# New Family Members!



## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Hey guys! I briefly mentioned two of my new pets in a different thread, but I thought I would make one just for them. There have been a string of reptile shows in Alberta over the past few months, and my boyfriend decided he wanted to expand our breeding stock to include Crested Geckos. We ended up with three so far, one male and two females.

The male's name is Grunt. He's a brown and cream partial pinstripe with fur, kneecaps, blushing, and fringe.









The female I picked is Mordin. She's a red and cream full pinstripe dalmatian with kneecaps, blushing, and fringe. Some of her spots are red, and that's one of the traits I'm hoping to focus on.









The second female is Nanamo. She's a cream on cream full pinstripe dalmatian with fur and fringe. She's easily the more photogenic of the three, but I absolutely adore them all!









All three are still under a year old, and I'm one of those weird breeders who doesn't breed the absolute second an animal is able, so it will be at least another year before they're ready to go in the cage together. In the meantime, they'll be absolutely pampered and adored like the rest of my crew.

Along with these three, we had a surprise salamander join the family a few weeks ago. My boyfriend works in a metal pipe coating plant, and he was working away when he saw a face peek out from underneath a pile of rust. Not only was the poor little guy inside the building in the filth, that section of the plant is about to be renovated, so if the rust didn't get him the construction likely would have. The local Tiger Salamander species is legal to keep but not sell, so he came home in my boyfriend's lunch container, and we tidied him up and fed him and now he's looking much better. I don't have a good picture of him yet since he was such a mess when he came home, but I'll take one soon!

And last but certainly not least, I picked up my dream snake at the show on Saturday! He's a Sorong Green Tree Python. I haven't named him yet because I've been too giddy to think straight. I've purchased several animals from this vendor in the past and I trust him immensely, so when he opened a tub, reached in, scooped the snake out, and handed him to me with a "you can hold him" I almost died. Green tree pythons are notorious for being snappy and just outright "mean". And they have a really nasty bite. If it weren't for the insanely green color on these guys, you'd think they were ball pythons or corn snakes. I've been waiting for a calm yet gorgeous one of these since I was ten years old or so.

Here he is:









He's about two years old, so this is his adult coloration. (Green tree pythons hatch out either red or yellow, and typically turn green gradually as they age. A lucky few stay yellow, and some turn a blue-ish color.) The blue and white flecking is permanent. I custom designed him a cage, and I gave him lots of places to hide, but he just plopped down on a branch, coiled up in the famous tree snake position, and went to sleep. He had a nice long drink today straight from my bottle and he's doing super well so far! I'll probably have to post on him again in the future because I just can't contain my excitement :lol:.

I hope you guys like the pictures!


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

All of your new babies are absolutely gorgeous!!! I love that python, he's so beautiful. I'm so happy for you!  I'd love to see pictures of his enclosure if you have some!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Alright now promise not to laugh.... xD. I had two other fake plants in here but he just doesn't seem to care so I took them out, and he's got paper towel on the floor for now so I can take a look at his poops easily. It'll be coco husk in the near future to help with humidity.










He's about 2.5 feet long. With GTPs the trick is to place the water bowl within their reach but on the bottom of the cage, or they might not drink. So the top perch is about 2 feet above the bowl. I have a full spectrum bulb on a stand that I shine through the mesh right to where he's sitting to create his basking spot.

The perches are wooden dowels. I melted the plastic with a butane torch and pushed them through, so they're stable enough not to roll when he's on them but they can be slid out for cleaning.

The "door" is what used to be the lid of the bin. The frame of the lid is in tact, and then the rest is cut away and replaced with screen door mesh. This is what Finnick's lids look like too, only with super glue instead of tape, because I had more time to design those. I punctured holes in all four corners and tied it shut with some ribbon because this lid doesn't have locks.

Younger GTPs like smaller enclosures. The bigger the enclosure the more jumpy they get and they're also less likely to eat. So the box is about 2.5'x1.5'x1' total. Once he's all settled in and he gets a bit bigger I'll upgrade him to a 3'xsomethingx2' terrarium, and I might throw some live plants in there and whatnot.

This cage cost about $40, compared to a store-bought glass one with similar "reptile brand" perches and bowl for around $200. So that's an added bonus after what the snake cost me .

I would definitely still suggest a glass aquarium or terrarium for something more terrestrial like say, for example, a ball python . Just because you can get better tank sizes that way, and the lids are super secure. But this is what my basic homemade quarantine cage looks like, and I think this one turned out well enough to last him a year or so.

Also! I'm totally open to name suggestions. I can't settle on anything I like. He is definitely a boy. Help! :lol:


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## twobytwopets (Feb 2, 2014)

Very cool. One thing. I hadn't had snakes in years, we had the if you can catch it you can keep it rule growing up. So we had rat snakes, garter snakes, black snakes some mystery snakes. They always "ran away" within a couple days. But to my question. 
Do they do better with a dowel or with the wood branches? I don't know if there is an issue with dowels with snakes like there are for birds.


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

It doesn't seem to make a difference with these guys. The dowels are easier to sterilize if someone manages to poop on them, but I do worry about branch width variety being good for him mentally. You'd think variety would help with muscle tone too but there haven't really been many studies done. I'll be giving him a few of each when he gets upgraded to a bigger cage. He's a farm raised guy from New Guinea so he has experienced natural branches. I figure it's only fair to mimic what he had as a baby as closely as possible.

Once they were imported the importer kept them on dowels in tubs so for now I'm sticking as closely to his last stable environment as possible. Once I'm sure he eats and poops I'll fiddle around a bit. I'd really like to get him a live plant too.


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Just wanted to share some videos I took recently of my crew. None of Akihiko the green tree python, sadly, as he's in exile until he eats. But I got some videos of fishies and froggies!

Sadly, my very first saltwater fish, a Banded Hi Fin Goby, seems to have had a parasite. He passed away only 8 days after my purchasing him. But here he is anyway, being adorable with his pal, the Randal's Pistol Shrimp:




The pistol shrimp, named Seamus, is still alive and loving it. He likes to punch the little hermit crabs when they get too close. Once any possible parasites have had time to die off, I'll be getting the shrimp another goby pal.

And on the amphibian side of things, here are my lovely baby boys and gals, the Dendrobates auratus "El Cope" poison dart frogs! I adore these dudes. There are 5 in here but I think I only caught 4 of them in the video. 3 boys and 2 girls. They're doing super well as usual. I just cleaned the front glass so I can actually see them. Cleaning their cage can make them stop calling and breeding for a month, so I do it very sparingly. Here they are:




I love how you can see a fly go by on the vine at 0:22 :lol:.

And an added bonus! While I was in the pet room tidying and taking videos, miss Kaylee decided to pop out and say hello. She's a Lygodactylus wiliamsi day gecko. Her mate is bright blue, but the girls range from brown to green. Here she is smiling at me:









I hope nobody minds these dumb pet updates I do :???:. I enjoy doing them and I hope someone out there likes seeing my crew as much as I do.


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

I always enjoy seeing your animals!  The frogs and gecko are so pretty & cute. Thanks for sharing, and I'm sorry about your goby.  He and the little shrimp were very cute peeking out from their rock. And of course I have to ask...any chance of a video of the hermit crabs? The marine ones look so weird to me because I'm so used to my guys. :lol:


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

We're still waiting for their new shells to get here. Looks like the shells just passed through customs. I'm hoping to catch the little guys switching homes on video, so I'll share that once it happens, whether I catch them or not. Hopefully sometime this week!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

*Crab time is best time*

Well. The shells are way too big. They'll grow into them but that means I get to try to find some smaller ones somewhere. Here's a video of everybody in the tank after I fed Seamus, the pistol shrimp.

Looks like videos can't be embedded here, so here's the link:





Everything in the tank right now (Except Seamus) is in there just to clean up the mess from any other inhabitants. Since my messy inhabitant died already, I have to feed these guys once a week. I'll be adding some zoanthid corals soon, as well as another fishy at some point.

Here's a zoanthid picture thread for the curious: Reef Central Zoanthid Pictures and Videos

I got all my information to start things up from Reef Central. They're a group of really great people, even though the population size compared to here is extremely overwhelming :lol:


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Crabbies!!!  They're so cute! But oh dear, those shells really are too big...oops! I hope you can find some smaller ones somewhere. What size is the opening on the ones you bought? And from that, can you estimate what the opening size likely is that your crabs are in now? I have a container of pretty tiny shells, I could see if they're any more suitable for your little ones!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

I'd say they're probably in just under an eighth of an inch openings right now, so I need some that have openings about 1/4" long by 1/8" wide, plus or minus a little for them to choose the best fit. The ones I bought have openings of 1'2" long by 1/4" wide.

They don't seem to like round shells, just the ones that taper off to one side. They use the tapered end as a wedge in the sand to hurl themselves around faster :lol:.

If you have any like that let me know! I'd be willing to pay for shipping and everything. The poor guys have started eyeing up each others' shells. It's getting pretty tight in their current ones, I think.

Thank you so much!


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

By round ones, do you mean round openings, or the shells are rounder, like turbos?

Unfortunately (if the second one), most of the teeny shells I have are turbos! Here are pictures of my smallest, that are around 1/4" long, that seemed like they might be possibilities.





And while I was looking, I found a few that were bigger, closer to 1/2" long & I thought I'd pull them & take a pic as well. If you'd like them, I can toss them in for when your crabbies get big enough for them!



I can't recall if I suggested it (I probably did, but just in case), but it might be worth checking around at craft stores near you like Michael's and Joann Fabrics. They carry bags of shells in their decoration aisles & that's where I got all of these teeny ones.

(But please let me send you these too, if you think they'll work! I have no good use for them & I'd like them to be used by some little creatures. )


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

They don't seem to like the turbo shells as much. Though at this point they'll probably be happy as long as it fits. One of them tried on a stripey shell today, but he couldn't even lift it. :lol: The ones in your first picture should work for them. These dudes are only supposed to get about half an inch wide in the back end so your biggest ones would probably fit them when they're all grown up.

I'm willing to try just about anything I can find, so if you don't mind sending me a little of everything that would be perfect!

The closest craft store to me here is Michael's in Edmonton, which is an hour and a half away, and we've got about a foot of snow, so it'll be a while before I manage to go see what they have. The saltwater fish store I'll be buying all of my tank inhabitants from is almost two hours away. They would likely toss piles of nassarius snail shells (same species as the snail in my video) at me for free but I have to get over there first. There are some small shells at the dollar store here but they're painted and I don't want to risk putting something toxic in my finally cycled tank. I'm pretty much stuck out here with nothing until at least Christmas.

The local pet store let me loot all their old mystery snail shells out of their freshwater tanks but they're too big as well. :roll: :lol:

So long story short, I'll take whatever you're willing to part with! Thank you so much for the offer!


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Booo snow! I'll definitely send everything from the pictures then, and let me see what else I can dig up this weekend.  PM me your address when you get a chance and I'll send a box out on Monday!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Yay! Thank you so much!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

So the bigger hermit crab switched. And he picked one of the coolest shells!










I didn't catch him trying them all on, but none of the shells are quite where I left them and his old shell is right in the middle of the pile. I found him on top of my purple starburst polyps and had to re-position him for the picture. So that's one happy crab!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Went and made a new album and now my links are all broken. Here it is again:


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Yay!!  I'm glad he found one he likes! He did choose a really neat shell, good taste little guy. I hope his friend follows suit at some point!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

The other guy is switching now. He's tried on three different shells already! Of course he's in the only place I can't get a clear video from because of the angle of the light outside. But he's definitely pleased with the selection. Kelsey's shells are waaaaaaaay better than my shells! I'll get a picture of him once he makes up his mind.

Here's a few shots of the tank in the meantime:

Full tank shot, natural light:









It has one par38 bulb on it, but I think I need a second one to get the light to spread evenly. Right now I have kind of a central light hotspot instead of a nice even covering. Also, that red stuff on the sandbed is bad. It's cyanobacteria and I'm going to try to kill it by leaving the lights off for three days. So normally the tank has that pretty blue filter on it that you usually see with saltwater tanks, but it's not on today.

On the whiter colored rock on the left, at the top, the purple mat is two types of star polyps. I have a chunk of green and a chunk of purple. Down and center on that same rock is the unknown zoas pictured below.

Top center of the other rock is some purple passion zoas. They got to sit in their bag for 28 hours, so they're still upset with me. I'll get a picture of them once they open. The brownish red blobs below those are little mushroom corals that came with the rock. I'm indifferent to them but they seem happy enough. Straight down from the farther left mushroom is another zoa colony (my favorite but don't tell the others!) but they really don't show up well in natural light. I'll get a picture of them once the lights come back on. When I bought them last month there were 6 or 7 on the little plug, and now there are 16 or so, so they're definitely pleased with themselves. And in the farther right green area is a fire and ice zoa colony. Super common but I think they're very pretty!

Fire and ice zoa colony:









These guys are even prettier under blue light, but they look cool like this anyway. The zoanthids will eventually cover the rock entirely, so the way I have them positioned around the tank is strategic for their health and for maximum rock coverage. It should hopefully result in large patches of different colors all over the rocks.

And the unidentified zoa colony:









I love these guys' little yellow and white lips. They look more pink and yellow under the blue lights, but here they are with no lighting.

The very center of each of these little guys is an individual mouth. They move reaaaally slowly, but they do eat particles of shrimp that end up in the water from when I feed the shrimp and crabs. They'll grab teeny bits of food with their outer ruffles (or skirts, if you want the actual lingo) and then slowly shift the food inward towards their mouths. My blue, grey, and lavender zoas grab their food and then close up like venus fly traps to eat. Super cool little dudes.

I'll add some pictures of my weeds (the two types of star polyps) once the lights are back on and they're happy again. Right now they aren't speaking to me.

Oh and I took this with my Nikon D5100:









Man that's a good lookin' snake! He's decided that when he comes out he needs to perch on top of my head. He hooks a coil onto each of my ears and rides me around like he's the boss. Pretty silly behavior for someone designed to wrap around branches.

This thread is turning into sort of a pet blog.... I hope that's alright with everyone! If not just let me know .


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

I'm loving this!  I think it's fascinating to hear more about the different kinds of pets everyone on here has. Especially things I don't know much about. I've never been super interested in fish & sea creature tanks, but it's still fun to read about them! I just don't have the interest to actually take care of one myself (other then betta fish, which I'd like to get one sometime soon). Saltwater tanks especially intimidate me, but they're really cool to look at! And I'm so glad the crabbies are enjoying their shell selection!!  Yay for happy crabs. I think my guys are holding a grudge for the tank cleaning, they haven't been as active since I did it, so I haven't seen a whole lot of them.

And your snake is absolutely gorgeous! What a good picture of him. I giggled at your description of him riding you...what a little dork. :lol: Charis likes to hide in my hair, but for the most part she won't stay on us long when she comes out. Too much to explore!

I keep meaning to start a thread where I can update with pictures of Bindi & possibly the other pets, but I keep running out of time in the evenings.


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

I love bettas! I've had three now, two halfmoons and one veil tail. The veil is technically my boyfriend's but as his work schedule changes so often I'm typically the one doing feeding and maintenance. I can't stand the thought of keeping them in those little bowls though, especially considering they're pretty clever and like to explore. My first one, a dark blue male who turned red when you upset him, was in my 8 gallon (the tank behind the main aquarium in the pictures above, being used as a quarantine) with several species of live plants. He loved it. He'd wake up and check that nobody had touched his things every morning.

When he passed away, I got a pea puffer and he went into the 8 gallon, so when I found my second betta, a black and white mottled male, I had to buy him a new tank. He was in a Fluval Spec 2 gallon with a moss ball and a piece of java fern, along with a little decorative log. He slept inside the log and would roll the moss ball around. I ended up giving him and my pea puffer away when I moved, because I wouldn't have been able to pack them well enough to be comfortable bringing them in the car for three hours. I couldn't have moved the planted tanks with water in them, which meant killing or individually bagging every plant. So I found the absolute nicest lady ever on kijiji, and dropped them off at her house only ten minutes away. She updates me on them regularly.

Naturally, after a few months the fish tank itch returned, the debilitating addiction that it is, and I decided if I was going to start another, it might as well be a miniature copy of my dream saltwater reef tank. So here we are!

Your poor angry crabs! I'm sure they'll get over it soon :lol:.

Snakes are weirdos. It's amazing how much individual personality each one has. My Mexican black king, Sherlock, seems to be over biting me when I go to pick him up, but yesterday when I went for him he rattled his tail like a rattlesnake and hid. He has really deep substrate because he's a digger, so I only found him by following the sound of his tail hitting the glass. I used my snake hook on him, because I "ain't no stupid", as I tell him daily, and he kept sliding off like a wet noodle and rattling at me. I finally got him and he musked (read "smelly peed") all over me and gave me a good view of his genitals. I can say he's definitely male now. And then once he was out of the pet room he was fine. I had to give him a bath though :lol:.

I can't wait for a Bindi thread! I need more pictures of that adorable potato!


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Totally agreed with those stupid little bowls...and vases and everything else they sell for bettas!  My last one had a 10g tank to himself and after he got used to it, he used every inch of it. I may have to pick your brain once I get one...I'd love to do a planted tank! But I know almost nothing about plants in general, much less specifically aquarium plants. Sounds like your little guys were very personable! That's one of the reasons I like them so much, they're all such interesting characters. I'm hoping to do a totally frozen/live diet for mine when I get one. I was working on research on what foods can be fed & what their pros, cons & nutritional info are before we moved & I haven't had a chance to get back to it yet...probably won't for a while, sigh. Have other things I need to work on first!

:lol: What a big scary boy! I feel like everything I've read in passing about king snakes has been similar stories. Are they usually pretty defensive & grumpy about handling? What did he think of the bath? I haven't had cause to give Charis one yet, but I'm really curious as to how she'll respond. I'm guessing it depends on species & individual as to whether they enjoy it or think you're trying to murder them! Also I got lucky with Charis tonight - she was on her hot spot warming up when I went to take her out. She decided I was an acceptable substitute which meant I got snake cuddles!!  I think I'll get that thread started tonight as I have some fantastic pictures of everyone to share from the last few days.


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Just let me know if/when you decide to start that aquarium and we can work through it together! I had a lot of beginner plants but they looked really good so I didn't bother getting more complicated.

Yeah kingsnakes can be a little grouchy. Some are fine but most have pretty crazy attitudes. Which I enjoy, but they're not very good for nervous beginners. My milksnake used to only bite men, and he would chew and tug. But he had teeeeny little teeth so everyone just laughed at him.

All my snakes get baths. Especially around shedding time, just to make the process a bit easier. They all seem to enjoy it well enough. Sherlock just sort of wallows with his face out. Illidan blows bubbles and pretends he's an anaconda. Aki likes to only have one coil in at a time. And Rocket the skink swims around like a maniac xD.

Yay snake cuddles! I see your new post and I'm off to read it now!


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Awesome, thank you! And :lol: at Illidan in the bath. I'll have to give Charis one sometime & see what she thinks of them. Sounds like there's at least hope that she won't immediately assume I'm trying to drown her like hedgehogs (including Bindi) think!


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## FinnickHog (Dec 1, 2014)

Ball pythons are more ground dwelling than arboreal, and they're really prone to having stuck sheds, so I figure they probably at least encounter bodies of water in the wild. He really seems to enjoy the soak, and the warm water is probably a nice contrast from only getting heat on the top of the snake or the bottom of the snake. Actually I should go throw him in the bathtub now. His eyes were blue yesterday and the day before. Maybe I'll try to get a video... I hope Charis enjoys her first bath too!


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

I'd love to see if you do get one! I know Charis has been going into her water dish every couple days, at least, as the level will start out full & then be less than half full when I wake because she's climbed in & flooded it. :lol: I'm pleased she seems to be taking advantage of it though, that's exactly why I gave her one big enough for her to get in!


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