Petco $1 per gallon sale?

[infernalis]

Very nice Loren..

At the moment I'm trying as best I can to keep all the tanks in the "display" orientation, Close to impossible with 36 tanks

How big is that room?? bottom row, second over from the far right, what is that in the tank?? the zebra stripe looking thing..

Those lids are sweet, nice work Since the frames are wood, you could easily fabricate latches that grab up under the frame of the tank and eliminate bricks.... (just a thought)

You have a very steady hand to do those cuts with a circular handheld..

Very cool about the indigenous species display, almost there myself.

When I first got "bit" by the snake bug I had little money to spend, so I slowly collected one specimen of each species that frequented my back yard.

[Loren]

Very nice Loren..

At the moment I'm trying as best I can to keep all the tanks in the "display" orientation, Close to impossible with 36 tanks

How big is that room?? bottom row, second over from the far right, what is that in the tank?? the zebra stripe looking thing..

Those lids are sweet, nice work Since the frames are wood, you could easily fabricate latches that grab up under the frame of the tank and eliminate bricks.... (just a thought)

You have a very steady hand to do those cuts with a circular handheld..

Very cool about the indigenous species display, almost there myself.

When I first got "bit" by the snake bug I had little money to spend, so I slowly collected one specimen of each species that frequented my back yard.

Well, I'm back to reply your comments better- was in a hurry this morning.

The one down side to my arrangement is that the animals arent displayed as well with the tanks set with short side facing you. But, its the only way to fit them all into a 9' x 15' building. I have snake racks for the other snakes and rodent racks/tubs on the other side.


The position they are in also makes lid clips difficult as I cant reach the back outside of the 20 longs too well. My weighted lids make for really fast in and out feeding.
I hand them their food with a 24" long hemostat. Almost all of them accept food right from them.

For cutting like this you need a steady hand with a strong grip. Cutting like this with a circular is very dangerous, as sometimes the blade starts fighting you and wants to kick back. I have been told by a carpenter that its a good way to get hurt. I try to keep my body out of the way.

I love natives, and hope to soon have at least one of almost every legally obtainable species from my state, with the exception of a couple that are extremely difficult to care for due to only eating slender salamanders(2 hour drive to find those) or lizard eggs(then again, I do have a few leopard geckos I could breed...). With some, I will have more than one subspecies as well- depends on the species, the law, and how much visual difference there is between the subspecies.
I would love to put on a few presentations being able to state that I have the most complete collection of natives you will see outside of a zoo. (other than the protected ones)

I started out growing up on the family dairy, catching mainly gopher snakes, and the occasional valley garter. Used to always have 3 or 4 gopher snakes around. I'd keep them for a while, let em' go, and catch another. Had a 3' x 3' x 3' home made cage in a shed that I kept them all in.
Actually raised a baby goat in that cage once too. (without the snakes).

Here is the reptile building from the outside. It was here when I bought the house, but I remodeled it to suit my needs.
Foam panels rated at R-13 cover the windows, the walls are 1.5" thick concrete and stucco with R-13 behind the sheet rock, and the ceiling has 6" deep of blow in insulation which I spread out by hand. The door is a new prehung door from Home depot- also insulates well. It has an air conditioner set to 80, and in the winter a space heater on a timer. A digital thermometer records min/max for me at 2 locations.
Also a big fan blowing diagonal down from the ceiling to keep the top/bottom within 2 degrees of each other. I added something like 14 outlets. It runs off 2 - 20 amp breakers(2 walls per breaker), and has 12 gauge romex throughout. I added flood lights for the yard while I was at it.
So, I have been busy the last 2 years.

[infernalis]

That is extremely nice. OK awesome

When we got this house there were 2 living rooms, both 12x18 so we use the one with the main entrance as a living room, and the one with the big bay window for the animals, its a shame, I blocked off the window so nosy neighbors cannot see in.

One day I want to build a jungle room in the basement, it's 24x50 down there with 8 foot ceilings, would love to build a 18x18 room, dirt floor and grow lights, then we could take the animals in there during the winter.