of WA, and it's desperately sad that it will probably be wiped out in the wild in the next few years by the advance of the Cane Toad across the Kimberley.
Jamie
