Herpetology

I guess you could say we're not ordinary. I mean, most people have traditional pets like cats and dogs. And though we do have two dogs, we also have some very unusual pets. I think of our house as a herpetological society of sorts. Let me explain.

We have several Eastern Box Turtles that live in our back yard. Most of them are transplants from other places that lost their habitat when someone decided to build a house. A few are "special needs" turtles. One has only three legs. His name is Tripod. One has a growth or tumor on his neck. His name is Quasimoto. One was run over by a car, so her shell is kind smushed. Her name is Porch. I did not name Porch. She was actually given to me by one of my students.

Turtles make great pets in my opinion because they are very low maintenance. They can usually be seen early in the morning before the temperature gets too hot. They also come out when it's raining.

Did you know that turtles LOVE bananas? And that they have an incredible sense of smell? I can throw an overripe banana on the back patio and usually within 10 minutes there will be a turtle there to eat it. Here is some video of one our backyard turtles coming up to the patio for a banana. Some of them, like this one, will eat it right out of your hand.





But turtles aren't the only unique animals at our house. Meet Lilly. Lilly is a Leopard Spotted Gecko. I bought Lilly from a vendor at a convention I attended in February of 2009. Despite her fearsome look, she is quite tame and sweet. She kind of reminds me of one of the SoBe Life Water geckos from the SuperBowl commercial. We haven't given Lilly any Life Water, just crickets. Hmmm...
This year I bought Lilly a companion.  Unfortunately, Lilly has lost most of her eyesight and hunts based on movement, so she kept biting the new juvenile leopard gecko, who's name is Squiggy, so I had to separate them.  I'm thinking leopard geckos don't have very good eyesight in general, because Squiggy has bitten me many times while I was attempting to feed him. 
In addition to the leopard geckos, I also have bearded dragons.  I currently have 4 of them.  Two are mine that I've had since they were juveniles.  Their names are Twist and Shout.  Shout has metabolic bone disease, so he cannot walk but before you start feeling sorry for him, let me tell you that it does not slow him down or keep him from hunting.  Here are some pics of a couple of them.