I will have a herd of tortoises.

I wish I could have a herd of tortoises

I'm a herd of tortoises

Am I correct in thinking about cold bloodedness like a sort of temperature battery where animals need to essentially store up heat to get to the proper temperature, and then they have that heat as essentially a reserve that they can use to leave the heat source and do other things, before having to "recharge" by basking again?

>listing for a galapagos tortoise hatchling for 10 thousand dollars on morph market
>store/breeder is about an hour drive so I don't need to pay for shipping

Should I do it bros?

>>4930073
Surely that can't be legal?

>>4929845
What should I get for my 29 gal tank?

>>4930302
A tarantula

Is anybody actually serious about snake enclosures being as long as the snake when an 8 foot pvc enclosure is 1000 to 2000+ dollars

>>4930073
Okay. If, and I mean IF you have the ability to take care of the animal, and do it properly, AND it isn’t illegal (so you’ll not have your pet seized while also potentially harming wild populations) then WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR GO GET THE MOTHERFUCKING MEGAFAUNA TURTLE BABY AND POST FUCKING PICS!!!one!

>>4930302
The other anon's galapagos tortoise

>>4930167
Surprisingly they are legal and it wouldn't even require a permit. Store says it's captive bred which I'll believe since no smuggler is going to be posting on a public facing website with a lot of traffic. Makes me question who the hell is out there that has a successful private breeding project of Galapagos Tortoises, but whoever they are they're living the dream.

>>4930433
If I won the lottery I'd love to, the 10k is probably the cheapest part considering that you're going to need a private ranch in hospitable climate, top tier veterinary care, and have to care for it until you die. With a 150+ year lifespan in captivity whoever's next in line to take care of it might croak before the tortoise does as well.

Aren't Galapagos tortoises seriously endangered to the point where if you're not breeding them the responsible thing to do would be to buy it and immediately give it to a zoo

>>4930463
>>4930308
>>4930302
>>4929845
How about a chameleon? They look real cool and would make a nice occupant of this vivarium.

>>4930596
Die

>>4930587
By all moral, ecological, and financial justifications yes, but it'd still be cool.

Shiny Sand Swimmer

i have shiny swimmers

>every single listing on morphmarket is local shipping only
I really am just gonna have to get a ball python or nothing, aren't I

Hey snake people. I would like something that’s a decent size, docile, and active and curious enough to be fun.
I’m thinking a corn snake currently, but open to suggestions.

>>4930615
>>4930587
>>4930167
>>4930073
If you want a giant tortoise get an aldabra which is basically the same thing as a galapagos except it is way cheaper and not as endangered.
But yeah unless you live in a suitable climate zone and got enough space to build a large outdoor enclosure these giant tortoises won't make good pets.
The largest you can reasonably keep in a colder climate would be a red-footed tortoise I think.

>>4930661
milk or king snake

Has anyone ever purchased animals from Reptile Mart? I was thinking of purchasing a snake from them, but there doesn't seem to be anything about them online and I want to make sure they're legit. Here's their website:
https://reptilemartusa.com/

>>4930926
literally just look at the google reviews. most recent low reviews tend to be because of pricing, a few year further back it was because of shitty condition, but more often than not they seem to be okay.
Do your due diligence as you would with any breeder - ask as many questions about thier condition and how they're being cared for (what they're eating how often last feed, last shed, current substrate/enclosure, etc) - if they're proud of how they keep their animals thjey'll be willing to give you that info, if they're being cagey they either dont know (bad) or dont want to say (also bad). Ask if other keepers have had problems moving their snakes in before, what issues you might come up against and what they can do to help if you do, etc.

Are low humidity desert species fine if humidity goes up at night as long as it's dry in the day and the substrate doesn't hold moisture?

Do Hognoses need a basking light? I've never seen him bask under his bulb once, and the temperatures are correct going by my heat gun.

>>4930596
You know what you’re doing

>>4931050
Yes. The idea high humidity will kill desert species is a myth, the issue is a lack of ventilation. Most desert herps will be spending most of their time in burrows or crevices where humidity is high, an ackie burrow can be like 80 or 90% humidity for example

I can't tell if superworm beetles are just leagues more photophobic than mealworms and also somehow better at hiding despite being 3 times the size or they're just dying days after i put them in the enclosure :c

>>4931137
But it's not the same the other way around, right? High humiditers die in moments when exposed to a furnace?

Minimum size for a single leopard gecko

>>4931050
There's two important facts to know about humidity:
1) Relative Humidity is the amount of water vapor in the air (and here's the important part) relative to the amount it can hold before it falls out of suspension.
2) The amount of water vapor the air can hold is directly related to its temperature. Hotter air can hold more water than cooler air.
Humidity will ALWAYS go up at night because temperatures go down. The amount of water vapor in the air hasnt changed, it's the total amount of water vapor the air can hold that has decreased.

>>4931396
>Humidity will ALWAYS go up at night because temperatures go down
Except if you heat your home, causing humidity to plummet
Also I knew both of these things, neither has anything to do with animal biology in regards to humidity.

>>4931398
If you actually knew what I posted you wouldnt have posted what you did here, because it's fucking wrong. You also wouldnt have asked the question in the first place because you would already know the answer.
The amount of water vapor suspended in the air of your enclosure DOES NOT CHANGE WITH THE AIR TEMPERATURE OF THE ENCLOSURE, unless the temperature delta is so big and the starting relative humidity so high that it precipitates out, which it wouldnt in an arid enclosure.
If the temperature drops in the enclosure, the relative humidity will rise, but the ABSOLUTE humidity, the amount of water vapor bouncing around in the air, does not. The biological functions of an animal aren't REMOTELY concerned with how much water vapor the air CAN POTENTIALLY HOLD, only the actual amount in the air itself, which is not changing.

>>4930638
Availability improves when it's not too cold for shipping in half the country.

Has there ever been any formal studies done on skink intelligence? It's a very diverse family of lizards so I'd imagine it's going to vary widely, but my blue tongue and zebra definitely feel way more "aware" and inquisitive than my beardie or geckos ever did.

>>4931405
is that why the shipping cost on everything is 1-200 dollars
I thought they were just moneygrubbers

>>4931413
even during the summer shipping is usually express overnight, which is going to cost a shitload regardless.

>>4931415
Really is gonna be a ball python or nothing...

>>4931416
I know that feel, anon. When I first decided to get into reptile keeping it was fucking late october. No more of the year's babies available, no one shipping, all the potential mommies and daddies tucked away for a long winter's nap. Didn't end up getting my critters until fucking JULY, but it gave me plenty of time to get a decent enclosure and all of the necessary supplies ready to go and dialed in.

What do you guys think of chameleons? i've heard they are very delicate and difficult to take care of

>>4931450
They are, and even a well-cared for one lives as long as a rat anyway.

>>4931454
ackshully not true. 5-7 years is reasonable for a well cared for panther/jacksons, veiled up to 10 though usually around the same. The whole "it only lives 2 years" memes are due to imports and poor care people are masquerading as good care. Part of the issue is they will breed readily so breeders didn't need to first master their care before being able to sell them as pets.

Good care needs a very, very specific replication of their microclimate, which is subtly different for all of these species. Go watch the Chameleon Academy videos on youtube if you want to dig deeper. I tell people it's like a saltwater aquarium. Once you have done hundreds of hours of research and tinkering with designing an ideal system, it is not that much more work than a freshwater tank (in the comparison, any other arboreal lizard). But if you don't build a good system you're going to have a lot of problems.

But don't go post this on the chameleon subreddit, lmao. that whole situation is tragicomic considering there is actually extremely good advice out there these days.

My gecko prefers darkling beetles over dubia roaches. Is he broken?
(Realistically, I think I just need to feed him smaller roaches)

>>4931801
have you tried mealworms like everyone else ever

Is stacking pvc enclosures a marketing gimmick you shouldn't actually do?
Wouldn't anything in either tank be able to tell there's something walking around just above/below it and get stressed out?

>>4931865
Well yeah of course he also loves mealworms, but I don't want to feed those as a staple.

Colubrids faces look lame

>>4932034
animals dont seem to mind, so presumably they either dont notice. notice but dont care because it doesnt sound like food or is just filtered out by their brains as static since it's constant, like how you stop smelling perfume or something cooking after smelling it constantly for like 15minutes.
That said I dont trust that stacking shit unless it's something like the vision cages, and those tend to be pretty expensive. Wire shelving is just objectively better.

>>4929995
you are correct. that is how thermoregulation in cold-blooded animals works.

Will socializing an angery snake make them learn all humans are safe or just their keeper?

Why do people keep snakes on all these premade commercial substrates like aspen/coco fiber/reptibark when basically everything else is pretty much kept on mixes of dirt and sand with a sprinkle of other goodies?

>>4930687
>>4930661
even though they basically are kingsnakes, milksnakes have a reputation for being less docile. might musk and nip you

>>4931299
My cute boi deserves this

>>4932403
for the most part? the new person won't smell familiar so they;ll be a little unsure and curious but they wont go batshit, or else people wouldnt be able to do reptile outreach stuff and let kids hold big fuck-ass boas. just make sure the new person doesnt bug out and is just calm and using slow, deliberate movements.

I've come to the conclusion that aside third world countries/China, Japs are the worst herp owners I've ever seen. Every cutesy Japanese pet owner clip I've come across showing their leopard gecko/frog/etc. has them live in the most poverty setup I've ever seen, even rackfags provide more space and enirchment

>>4932973
Asians are intellectually incapable of empathy. They see animals as trinkets or toys purely for their amusement.

>>4932998
Fucks me up seeing someone mess with their pacman frog or turtle and all the comments talking about how cute it is when they're visibly swimming in their own shit. Or all those psychotic live feeding videos, they make vore fetishist sickos like the Reptile Channel look tame.
[spoiler]I'm Asian American and I love all my reptiles though[/spoiler]

>>4931299
Jokes aside I wish I could build something like this for every single one of my enclosures. Even my smallest reptile(crestie)'s multiple feet of space in every direction feels like a cramped jail cell, I know he wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyways because he's fucking dumb and can hardly tell up from down but I still wish I could go bigger

>>4932998
It's cultural.

>>4933006
Your white blood gave you a soul

Got my first bearded dragon yesterday! Always been a frog guy up until now (pacmans, dumpies) but I'm super glad to have my first pet to browse the chans with me- I call him Ember. Would describe his personality as smug.

>>4933479
You look like a fag and keep Karen-tier herps.

Many happy returns to you and your lizzer

>>4932413
Maybe to reduce impactation risk. Though of course if you keep your snake in good conditions, eating a little dirt won't hurt them. So no reason I guess?

>>4933551
>karen-tier herps
Stop this. All herps are great and deserve to be celebrated.

>>4933479
Why are beardies so smug looking

>>4933574
If you're not breeding pygmy chameleons and shinglebacks you're part of the problem.

Everything I learn about bull snakes tells me they'd be an absolutely perfect pet
but I can't get over how DORKY they look, their pattern is very pretty but their head looks like someone drawing a snake for a kids cartoon

Does an albino hognose snake need uvb or would it be fine with just a heat mat?

>>4933840
All reptiles require uvb

>>4933885
no they dont

>>4933887
Yes they do.

>>4933840
Maybe use a weaker UVB lamp since its an albino, but it still needs some amount of UVB.

I want to attract tiny lizards to my property. I rockhound. I occasionally see a lizard skitter around the rocks. Is there a trick to picking specific rocks to attract tiny crawlers? Big ones, small ones? Shiny? Calcium/salts?

>>4934331
Dig a hole and fill it with large and flat rocks until you have a mound. Plant bunch grasses around the mound and maybe add a water feature to attract more insects.

I found a reptile podcast I watched last night, and one of their main hosts is some zookeeper guy who cheers on bans and explicitly wants the pet trade to be banned. He also talked about how much he hated usark and how people don't have a right to own animals.

The funny thing is the show is run by a reptile store owner, but this nutter is on every episode of the podcast. Why do reptile people welcome people who are deadset on ending their livelihood and lifestyle.

I also heard spain banned pretty much all exotic pets except for reptiles under 2 pounds and fish, and got away with it. Is the reptile hobby going to go the way of the parrot?

I'm a fish person so I'm further down the line, but it seems like everyone is trying to take your animals from you legally.

>>4934331
Big flat ones are best, especially when stacked on top of each other

>>4934349
Outrage views are still views.

experienced fishkeeper, somewhat green with reptiles. i had a bearded dragon i bought as a teen that lived over 10 years but aside from that haven't kept reptiles. i kinda want to get a snake, what's something that i can actually socialize and hang out with? hognoses seem cute but very dramatic

>>4934444
have you considered the first page of a google search

>>4934444
Look into kingsnakes, they're pretty common for beginners (don't expect too much socializing out of any snek though)

i hate the reptile community. It's fucking impossible to just find simple answers to things because there's so much conflicting information and everyone acts like they're 100% correct in everything they say.

>>4934693
you're obnoxious

>>4934755
And you're retarded

>>4934645
Just balance the fact that 90% of peoples' pet care is actual dogshit with the fact that the other 10% are so emotionally invested in their animals and personify them so much they ignore that most reptiles have a daily ritual of "hide in hole -> eat -> bask under lamp -> shit -> hide in hole" and go overboard and turn into husbandry nazis
Also this is a real-frogs only general, take the reddit one elsewhere

>Pepe is reddit
oy vey

Forgive me if this is retarded but
So when you play with a cat and they pounce on the thing, you often attempt to pull it away so they have to work for it and actually be fast, would there be any major reasons to not do this with a snake's mouse?

>>4934913
might hurt their teeth? I usually give it a little wiggle after she grabs to get her to bite down a bit more so she doesn't accidentally drop it and get it dirty, but snakes dont really pursue/chase down prey like cats do, they just sneak up and throw everything into one strike. probably not a real benefit. maybe drag it around the enclosure a bit so she can track it's scent if you want more feeding enrichment, that's more or less how they work anyway

>>4934921
I figure in most clips I watch of wild snakes going for mice they usually at least attempt to jump away
It's weird how snakes evolved to be mouth tubes to go down into mammal burrows and vaccuum up anything inside and yet they seemingly just... never do that? Only very small snakes are actual pursuit predators of any sort, the entire strike is based around having a lot of room out in the open to get your pouncing stance set up, where their prey has a chance to get away from them

>Gecko usually hides in his hole for 20 hours a day.
>came out way past his bedtime because beeg fly was bouncing around
>he's never come out at night to go after beeg flies despite them making all sorts of racket banging against the mesh, he'd wait until the next morning.
>he finally thought he was safe enough to come out specifically to grab a bite to eat outside of his designated 2 hours of basking time.
>Cat was half asleep on the cat tree
>Movement occurs so she, still VISIBLY TIRED, MUST loudly thump down the tree and come over toward the tank before coming over for pets.
>IMMEDIATELY goes back to sleep after scaring the gecko into learning no, it's not okay to come out at night, you MUST stay in your hole as much as possible or something WILL come after you.
I hate this cat so god damn much.

My gecko cannot conceptualize danger and would walk directly into a cat's open mouth if given the opportunity

>>4933840
Very small amount of UVB if you must. Too much can cause them to get cataracts.

>>4933923
all (non troglodytic) reptiles benefit from access to uvb from lighting
not all require it
with albinos, you need to be very careful with how much UV you supplement with. offering some UV light is always a superior care practice but if I had to choose between going overboard or get D3 solely from food, I would go with D3 from food.
desu breeding albino reptiles purposefully is sort of abusive and i wouldn't support that practice by purchasing them.

>>4935394
that's kind of a mixed bag - albinism really only becomes a detriment with heavy basking species that require a lot of UV, like iguanas. Snakes and other stuff that does cryptic basking dont really have that issue.

Are Dune Geckos pet empty glass boxes or do they leave their hides?

>>4934930
Cats are great if they are the smallest pet you own. Cats are terrible otherwise. A dog can learn to ignore a small skittish animal. A cat basically can’t.

Anyone here have any experience with ball pythons as pets?
I've heard they make good beginner reptiles.
Is it true that if you go on holiday somewhere for like 3-4 days, you can just leave them and they'll be fine as long as you have fed them beforehand?

>>4935499
ball pythons are extremely tolerant to neglect, which is not the same as a good beginner reptile. They require tropical levels of heat and humidity which is difficult to dial in if you';re inexperienced with terrariums, and can be picky eaters, which can be SUPER stressful for a new snake owner.
I'd recommend a corn snake instead. generally the same size and enclosure requirements but a temperate snake so their temperature/humidity needs are far easier, they're generally more active/exploratory, and are notoriously eager feeders to the point where it's actually quite easy to make them obese if overfeed.
As for vacation, you're going to want to put your lights/heat on a timer anyway, but that's really the only thing they need to change on a daily basis. 3-4 days isnt enough for a decent sized water dish to evaporate, and younger snakes need more regular feeding, but that's more like weekly for babies.

>>4935515
> and can be picky eaters,
What do you mean? Will they get bored if I feed them frozen feeder rats all the time and refuse to eat or something?
>I'd recommend a corn snake instead.
Thanks. I'll check it out.
>3-4 days isnt enough for a decent sized water dish to evaporate
The reason why I asked was because I know snakes can live up to like 20 years, and while I obviously want my pets to live long and healthy lives, I don't want to be tethered to my house for 20 years without any chance of going out of town or out of country every now and then. At least now I know I can go on vacations without worrying about my potential snake dying.

>>4935524
Most pythons and boas in captivity are grossly overfed. Once the snake reaches a mature size, it should probably eat less than once every two weeks unless it's a breeder or a particularly active species.

>>4935499
They're decent beginner reptiles but like the other anon said you might have more fun/an easier time with a corn snake (marginal difference in difficulty imo as long as you give a shit about the thing's well being, so don't stress about it too much if you really like ball pythons)
>>4935524
For the most part generally only eat every 1-3 weeks so as long as it has water and its cage stays the right temp/humidity levels then you can leave it alone without worry
>I don't want to be tethered to my house for 20 years
A ton of people dump their pets once they realize it will grow and inconvenience them, so you can usually easily find an adult to save from its shortsighted overlord if you don't want to commit half your life to it

>>4935598
That might be a good idea. I'll try to see if my country has some kind of a network (maybe on social media or something) where I can find pet owners willing to part with their snakes.

Honestly, when I was beginning to do research on pet reptiles, one thing that really surprised me was how long these things lived.
Even something as simple as a bearded dragon can live up to a decade.
I've always thought they only lived like 3-4 years at most. But in captivity? Turns out they can live quite long lives.

Why are snakes considered on the whole so much more dense than lizards when if you give a (comfortable) snake some kind of new toy or terrain it will generally investigate and interact with it wheras lizards dont give a shit about anything unless they want to eat it or they think it wants to eat them, which is exactly what people say about snakes?
I've never seen a lizard do anything with any kind of enrichment items like snakes will, they barely seem to be aware of the world around them if its not moving

>>4934340
>>4934418
thanks fellas, flat rocks it is. hopefully will have the energy today to go on out and collect

Dubias having such long flexible necks under their shells always looks so weird

x-posting here from /aq/ because i know you guys use heater lamps more. usually you'd use a thermostat but the bowl is tiny and i'd need a light anyway. what's the minimum requirement lamp i'd need to keep about 6 liters of water at 21~24 ºC? my house is probably at around 15ºC most times.

I am once again asking if chinese cave geckos need friends to be happy or if they can live full thriving lives alone

God it hurts every single time I learn what size of tank a normie is keeping their reptile in

>>4934645
Damn I forgot how much I love those candies.

>>4935499
The other anons gave you good answers, but I'll add this. Don't get a reptile just because people say it's for beginners. Get the reptile you want to keep. Snakes can live for twenty years, do not get one unless you want to commit to owning one and unless you want to give it the best possible life it can have with you.

>>4935986
i am telling you once again that there is no compelling evidence that any squamate is an obligate-social animal. Some will tolerate communal living and display novel behaviors in communal enclosures but they are not deprived from a solitary life like a schooling fish would be.
cave geckos do not need to be housed communally, but they tolerate this sort of living situation relatively well.

>>4936541
What about mourning geckos, don't they live communally in the wild?

I just applied for a job as a government toad breeder
Wish me luck guys

>>4936475
Yeah, you don’t need to collect pet XP, you just need to learn what it takes to meet a certain need. A cage with a pair of temp/humidity probes and a data logger demonstrates this ability much better than keeping a species that lives 20 years even when neglected as a “beginner” pet.

Which isn’t to say that you shouldn’t consider a “starter” pet. They are generally better pets if you don’t just want a display habitat in your house.

Never owned a reptile before, but I'm getting my first corn snake soon :D He's 9 years old and a rescue. Gonna make him a lovely tank to live in, want to make sure he's happy and healthy.

Where do you personally store your feeder mice, just your kitchen freezer or a separate one?

I have a different question about cave geckos, does "nocturnal" mean "comes out when the cage light is off" or "comes out when all the room is pitch dark and you're asleep"?

>>4936793
There is 0 difference between a frozen rat and a pork chop, theres no reason to have a special mouse freezer

>>4936836
It wouldn't make much difference to me, my dear mother would probably have a conniption over it though

>>4936828
It means "comes out when they think it's night and feel safe" so usually the latter

>>4936836
Pork chops do not have intestinal tracks with shit in them

>>4936930
if you keep your frozen rodents in such a state where you would get shit from inside their intestines anywhere near anything that touches your food, you are doing something terribly, terribly wrong.
I personally use a quart freezer bag that is inside a gallon freezer bag, as I feed fuzzies and thus buy two packs of 50 like two to three times a year, and want to mitigate freezer burn as much as possible.

>>4936935
Yeah don't get me wrong, I used to keep my frozen mice in the same freezer as food(before I got a mini freezer to put in my herp room because I'm actually just that lazy), but I can see why someone who isn't in the hobby could get grossed out by the prospect in any case.

Its a wonder how anyone has any issues keeping humidity high when putting a towel or something over the tank mesh keeps everything so wet without even killing ventilation

i cant get over that the "bad smell" that superworm beetles defensively release smells like barbecue sauce

>>4937883
Most animals dislike the smell of vinegar and capsaicin. Humans are just weird.

>>4937902
I wonder if the scent would act like seasoning for eating them

How are Mealworms for Bearded dragons? Mine is about a foot long from head to tip of tail, he's still pretty small though. I thought I saw a while ago when I first got him that mealworms are like super bad or something?
Chewy only has 250 as the smallest count for mealworms, and I'm ordering it for my tarantulas, but 250 is obviously 200 too many, so I thought I'd share it with my bearded dragon.
Normally I'd just go to the local exotic pet store for a proper amount of crickets, dubias, red runners, mealworms, but the owner has a vendetta against me after I tried to politely point out his keeping of some spiders was wrong lol. So now I have to live through Chewy. Chewy is pretty cheap though, in fact it has a substantially better price to amount ratio than any pet store at least.

>>4938031
mealworms are poisonous and will kill your bearded dragon, this is why they are the most widely sold feeder on the market. They have hardly been studied whatsoever and it is very difficult to find information on them, so it's good you came here to ask this, because no one else would have been able to tell you whether it was okay for a fucking bearded dragon to eat fucking mealworms holy shit

>All reptiles need to sit in the sun and warm up to function
>80% of reptiles are nocturnal
I don't undastando

>>4938117
1) they dont NEED the sun, it's just that IR-B is a really efficient way to warm up a body since it penetrates the skin and gets into the flesh.
2) cryptic basking. nocturnal animals are still outside during the day, and they dont have to flee into their coffins like vampires, so if they need to thermoregulate they'll stick a body part out into the light and warm up. it's the reptile equivalent of "too hot with the blanket, too cold without the blanket, stick a leg out of the blanket."

I'm thinking about getting a reptile, mostly because a cat or a dog is out of the question. Being in Australia, I'm not quite sure what my options are outside of natives but I have a wildlife permit. I've narrowed it down to either an eastern Bluetongue or a Children's Python. I've done my research on both but am still undecided of which one I should get. I like both of them but I guess the bluetongue would be a bit more interactable than the snake would be.

>>4938128
>and they dont have to flee into their coffins like vampires
Please tell this to mine I don't think they know this.

Leopard geckos deserve large outdoor enclosures.

>>4938144
good a reason as any to depopulate pakistan