Our Latest Aquarium Set-up

Braxton purchased a pair of snow paradoxes from Steve Perry a couple of months ago. For his birthday we purchased an albino paradox female from Scott Miller for him. So he has a 1.2 paradox which should produce him some nice animals three to four years from now. I told him we'd convert his 30 gallon fish aqurium into a paradox habitat around March. Well, April was busy and May wasn't any better so we spent the day cleaning a fish tank and setting up a Kenyan Sand Boa tank.

We used burrowing clay around the edges to keep the green bottom base carpet from being accessed by the snakes. Then we seperated the warm side from the cool side with a burrowing clay wall, although, in retrospect, I'm unsure why I did this. We made a small square area in the back right with burrowing clay and filled it with green pete moss to allow the KSBs moisture if needed but not expose them to it without their efforts. We have had some trouble with the lack of humidity in aquariums with metal mesh lids so this is our latest attempt to avoid bad sheds. We filled all the remaing areas with sand (less the water dish) and are hoping we will be able to spot clean the loose sand. This is the first time we've used loose sand in our aquarium, typically we use burrowing clay packed down hard so they can't burrow and provide cover with low lying artificial plants and furniture (ie logs, bridges, etc.). The problem with the burrowing clay is it gets soiled real quickly and then the only way to clean it is to remove it and start over. So we're hoping the sand is going to give us a couple more weeks with spot cleaning.

This is a top view, you can see the pete moss pit in the top left corner next to the water bowl.

As you can see we dumped the little suckers in and feveriously snapped photographs before they disappeared into our miniature Dune. The problem I now see is with the sand color, these are snows and albinos and they would of shown up better in a darker sand, whereas brightly coloreed normals, high oranges, flames, stripes, tigers and anery's would of shown up well in this sand color. I'll try and remember that the next time I purchase sand.

The boys love having snakes back in their room.

You can email Mark@LHALegal.com

Latest Dodoma Pictures

Forgive us if we don't respond to every question in your emails. We generally try and answer all emails, starting with questions of past clients, inquiries about new purchases and then everything else. Someone emailed us a pictures and wanted to know if it was a Dodoma. Apparently, I didn't respond within 24 hours and I got a pretty nasty email from someone I've never met, spoken to or emailed with. I am a bad person because I don't respond timely was the gist. I apologize and I'll try and do better so to you Mr. Angry I dedicate this blog...... :)

This is a picture of a Dodoma's Face (there are much better reduced patterned Dodoma's out there but this is what I have)

Notice how there is very little black pattern on the face and there are NO eye stripes. I think the absence of eye stripes is a very good indicator as to whether you are going to have a reduced patterned Kenyans.

This is a full body shot, notice how the black patterns are more like spots and don't run together like a normal.

If anyone has a question please feel free to email Mark@LHALegal.com and I'll get back to you as soon as possible. Have a great Memorial Day!

Dixie Reptile Show May 29th

We didn't have a table today at the show because Jenn's family reunion was today at Rickwood Caverns. However, we got up early and were at the show around 10 am  and it was packed. It looks like Terry is back on the game. I hope everyone had a good show. Scott, House of Reptiles, had some Kenyan Stripes on his table for 200-300 a piece. He said he had about sold out at those prices and quite frankly mine look much better. So don't be shocked if you see the price of Stripes in that range and don't blame me, blame Scott at House of Reptiles!

We did buy 52 mice pinkies (which I just returned in from feeding) from Trey or Grant...I can't ever remember which name it is, although, I think he remembered my name today, anyways that was all he had. Braxton purchased a shark tooth necklace that broke in the car, I'm unsure of the cause at this point. Asher bought a monkey necklace from the Jewelry Guy, it's pretty cool, we tried to get him to pick the rattlesnake or lizard necklace but he was dead set on the sissy looking bear necklace and the monkey was a compromise. The surprise purchase of the day, we had planned on clearing out  every pinky we could find, was from the guy who is always on the end with heat tape, had  brought Beta Fish. They were real nice looking, not like the ones at Wal-Mart, although, we have had good luck with the wal-mart variety. Jenn picked out a blue colored one, I think, I just paid and didn't really get too caught up in the selection proces, especially when it became apparent my two year old daughter's opinion was going to be weighted heavily in the decision. It was like 3 or 4 bucks, I have high hopes it will live at least until the next show!

If you made it to the show email Mark@LHALegal.com how it went.

Sunday is Mother’s Day

     Sunday is Mother’s Day and I have been thinking about my Mother and the Mother of my children. Last week one of our hens hatched out 8 or so baby chicks. A couple days ago the baby chicks went outside the 1” x 2” fencing and the hen with partially clipped wings somehow made it over the fence after them. The dogs caught her and chewed her up but she somehow got away and hid in our horse stall for me to find her that night. I did and threw her back in the pen with my fingers crossed. We’ve had this happen before and we have been giving her shots of farm animal anti-biotic. Normally, I’d say, she probably won’t make it, in fact, if she didn’t have the brood of chicks, I’m fairly sure she would have been killed by the dogs a couple of days ago. However, she has stayed right with her chicks, fluffing out her feathers to keep them warm at night. She still takes them outside in the mornings and has had to sit down to rest but if she didn’t have the chicks, she wouldn’t have left the chicken coup. She is still trying to teach them how to scratch the ground to find bugs but the anti-biotic hasn’t broken the fever from the infection in the bites and her legs shake as she scratches. She looks pretty rough and weak but when I went in to check on her tonight she got up off her brood and spread her wings to make herself look bigger and more effectively protect her babies.

     Whether a Mother is a chicken or a woman, Mother’s selflessly will give up everything in order to protect their young. Before the accident, Jennifer did everything at the house, I just added to the confusion and mess. Today, Jennifer does almost everything at the house, but I like to believe I understand the standard operating procedure and try and follow it, with the exception of inside out clothes, a story for another day. Being a husband it was so easy to take for granted the mundane thankless work Mother’s do for their families. We don’t see it, we don’t know where it is and we live by the motto, ‘ignorance is bliss.’
     On Saturday mornings we will sometimes have turkey bacon with our eggs and biscuits. Just enough bacon is made for each person to get their share. Regularly, one of the kids will finish all of their bacon before Jennifer. And regularly, they will ask Mother for one of her pieces. Now there is no way one of those little rag-a-muffins would get my bacon after wolfing down theirs. But Jenn, will give them a piece and of course then the other one has to have an extra piece and Jenn will go without bacon.
     I think of the number of times my Mother must have had to adjust her schedule to get me to ball practice or come to a game but I don’t remember her once every mentioning it. My Mother had to do most of the parenting alone, with two strong willed boys. I don’t remember any punishments for misbehaving after about 6th grade, but my Mother was always improvising. One time I came home real late on a school night and she was sitting on the couch waiting for me. When I walked in she simply stood up, walked up and kissed me on the cheek and said, ‘Goodnight,’ and even managed to do it without one bit of frustration, anger, anything, almost genuinely just happy I was home in her tone. But she knew her baby couldn’t be left unchecked, without any rules and she knew her son would have fought her on traditional punishments. Looking back on my younger days and comparing them with the small discipline issues I have to deal with, I know she must have had to spend time thinking about how she was going to handle each situation. Believe me there were many, and most she let slide, but she always seemed to know when she needed to throw an elbow. When our children were babies Jennifer could tell by their cries what they wanted. I never could tell one cry from another. Mother’s just seem to know. Unlike the hen who can’t stop being what she is, Mother’s can. I know some children don’t have a Mother that thinks about them and worries about their future and whether they have on clean underwear. But I did, and my children do, I’m thankful for my Mother and for the Mother of my children. I love you, two.

Female Stripe and Anerythristic Male Kenyan Sand Boas

Here's a couple pictures we took tonight.

Female Stripe Kenyan Sand Boas

Male Anerythristic (Anery) Kenyan Sand Boas