So i've seen what looks to me like bad husbandry practices at a local reptile dealer and i'm not sure what to do about it.
The local nature center where I do presentations with my few snakes and tarantulas wanted a new tarantula of their own, their mature male brachypelma Smithi recently died of old age. I told them i'd look around for a new spider ambassador for them, another calm easy tarantula that was already grown, preferably a female this time. I found someone ten minutes away on Craig's list selling female grammostola rosea's as well as other tarantulas, large lizards, and snakes including expensive ball python morphs, Australian pythons and a burmese python (i thought Burms were illegal in connecticut now but i'm happy to see them available.) Turns out the guy has his own website and it looks decent. I make plans with him to go pick up the G. rosea.
I get there and he's not home, unfortunately I never met him I just talked to and did business with someone i assume was his wife or girlfriend. She leads me into the reptile room, its wall to all tanks, i'm in heaven since I love seeing other peoples collections. I notice a beautiful juvenile reticulated python in one tank. She tells me he has more animals in th e basement. I didn't explore the whole room, I didn't want to go through his reptile room while he wasn't home although I was thinking i'd love to meet him and ask him to show me around. Then I start to notice the husbandry issues.
She hands me the G. rosea in a small critter keeper, she looks healthy to me so I hand her the money, then I notice the water gel in the water dish which I know is bad for tarantulas. I tell her how awesome the retic is then I notice the retic is being housed in the same tank as a similarly sized boa constrictor, they both look to be around four or five feet maybe. I know your not supposed to house different species together, really snakes should be kept separate but I have seen some pet stores do it anyway, maybe its ok for short periods. She noticed how much I like snakes and showed me a plastic bin on the floor with at least half a dozen baby snakes in it including a beautiful all white ball python morph, not sure what its called but it must be expensive. But I also noticed the bin had a mix of baby ball pythons, boa constrictors, and one blood python, then I noticed the blood python was dead. She noticed too and discarded it.
I ended up leaving with the rosea but i'm not sure what to do now. Everything else I noticed seemed correct, substrate and heating, he's keeping some expensive morphs so he must be good at keeping them alive, maybe he doesn't know any better about the tarantula water gel or housing multiple species together. The dead blood python thing makes me angry but maybe I should try being nice, get in touch with him and tell him what he's doing wrong, but what if he won't listen? Is there anything I can do?
The local nature center where I do presentations with my few snakes and tarantulas wanted a new tarantula of their own, their mature male brachypelma Smithi recently died of old age. I told them i'd look around for a new spider ambassador for them, another calm easy tarantula that was already grown, preferably a female this time. I found someone ten minutes away on Craig's list selling female grammostola rosea's as well as other tarantulas, large lizards, and snakes including expensive ball python morphs, Australian pythons and a burmese python (i thought Burms were illegal in connecticut now but i'm happy to see them available.) Turns out the guy has his own website and it looks decent. I make plans with him to go pick up the G. rosea.
I get there and he's not home, unfortunately I never met him I just talked to and did business with someone i assume was his wife or girlfriend. She leads me into the reptile room, its wall to all tanks, i'm in heaven since I love seeing other peoples collections. I notice a beautiful juvenile reticulated python in one tank. She tells me he has more animals in th e basement. I didn't explore the whole room, I didn't want to go through his reptile room while he wasn't home although I was thinking i'd love to meet him and ask him to show me around. Then I start to notice the husbandry issues.
She hands me the G. rosea in a small critter keeper, she looks healthy to me so I hand her the money, then I notice the water gel in the water dish which I know is bad for tarantulas. I tell her how awesome the retic is then I notice the retic is being housed in the same tank as a similarly sized boa constrictor, they both look to be around four or five feet maybe. I know your not supposed to house different species together, really snakes should be kept separate but I have seen some pet stores do it anyway, maybe its ok for short periods. She noticed how much I like snakes and showed me a plastic bin on the floor with at least half a dozen baby snakes in it including a beautiful all white ball python morph, not sure what its called but it must be expensive. But I also noticed the bin had a mix of baby ball pythons, boa constrictors, and one blood python, then I noticed the blood python was dead. She noticed too and discarded it.
I ended up leaving with the rosea but i'm not sure what to do now. Everything else I noticed seemed correct, substrate and heating, he's keeping some expensive morphs so he must be good at keeping them alive, maybe he doesn't know any better about the tarantula water gel or housing multiple species together. The dead blood python thing makes me angry but maybe I should try being nice, get in touch with him and tell him what he's doing wrong, but what if he won't listen? Is there anything I can do?
