First of all, Happy New Year to all of our readers!!
It has been quite a while since Hellan or I have blogged here, we hadn't forgotten about it but we were hacked, once again. We've not had much luck in this department, it's obvious that someone, or some people, do not appreciate our community. Nevertheless, we haven't given up and we'll just start over. This is where the members have been key to getting things off the ground again. Without our members, we wouldn't have tried to make the forum a success again, and we would have given in to whoever seems to dislike us.
The forum is slowly getting back into the swing of things. We lost most of our members but many are coming back, so thankyou! We will be back on top very soon, and thankyou all again for your support throughout our time as a forum.
Cheers!!
Thursday 8 January 2009
Wednesday 19 November 2008
Off Topic
Hello everyone,
This week i would like to step away a little from talking about reptiles and our forum at herpuniverse
and say a massive congratulations to a few fellow blogger's, Julie at julies journal Corinn at oh hey, whats up and Heather at Beautiful British Columbia Well done Ladies on getting the IZEA insiders positions, I really enjoy reading the blogs and I'm sure this will just make things you post even more fascinating to read.I wish you all every success if anyone deserves it it's you guys!!
I love reading peoples blogs, I've learned about gaming,cooking, found new interesting books to read, places to visit and so much more and hopefully by reading this one people learn a little bit about reptiles.
Til the next time
H x
This week i would like to step away a little from talking about reptiles and our forum at herpuniverse
and say a massive congratulations to a few fellow blogger's, Julie at julies journal Corinn at oh hey, whats up and Heather at Beautiful British Columbia Well done Ladies on getting the IZEA insiders positions, I really enjoy reading the blogs and I'm sure this will just make things you post even more fascinating to read.I wish you all every success if anyone deserves it it's you guys!!
I love reading peoples blogs, I've learned about gaming,cooking, found new interesting books to read, places to visit and so much more and hopefully by reading this one people learn a little bit about reptiles.
Til the next time
H x
Monday 10 November 2008
We have achieved so much!!
Firstly, I would like to introduce myself as the other administrator on Herp Universe! I'm known as Geckoella on the forum and I should be contributing to this pretty frequently from now on so I thought I'd say hi, and a big thankyou to all our current blog visitors! November has marked a few milestones for Herp Universe. We now have a total of around 128 members and we have achieved 6000 posts already in just three months! We would like to say a big thankyou to everyone who has signed up and given their unconditional support, it means a lot!
Recently on the forum we decided to try and find out what our members thought about our hobby. I think the overwhelming majority of members agreed that there were major issues within the hobby which need resolving in order to put animal welfare back on the top of everyone's agenda. We came to the conclusion that not only do we need to tackle the issue of poor reptile keeping, but many shops and businesses also need to be held accountable for their actions when things do go wrong. We agreed that the sale of reptiles should be revised, to ensure animals are going into capable and caring hands.
We realised that there are so many problems and they are madly obvious. We can talk about these issues all we like but still it feels like there is no solution to these problems. The RSPCA isn't effective enough in monitoring possible cases of mistreatment and neglect, after all they believe a reptile is being treated well if it has clean water available at all times! Environmental health is not effective enough in monitoring businesses, and they have been known to call the RSPCA in for advice at times. In my opinion, the only way we can move forward is by working together to sort out such drastic problems. Easier said than done, but we should at least try for the good of the animals we love so much.
Recently on the forum we decided to try and find out what our members thought about our hobby. I think the overwhelming majority of members agreed that there were major issues within the hobby which need resolving in order to put animal welfare back on the top of everyone's agenda. We came to the conclusion that not only do we need to tackle the issue of poor reptile keeping, but many shops and businesses also need to be held accountable for their actions when things do go wrong. We agreed that the sale of reptiles should be revised, to ensure animals are going into capable and caring hands.
We realised that there are so many problems and they are madly obvious. We can talk about these issues all we like but still it feels like there is no solution to these problems. The RSPCA isn't effective enough in monitoring possible cases of mistreatment and neglect, after all they believe a reptile is being treated well if it has clean water available at all times! Environmental health is not effective enough in monitoring businesses, and they have been known to call the RSPCA in for advice at times. In my opinion, the only way we can move forward is by working together to sort out such drastic problems. Easier said than done, but we should at least try for the good of the animals we love so much.
Saturday 1 November 2008
Winters on the way!!!
I hope everyone had a nice Halloween!!
There's a definite chill in the air and we even had snow this week!! I can't believe how quickly its come around, but I'm sure i say that every year. My friend has already put his gorgeous Tegu's into brumation for the winter,this is similar to hibernation in other animals, but it differs in the metabolic processes involved.This year we have decided not to brumate any of our snakes (most are a bit young) so we will keep their temps up and continue feeding them up over the winter , ready for breeding the adults in the spring.
Thankfully the reptiles don't seem to suffer as badly as the poor dogs do at this time of year, from all the fireworks going off every evening. They whine at all the noises and tend to hide away. I wouldn't think of taking them out in the evening at this time of year, i think they would be too scared. The poor things don't understand that all those loud bangs are supposed to be fun, defiantly not fun for my poor doggies.
If anyone is going to a fireworks display, i hope you have a good time and stay safe.
Until the next time,
H xx
There's a definite chill in the air and we even had snow this week!! I can't believe how quickly its come around, but I'm sure i say that every year. My friend has already put his gorgeous Tegu's into brumation for the winter,this is similar to hibernation in other animals, but it differs in the metabolic processes involved.This year we have decided not to brumate any of our snakes (most are a bit young) so we will keep their temps up and continue feeding them up over the winter , ready for breeding the adults in the spring.
Thankfully the reptiles don't seem to suffer as badly as the poor dogs do at this time of year, from all the fireworks going off every evening. They whine at all the noises and tend to hide away. I wouldn't think of taking them out in the evening at this time of year, i think they would be too scared. The poor things don't understand that all those loud bangs are supposed to be fun, defiantly not fun for my poor doggies.
If anyone is going to a fireworks display, i hope you have a good time and stay safe.
Until the next time,
H xx
Monday 20 October 2008
pet insurance
One of the hot topics over on our forum HerpUniverse is pet insurance for reptiles, and how to find a good provider. There's lots of companies that offer insurance for dogs,cats rabbits etc but finding a good provider for reptiles and exotic pets seems to be difficult. I still haven't managed to find one that is reasonably priced, and it leads onto another subject, good reptile vets to take your pet to when god forbid, the worst happens and a reptile becomes ill. For me, i guess i am very lucky in the fact that good friends of mine are, experts in reptile medicine so they are usually my first point of call. If a snake of mine does need vet treatment, again i am lucky in that a very good, reputable, reptile vet is only a 20 minute drive away. But with treatment so expensive finding good insurance would be wise.
on a lighter note, this post on HerpUniverse made me chuckle:
To weigh a snake:
Find large digital kitchen scales
Place bowl on top of scales
Place pillowcase in bowl
Set scales to zero
Remove snake from viv
Put snake in pillowcase
Retrieve snake from round leg and replace snake in pillowcase
Retrieve snake from hair, put band aid on bite and replace snake in pillowcase
Hurl self across room in order to catch snake
Place snake in pillowcase
Put pillowcase (with snake) in bowl on top of kitchen scales
Retrieve pillowcase from floor and snake from under wardrobe
Put snake and pillowcase in bowl, hold still for a few seconds
Take weight reading
Lose pencil
Find pencil
Retrieve snake from top of bookshelf and pillowcase from inside laundry basket
Write down weight with one hand while restraining angry snake with the other
Replace snake in viv
Treat your wounds
Prepare self for an evening of being glared at.
That's how to weigh a snake.
anyone who has ever tried to weigh a snake will I'm sure understand.
I would also like to say a big hello to all my friends over at Forum Finder if you have a blog,forum, or website FF has some great resources tips,tricks and lots of fun, its well worth joining and a great community to be a part of.
Bye for now, have a great week everyone,
H xx
on a lighter note, this post on HerpUniverse made me chuckle:
To weigh a snake:
Find large digital kitchen scales
Place bowl on top of scales
Place pillowcase in bowl
Set scales to zero
Remove snake from viv
Put snake in pillowcase
Retrieve snake from round leg and replace snake in pillowcase
Retrieve snake from hair, put band aid on bite and replace snake in pillowcase
Hurl self across room in order to catch snake
Place snake in pillowcase
Put pillowcase (with snake) in bowl on top of kitchen scales
Retrieve pillowcase from floor and snake from under wardrobe
Put snake and pillowcase in bowl, hold still for a few seconds
Take weight reading
Lose pencil
Find pencil
Retrieve snake from top of bookshelf and pillowcase from inside laundry basket
Write down weight with one hand while restraining angry snake with the other
Replace snake in viv
Treat your wounds
Prepare self for an evening of being glared at.
That's how to weigh a snake.
anyone who has ever tried to weigh a snake will I'm sure understand.
I would also like to say a big hello to all my friends over at Forum Finder if you have a blog,forum, or website FF has some great resources tips,tricks and lots of fun, its well worth joining and a great community to be a part of.
Bye for now, have a great week everyone,
H xx
Wednesday 15 October 2008
Hatchling's
They say good things come to those who wait, well here's one of our tiny anery corn snake hatching's. They arrived in the world a week later than expected but we have four beautiful tiny baby's.Right now they are no bigger than a worm, one is a little bit feisty and tried his best to nibble my finger ( which tickled like mad!!!) the others are very very docile and calm.
It was a big shock to me, with most of our snakes being either adult size or there abouts, i had forgotten how tiny hatching's are, they are growing well and I'm trying very hard not to say OK we will keep them all.
There's still a couple of reptile meetings left on the calender this year, but here in the UK it is getting very cold and they are all quite a distance away so we have decided not to attend anymore for this year(4 hours in a cold car in awful weather does not appeal to me)
I like attending the shows, to see who is breeding what, catch a glimpse of herps you wouldn't normally get to see, and of course catch up with friends for a coffee and a chatter, and we usually come home with a new addition too!!!!!!!
H
Thursday 9 October 2008
Spiders!!!!
After the last blog post i received lots of feedback about spiders, theres loads of you out there like me apparently that aren't too keen. I thought i would share with you some of the pictures posted on the forum at www.herpuniverse.comthese are some of our members spiders, and it has shown me (and hopefully you too) that not all spiders are icky black EWwwwy things . The first one in the picture above is a Avicularia versicolor, picture thanks to and © Steph Cooper
The picture below, is slightly more like the image that springs to mind when you think tarantula, its a Brachypelma vagans aka red rump picture thanks to and ©Gareth Pritchard
This last picture has to be my favourite, and the picture that first convinced me that spiders can be beautiful, its A. purpurea picture thanks to and ©Monsterspinnen.de
I'm still not 100% convinced i could ever own one but at least now i am starting to see them in a different light and can appreciate their beauty, and hopefully you guys can too.
H xx
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