1977 – 19 year old Gary Bagnall and college friend Mark Lemke start a reptile company out of a one car garage. Located in Costa Mesa, California, the company is called “In Cold Blood”.

1978 – Gary teams up with for a limited time with accomplished Elaphe breeder Lloyd Lemke and the name is changed to “Orange County Zoological”.

1979 – Gary starts California Zoological Supply (”Cal Zoo”) and travels to Honduras, Egypt, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nigeria, and Western Samoa in search of reptiles. Cal Zoo was the first company in the U.S. to bring in Uromastyx aegyptius, Pacific island boas and the original 4 Albino Columbian Red-Tailed Boas. Today over 50% of the reptiles and amphibians sold from Cal Zoo are captive raised from private breeders in the U.S.

1979-Present- Ty Dillon joined Gary in 1980 and continued to grow Cal Zoo as a one stop shop for wholesale herps. Gary branched off in the early 80’s to start Zoo Med labs.  Cal Zoo is now owned by Ty Dillon and resides in an 8,000-sf, 2 level facility supplying quality captive bred and field collected reptiles to pet shops and zoos nationwide.

Ty and his daughter (future owner of Cal Zoo)