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Khisanth Magus posted:It is a bit more work, but all of our reptiles have what are called "bioactive" setups. In the simplest terms it is a setup created to mostly mimic their natural environment, with the top layer they are on being a mixture of dirt, sand, and possibly other materials. It absorbs and releases moisture great, and with the addition of a "cleanup crew", which is a mixture of insect life similar to what would naturally dwell in the soil, there is minimal cleanup required because the crew will eat the snake poop, skins, and if it is established enough will even eat a rodent of your snake decides to not eat. This also provides some additional entertainment for the snake in that they get to dig in the dirt and even do some "landscaping" to get it how they want it. Sorry, but I refuse to believe that any terrarium CC, no matter how sufficiently established, is capable of adequately disappearing an uneaten rodent carcass. Unless your snake’s enclosure is, like, an isopod hellworld like a scene from The Mummy. I will second that a bioactive substrate may be a better choice for OP’s snake than straight coco fiber tho.
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Mar 29, 2019 21:30
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Hello, herp thread! Got a couple questions for you guys. I have a Budgett's Frog that's almost a year old now. From everything I've seen and read about them, they're supposed to be voracious, near-fearless eating machines. Mine is terrified of everything, to the point where he panicked and swam away from the nightcrawler I was trying to feed him. Is there anything I can do to make him feel less terrified of everything? Would adding more caves and more cover to his enclosure do it? I'm getting a boa constrictor probably within the next 2-3 months, probably a baby. My boyfriend and I are building the enclosure. As long as I provide lots and lots of cover and hidey holes to keep it from stressing, is there any real disadvantage to building the enclosure to its adult size and just growing the snake out in its final home? Edit: Also can anyone recommend some live feeder fish that don't get above about 2 inches and don't contain tons of thiaminase? Bonus points if they look cool, but that's not my main concern. I want something better than fathead minnows for my frogs to snack on for enrichment. Axqu fucked around with this message at 15:45 on Mar 30, 2019 |
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Mar 30, 2019 15:39
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Axqu posted:Hello, herp thread! Got a couple questions for you guys. Platies and guppies are what seem to be recommended. Danios are dead-easy to breed and come in tons of awesome cheap morphs, but they’re in the same family as goldfish although they’re way more sensitive to the enzyme and seem to at least produce way less. To some extent expect that easily available/breedable feeder fish will express the enzyme to some degree, which just drives home that you should be feeding a varied diet and supplementing with vitamins. Pinkie mice may be a good bet. I’ve even heard of people successfully cooking feeder fish and getting their animals to take them. Cooking denatures the enzyme but also arguably denatures other, better things- and I imagine it’s tough to get herps to eat poached minnow. I doubt that’s better than just supplementing for Vitamin-b and mixing up the animal’s diet. Also bugs. Dubia roaches and worms of various types. Get them gut loaded with vitamins and then don’t worry so much about the unhealthiness of the fish feeders. You can’t beat bugs for energy density/nutritional variety anyway. Shrimp too, if you wanna get weird- and you can gut load them like bugs, but that’s more work.
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Mar 30, 2019 18:55
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Khisanth Magus posted:It is a bit more work, but all of our reptiles have what are called "bioactive" setups. In the simplest terms it is a setup created to mostly mimic their natural environment, with the top layer they are on being a mixture of dirt, sand, and possibly other materials. It absorbs and releases moisture great, and with the addition of a "cleanup crew", which is a mixture of insect life similar to what would naturally dwell in the soil, there is minimal cleanup required because the crew will eat the snake poop, skins, and if it is established enough will even eat a rodent of your snake decides to not eat. This also provides some additional entertainment for the snake in that they get to dig in the dirt and even do some "landscaping" to get it how they want it. Thanks! I'll have to look into this.
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Mar 31, 2019 16:45
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Since there's some BP talk going on I'd like to post this here. This is the care guide hosted on the Ball Python People FB group. They're pretty strict on care guidelines and I can attest that so far, everything in this guide has helped me to some degree with my snakes. Not moving to feed, humidity levels without using a mister or spray bottle, temp gradients, prey size by snake weight, it's all here. There is a SHITLOAD of old and straight incorrect info online in various forums and websites. Everything in this guide has a good reason and it's just solid husbandry all around. https://docdro.id/XmUFBcA
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Apr 3, 2019 22:59
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Electric Bugaloo posted:Sorry, but I refuse to believe that any terrarium CC, no matter how sufficiently established, is capable of adequately disappearing an uneaten rodent carcass. Unless your snake’s enclosure is, like, an isopod hellworld like a scene from The Mummy. Agreed. I'm absolutely disgusted by the idea of having an enclosure full of dirt, bugs, and slowly decomposing snake poo poo (and dead rodents too? Are you loving kidding?) I keep my enclosures as sterile as possible. DustyNuts posted:Since there's some BP talk going on I'd like to post this here. This is the care guide hosted on the Ball Python People FB group. They're pretty strict on care guidelines and I can attest that so far, everything in this guide has helped me to some degree with my snakes. Not moving to feed, humidity levels without using a mister or spray bottle, temp gradients, prey size by snake weight, it's all here. There is a SHITLOAD of old and straight incorrect info online in various forums and websites. This is a good guide.
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Apr 4, 2019 04:40
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Hi thread. Just thought I'd pop in and give an update. It's been a while. The last time I was in here I was worried that my hoggie wasn't eating. I got her, fed her a couple times, and she just stopped taking food for seemingly no reason, even though I'd made great efforts to make sure she was comfortable and cosy... Months passed and eventually I decided that this was probably not just stubborn snake behaviour and took her to the vet. The vet squished her a few times, like a toothpaste tube, and he said that it sounded like she had a lot of air in her belly, probably caused by intestinal protozoas. Squirted some medicine down her gullet, and now two weeks later she is eating again!!! I'm so happy and relieved. She has much more energy and actually spends time exploring her tank rather than staying buried and never coming out. I used to go weeks without seeing her out, but she's out and about daily now. She accepts being handled now instead of being a hissy missy, and even seems to enjoy it. tl;dr my noodle is eating again! Good girl Crispy  click for big
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Apr 4, 2019 15:17
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Does my leopard gecko have "hands", "feet", or "paws" ? I can see arguments for all 3 - she climbs with them, walks on all 4 of them, and they've got claws rather than nails
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Apr 7, 2019 02:06
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ShadowHawk posted:Does my leopard gecko have "hands", "feet", or "paws" ? The preferred nomenclature is "sticky wickums"
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Apr 7, 2019 05:01
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Wait, that guide says you can use brown listerine to disinfect enclosures? Tell me more, please...
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Apr 8, 2019 01:22
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listerine is a disinfectant
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Apr 8, 2019 02:32
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from the funny pictures thread BRB getting dinos for my geckos
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Apr 8, 2019 03:02
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Leperflesh posted:listerine is a disinfectant But it was mentioned that you don't need to rinse the cage? That seems weird.
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Apr 8, 2019 05:23
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Don't post here much, but I live in Florida and have a shitload of brown Anoles in my back yard that are pretty much my pets, I feed them meal worms occasionally and they eat out of my hand. Well today I saw a GREEN Anole in my yard, which I have seen very rarely in the wild anywhere much less my back yard so it made me super happy and wanted to share that. My son is a big fan of reptiles too and he freaked out when he saw it. Hopefully theres another one and they breed so I can have more greens 
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Apr 13, 2019 20:21
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Applebees Appetizer posted:Don't post here much, but I live in Florida and have a shitload of brown Anoles in my back yard that are pretty much my pets, I feed them meal worms occasionally and they eat out of my hand. Well today I saw a GREEN Anole in my yard, which I have seen very rarely in the wild anywhere much less my back yard so it made me super happy and wanted to share that. My son is a big fan of reptiles too and he freaked out when he saw it. Hopefully theres another one and they breed so I can have more greens PLEASE DON’T FEED INVASIVE SPECIES THANK YOU
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Apr 13, 2019 20:32
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dwarf74 posted:Yes. Oh. The active ingredients are menthol (mint) 0.042%, thymol (thyme) 0.064%, methyl salicylate (wintergreen) 0.06%, and eucalyptol (eucalyptus) 0.092%. These are all vegetable oils. Plus, ethanol 26.9%, which will rapidly evaporate. If an authority told me the oils were harmless to reptiles, I'd believe that, but I would not just assume it. I don't think it's all that hard to wipe down with wet paper towels or rinse down with water or something after cleaning, so I don't see much value in a "no rinse" disinfectant.
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Apr 13, 2019 20:33
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Electric Bugaloo posted:PLEASE DON’T FEED INVASIVE SPECIES THANK YOU Whatever. Do you live in Florida? Brown Anoles took over a long time ago nothing anyone can do about it now. It's my back yard, I enjoy them, so I give them a treat now and then nothing wrong with it THANK YOU
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Apr 13, 2019 20:45
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Applebees Appetizer posted:Whatever. Do you live in Florida? Brown Anoles took over a long time ago nothing anyone can do about it now. as a working biologist and science educator it’s my professional opinion that you should go gently caress yourself with that hot take
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Apr 13, 2019 21:45
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Electric Bugaloo posted:as a working biologist and science educator it’s my professional opinion that you should go gently caress yourself with that hot take that's not how you educate people. species adapt and ecosystems change. humans are a far more destructive species than that little lizard, and you're not telling them to leave florida (tho not a bad idea), so maybe pick another hill to die on.
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Apr 13, 2019 21:51
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Solution: Feed the native green anoles and not the brown ones. crabrock posted:that's not how you educate people. The green anoles haven't so much adapted to the introduction of the brown one as they have disappeared or been forced into the treetops, unfortunately.
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Apr 14, 2019 00:08
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When I kept anoles as a kid, they could change between green and brown. I assumed that it was related to their body temperature. The house gecko I have now can change color too, but I think it is more about camouflage. She will turn olive drab green when I get her out and hold her, but will go back to brown when she is her enclosure.
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Apr 14, 2019 01:13
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Electric Bugaloo posted:as a working biologist and science educator it’s my professional opinion that you should go gently caress yourself with that hot take Take your smug “professional “ opinion and shove it up your rear end how’s that hot take I’ll be sure to feed them tomorrow just for you 
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Apr 14, 2019 01:22
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Copper Vein posted:When I kept anoles as a kid, they could change between green and brown. I assumed that it was related to their body temperature. You had green anoles then. The green anoles can turn brown, and the brown ones can turn black.
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Apr 14, 2019 01:53
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Youth Decay posted:Solution: Feed the native green anoles and not the brown ones. That's literally adaptation.
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Apr 14, 2019 02:11
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crabrock posted:species adapt and ecosystems change. humans are a far more destructive species than that little lizard, and you're not telling them to leave florida (tho not a bad idea), so maybe pick another hill to die on. lol, I didn’t die on any hill this is like “audobon society good environmental stewardship 101”-level basic, and your response of literally “humans are a far more destructive species than that little lizard” when no poo poo, the lizard’s very presence in Florida is an example of humans destroying and destabilizing ecosystems is some andromeda-scale galaxy brain like, ok realtalk- I’m sorry I was high and watching USS Indiannapolis: Men of Courage earlier and I could have phrased my comments better at the time, instead of maybe the way an angry Nic Cage, international treasure may he live forever, might. All caps was a bad idea. But Florida in particular is ground zero for introduced pythons, tegus, anoles, iguanas, anacondas, caimans, and a buttload of other reptiles that were largely brought here via the pet trade (and also through shipping and agriculture) and have gone on to completely decimate the native populations of organisms. And as minor as leaving some worms out for the pretty lizards seems in the grand scheme of things, and it is, there’s a good reason why doing the same thing with green iguanas or tegus carries a hefty penalty (if you’re curious you should check out the story from this winter of the people who rescued hundreds of cold-stunned iguanas in their area and posted about it on Instagram without realizing that releasing them back into the wild would land them tens of thousands of dollars in fines) and why rangers/people who work in environmental management emphatically discourage people feeding or fostering the proliferation of invasives. And in the case of the anoles, the reason that the native green anoles are becoming rare in that area to begin with is because the brown anoles are driving them to extinction. And even if they may fill the same ecological niche it’s a big loss for biodiversity, and that’s bad. Just because it is technically how adaptation and natural selection work doesn’t mean that we should be mucking up or accelerating the process with our activities.
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Apr 14, 2019 09:34
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Feeding the invasives just to pwn the scientist who was rude is a more or less identical attitude as "rolling coal" to pwn the people who care about pollution/climate change, and this phenomenon is also known as "cutting off your nose to spite your face." Spite is a strong motivator, sadly, and much easier to fall back on, than internalizing and coping maturely with the harsh feeling of finding out something you thought you were doing that was cool and fun and right was actually harmful.
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Apr 15, 2019 03:40
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It does feel like a losing battle, I spent most of my civil service time (Conscription -> conscience -> civil service) in an organization dedicated to maintaining nature reservations, from small commune level to bigger federal ones. We tried to get rid of or at least limit the spread of invasive species in those areas, but most of those imported species are just way stronger than the local ones. It always made me wonder if anyone has a long term plan for this and it always felt like the damage is already done and you can only slow it down. If anything fighting plants like goldenrods or Impatiens glandulifera makes you feel depressed and helpless. You can clear an area every summer but when you return they are back/still there. You clear a pond of goldfish, next year there's new ones and even less local frogs than in the past year. Global warming makes this even worse, where some species that couldn't survive Swiss winter now do, so they can expand into even more territories and endanger the local biospheres. Finding corn snakes instead of native members of Natrix is not really funny, as pretty as they are. Tl;dr: by feeding invasive species you undo a lot of work and make the fight even harder for them, they have every right to get angry. Instead you could learn how you could improve the conditions for local species in your backyard.
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Apr 15, 2019 07:54
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I understand the sentiment in regards to feeding invasives, but be realistic here. One guy occasionally feeding the brown anoles in his backyard is not going to make any impact on the already ruined ecosystem of Florida. If he was feeding burms or tegus or those horrible little monkeys that established themselves, I could see reprimanding him, but for brown anoles? Nah.
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Apr 15, 2019 08:13
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 Took my frog, Reggie, to a vet to get him some meds for frog diarrhea. He contracted chytrid last year, which he managed to beat, but the antifungal medications kinda messed him up on the inside, so before christmas he was at 17 grams and I thought he'd croak it. I left him at the vet hotel over christmas and by some weird miracle, he started eating again and he's now twice the frog he was then.
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Apr 15, 2019 14:52
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Big Centipede posted:I understand the sentiment in regards to feeding invasives, but be realistic here. One guy occasionally feeding the brown anoles in his backyard is not going to make any impact on the already ruined ecosystem of Florida. If he was feeding burms or tegus or those horrible little monkeys that established themselves, I could see reprimanding him, but for brown anoles? Nah. I mean, how discriminatory can you really be if you’re leaving food out for them, though? Like, arguably a bigger problem is people feeding stray cats (cats are like, top 3 for clearing an area of local wildlife and most smart cat lovers these days are against letting homeless cats breed to make more homeless cats/make other cats sick/etc), and when you leave a plate of cat food out you’re likely also feeding raccoons, rats, possums, coyotes, etc. A dish of mealworms is an attractive snack for a lot of reptiles, birds, and mammals besides anoles, although that’s really small potatoes. But if you’re leaving stuff out overnight then your local rats are probably getting the lion’s share. trilobite terror fucked around with this message at 16:01 on Apr 15, 2019 |
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Apr 15, 2019 15:58
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Electric Bugaloo posted:and when you leave a plate of cat food out you’re likely also feeding raccoons, rats, possums, coyotes, etc. Why the hell are you mentioning feeding possums like it is a bad thing? They are an important part of the ecosystem unless you'd like to be always covered in ticks and have Lyme disease, which personally I am against.
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Apr 15, 2019 17:46
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Khisanth Magus posted:Why the hell are you mentioning feeding possums like it is a bad thing? They are an important part of the ecosystem unless you'd like to be always covered in ticks and have Lyme disease, which personally I am against. Possums are essential parts of their ecosystem and you definitely want them around in your area. But while they eat a ton of bugs they’re also really great vectors for fleas, ticks (including deer ticks), lice, toxo, Chagas, and a bunch of other infections (leptospirosis, etc). You don’t want them hanging out close to your house and making GBS threads under your deck if you’ve got pets/kids.
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Apr 15, 2019 18:10
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goblin week posted:
Reggie is a very handsome frogge and lucky to have such a caring frog-dad. 
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Apr 15, 2019 23:46
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Big Centipede posted:I understand the sentiment in regards to feeding invasives, but be realistic here. One guy occasionally feeding the brown anoles in his backyard is not going to make any impact on the already ruined ecosystem of Florida. If he was feeding burms or tegus or those horrible little monkeys that established themselves, I could see reprimanding him, but for brown anoles? Nah. The only way to effect broader change is to have a consistent and persistent message. You don't make exceptions to that message for one person, just because that one person's actions are a drop in the bucket, or they're a swell guy, or they didn't mean any harm. It's true that you will not change a lot of people's minds, but if a lot of people communicate the same message consistently everywhere, then it becomes possible for broad attitudes and consequent actions to shift over time.
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Apr 16, 2019 01:11
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Leperflesh posted:The only way to effect broader change is to have a consistent and persistent message. You don't make exceptions to that message for one person, just because that one person's actions are a drop in the bucket, or they're a swell guy, or they didn't mean any harm. It's true that you will not change a lot of people's minds, but if a lot of people communicate the same message consistently everywhere, then it becomes possible for broad attitudes and consequent actions to shift over time. You make a good point, and I agree with you in principle, but I still think the reaction this guy got was a bit overboard. Brown anoles are well established. They're not going anywhere. Any serious attempts at controlling their numbers would probably cause just as many problems for green anoles. Not to mention that on the hierarchy of damaging invasives, brown anoles are going to rank pretty low compared to heavy hitters like Argentine fire ants or feral cats.
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Apr 16, 2019 04:21
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https://www.npr.org/2019/04/18/714529994/snot-otter-emerges-victorious-in-vote-for-pennsylvanias-official-amphibian?sc=tw Snot Otter Emerges Victorious In Vote For Pennsylvania's Official Amphibian 
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Apr 19, 2019 02:22
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This is a dumb question and let's not get into the backstory if we can avoid it, but I have a very smart skink and I think he's lonely. He was sold to me with very precise instructions (following an individual's personal tragedy) that I have followed carefully and the vet says he's very healthy. Having ensured I am not such a complete moron to have ended his life (and that the instructions were therefore probably good), I am worried about his loneliness. However I cannot for the life of me figure out how this completely bizarre world of herp buying works. Can anyone help me?
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Apr 20, 2019 02:14
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I'm sorry that I can't help because I don't know poo poo about skinks, but that sounds like some very Gremlins type stuff and don't think you should feed it after midnight.
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Apr 20, 2019 03:48
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How about you start with what kind of skink you have? How often do you guys change your snakes' water bowls if they don't poop in it? I usually do mine once a week unless the water gets nasty, and was wondering if maybe daily is better?
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Apr 20, 2019 03:52
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Trachylepis dichroma. I'd had herps in the past but not for a while but I have been very very diligent with him.
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Apr 20, 2019 03:55
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