Austin Gardening - Sankes, rats, crickets, frogs and lizards (was Re: Winter cover for bare soil)

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Sankes, rats, crickets, frogs and lizards (was Re: Winter cover for bare soil)

OmManiPadmeOmelet

2005-10-14, 1:21 pm

In article <6CH3f.3540$Zv5.3154@newssvr25.news.prodigy.net>,
"Cindy" <cinshep@hotmail.com> wrote:

> I eat meat every day, kill every mosquito that lands on me, poison fireants
> regularly to keep them out of my yard and trap the mice in my garage.
> I feed rats to my snakes and crickets to my lizards because that's what they
> *eat.* They can't survive on salad.
> My dogs eat dry food made from meat, and I cook them a lovely ground chicken
> mixture, because dogs are not vegetarians.
> When I lived home on the farm, I shot gophers and coyotes, killed millions
> of houseflies with bait traps and poisoned lots of mice.
> We all do what we're taught and what we consider necessary to protect our
> livelihood and quality of life, and I doubt anyone is thrilled be told
> they're wrong, bad, heinous murderers for doing it.

What kind of lizards do you have? :-)
I just dropped 5 bucks on crickets yesterday for my pet bullfrog. She is
still a baby but is really growing fast, so beginning to eat a lot more!
She morphed in early January of this year. I bought her as a tadpole.

I've always wanted a large frog! <G> Pretty tame too, especially
compared to leapard frogs. Siggy lets me handle and pet her. She's about
2" long now and gettng hefty.

I gut load her crickets with a mix of fish food and reptile vitamins.
She has also increased her cricket intake since I put her on moss
instead of fishtank gravel. I think she finds it more comfortable. I
should have used that as substrate in the first place! I was worried
about ease of keeping it clean, but it appears it's actually going to be
easier than rinsing gravel once every couple of weeks.

I want to eventually build her a large vivarium once I finish
redecorating the livingroom. Half land and half water. Once she gets
bigger, she really should have access to feeder fish to eat, so that
will require a better aquatic habitat.

It's funny how the crickets all swarm the food dish when they are put in
her terrarium. The pet store does not feed them so they are always very
hungry... Poor things! :-(

Also, how are you killing houseflies? I'm having a problem with them on
the sun porch and the usual stinkbait drowning bag trap is not
attracting these for some reason. I've considered Golden Mallorin (sp?)
but the last time I bought it, it did not work very well.

I used to keep a pet boa constrictor but I lost her after a very long
(and expensive) fight with some sort of gastrointestinal disorder.
<sigh> Sucked too. I had her for several years and Babs was a really
nice pet. I won't keep pet snakes anymore. I just don't really have the
space now that we've moved into a smaller house. I always did feel a bit
sorry for the rats. ;-) I've kept pet rats and they are smart and
interesting pets. Too bad they only live about 2 years. My last pet rat
was one of those naked, hairless ones. She only lived about 1 year. :-(

Many snake owners train their pet snakes to eat fresh frozen rats,
thawed and warmed. It's less risky for the snakes as rat bites during
constriction can be a problem and can get infected. Or, if a rat is left
unattended with a snake that is not ready to eat, the rat can inflict
severe damage to a snake. I've seen horrible photos of that. :-( I
always supervised feedings when I fed live, but I did eventually switch
her to FF thawed rats. She ate them ok.
--
Om.

"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-XXXXX." -Jack Nicholson

Cindy

2005-10-14, 2:21 pm

> What kind of lizards do you have? :-)

I have an 8-yr-old green iguana, a young savannah monitor, and 3 northern
blue-tongued skinks. Been looking at water dragons, but have managed to
resist so far.

I have two boa constrictors, one is 19 years old (Eve.) 2 rosy boas, 1
African clawed frog, 2 3-toed box turtles and a diamondback terrapin. I
think that's all.

> I just dropped 5 bucks on crickets yesterday for my pet bullfrog. She
> is still a baby but is really growing fast, so beginning to eat a lot
> more! She morphed in early January of this year. I bought her as a
> tadpole.
>
> I've always wanted a large frog! <G> Pretty tame too, especially
> compared to leapard frogs. Siggy lets me handle and pet her. She's
> about 2" long now and gettng hefty.
>
> I gut load her crickets with a mix of fish food and reptile vitamins.
> She has also increased her cricket intake since I put her on moss
> instead of fishtank gravel. I think she finds it more comfortable. I
> should have used that as substrate in the first place! I was worried
> about ease of keeping it clean, but it appears it's actually going to
> be easier than rinsing gravel once every couple of weeks.

I also gutload my crickets and mealworms, and I do feed frozen rats and
mice, as I don't enjoy killing them. I have some pet rats also--6 of them
are the hairless variety. They feel like warm felt.

I had an Argentine horned frog for about 10 yrs, but it died recently. I
started out with aquarium gravel for it too, but ended up using the moss.
Much nicer for the frog.

> I want to eventually build her a large vivarium once I finish
> redecorating the livingroom. Half land and half water. Once she gets
> bigger, she really should have access to feeder fish to eat, so that
> will require a better aquatic habitat.

Are you going to build a wood one or use an aquarium? I siliconed a divider
across a 50-gal. tank years ago for garter snakes--that worked very well.
Even had baby snakes before I eventually turned the big ones loose again.
(Yes, I know now you're not supposed to turn them loose, but didn't then.)
For a bullfrog I imagine you'd want at least an 80-gal. tank.

You're in the reptile newsgroup too, right? You can get good information
there, although trolls have driven many of the regulars away. There's also
a Houston Herps yahoo group, but it's fairly new and not very active yet.

> It's funny how the crickets all swarm the food dish when they are put
> in her terrarium. The pet store does not feed them so they are always
> very hungry... Poor things! :-(
>
> Also, how are you killing houseflies? I'm having a problem with them
> on the sun porch and the usual stinkbait drowning bag trap is not
> attracting these for some reason. I've considered Golden Mallorin
> (sp?) but the last time I bought it, it did not work very well.

I used to use the stinky drowning traps too, but don't want to anymore as I
can't put them far enough away from the house here in suburbanville to get
away from the stench. I got some new flytraps, but haven't got to test them
yet as they arrived after the flies were gone. I'll have to find the name
and post the url. Remind me if I forget.

> I used to keep a pet boa constrictor but I lost her after a very long
> (and expensive) fight with some sort of gastrointestinal disorder.
> <sigh> Sucked too. I had her for several years and Babs was a really
> nice pet. I won't keep pet snakes anymore. I just don't really have
> the space now that we've moved into a smaller house. I always did
> feel a bit sorry for the rats. ;-) I've kept pet rats and they are
> smart and interesting pets. Too bad they only live about 2 years. My
> last pet rat was one of those naked, hairless ones. She only lived
> about 1 year. :-(
>
> Many snake owners train their pet snakes to eat fresh frozen rats,
> thawed and warmed. It's less risky for the snakes as rat bites during
> constriction can be a problem and can get infected. Or, if a rat is
> left unattended with a snake that is not ready to eat, the rat can
> inflict severe damage to a snake. I've seen horrible photos of that.
> :-( I always supervised feedings when I fed live, but I did
> eventually switch her to FF thawed rats. She ate them ok.

OmManiPadmeOmelet

2005-10-14, 3:21 pm

In article <IrR3f.1450$D13.1059@newssvr11.news.prodigy.com>,
"Cindy" <cinshep@hotmail.com> wrote:

>
> I have an 8-yr-old green iguana, a young savannah monitor, and 3 northern
> blue-tongued skinks. Been looking at water dragons, but have managed to
> resist so far.

<lol> I know the feeling....
Savanna monitors are pretty cool.
Is it big enough to eat mice?

>
> I have two boa constrictors, one is 19 years old (Eve.) 2 rosy boas, 1
> African clawed frog, 2 3-toed box turtles and a diamondback terrapin. I
> think that's all.

Clawed frogs look SO cool!
I've drooled over them, but don't really have a proper habitat setup nor
space to put one yet, at least until the livingroom is finished. Siggy
would probably eat it tho' if I housed them together. Bullfrogs do that.

I have 5 ornate box turtles but am fixin' to pass those on to the local
nature center.

>
>
> I also gutload my crickets and mealworms, and I do feed frozen rats and
> mice, as I don't enjoy killing them. I have some pet rats also--6 of them
> are the hairless variety. They feel like warm felt.

Oh cool!
Yeah, I agree that the hairless rats are neat.
It's an autosomal recessive gene.
Do all your babies come out naked, or do you breed them?

I don't feed mealworms but now that I have her on moss, I'm considering
tossing some earthworms in there to see if she will take them. She can
use the variety. I have TONS of the big red wigglers naturalized in the
back yard.

>
> I had an Argentine horned frog for about 10 yrs, but it died recently. I
> started out with aquarium gravel for it too, but ended up using the moss.
> Much nicer for the frog.

Indeed. And easier than I thought to keep clean. I'm not sure why, but
it seems to be keeping the water cleaner as well? I think the moss is
taking off her sheddings more easily so all that dead skin is not ending
up in the pond.

The crickets seem to stay more active on moss too.

>
>
> Are you going to build a wood one or use an aquarium?

Plan is to use a very large aquarium. At least 50 gallon or more.

> I siliconed a divider
> across a 50-gal. tank years ago for garter snakes--that worked very well.
> Even had baby snakes before I eventually turned the big ones loose again.
> (Yes, I know now you're not supposed to turn them loose, but didn't then.)
> For a bullfrog I imagine you'd want at least an 80-gal. tank.

Yeah. The bigger the better. Right now she is in a 5 gallon, but she is
still pretty small.

>
> You're in the reptile newsgroup too, right? You can get good information
> there, although trolls have driven many of the regulars away. There's also
> a Houston Herps yahoo group, but it's fairly new and not very active yet.

I was, but there was not much info. about frogs so I dropped that group.
I was just subscribed to too many there for awhile! <lol> That's easy to
do!

I've been able to get in touch with bullfrog breeders via various
websites. Since bullfrogs are bred widely for commercial meat production
(frog legs), there are a plethora of websites on care and feeding of
them.

That's how I found out that "Sigmund" was a She. <lol> Sexing bullfrogs
is simple. The tympanic membrane over the ears of females is only as
large as, or smaller than the eye orbit. In males, it's twice the size
or more. She has very small ears.

It is interesting to me that bullfrogs are widely bred for meat and an
adult breeding pair is worth about $50.00... and yet, due to
overpopulation in some areas, they are considered to be pests, crowding
and/or eating all the other native species of frogs so they are reviled,
and rounded up and destroyed.

I don't understand why some enterprising individual does not dedicate
themselves to gathering them for profit! It's just wierd.

They can be a pond pest in backyard ponds since they will eat fish.
But Heron's do that too. ;-)

>
>
> I used to use the stinky drowning traps too, but don't want to anymore as I
> can't put them far enough away from the house here in suburbanville to get
> away from the stench. I got some new flytraps, but haven't got to test them
> yet as they arrived after the flies were gone. I'll have to find the name
> and post the url. Remind me if I forget.

I'd appreciate it!

Oh, and the secret to avoiding the stench of those bag traps is to hang
them HIGH! If they are at least a foot or so above head level, you don't
smell them. I used to hang them from high tree branches.

Now my pet ducks control the flies, outdoors anyway!
>

Cheers!
--
Om.

"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-XXXXX." -Jack Nicholson

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