- Hey good morning everybody and welcome to the vlog.
Still just getting chilled when I see that animal,
I mean it's absolutely amazing.
Continuing on, just a few days left
before the 13th, obviously the open.
A lot to do.
We'll talk more about that later.
But I'm gonna go ahead and continue to
move things around today, get some new stuff.
This is one of my favorite enclosures in the entire place,
not sure if the animal I'm about to move into it
is gonna stay here forever
but an animal I wanted to
get back over to The Reptarium
that had spent quite a bit of time here,
of course Sunfire, so.
Let's go ahead, get this enclosure set up
and bring her over and see.
She's gonna look really good in here.
Will I eventually switch it up?
I'm not sure yet.
I also have a few other things
I'm gonna be moving around today,
getting into The Reptarium
and I have an idea, I'm not sure if it's gonna work.
Later on I'll tell you about it and we'll give it a shot.
(upbeat music)
We all know that retics like to climb
so the fact that she has a bunch of ridges,
this log right here and stuff like that
could be really good,
I mean I think her colors are gonna really pop in here.
Originally I had a different idea for this enclosure,
but let's give it a shot. I think that, you know I've wanted
to get her back on display
because she's such a cool animal
and she deserves a place where
she can climb and have a great time, so.
Let's just go get her, get her in here
and see what happens.
She is such a pretty girl,
I mean I always loved her
when she was over at The Reptarium,
we didn't take her out as much as we probably should have
so I have a feeling with this enclosure
we'll be able to get to her a little bit.
This enclosure should be even better
and she's gotten even more docile
since she's been over there,
so this should make a great addition over there
so let's just give it a shot.
(upbeat music)
All right girl.
I'm just gonna go ahead and let her go,
probably maybe I'll let her go up on the branch.
Just like all retics, right.
Straight up.
I mean that's the thing that's so incredible about retics,
they love to climb
and I know that Lori gets onto me a little bit
about having too many retics hets at The Reptarium
but the truth is is that you know,
there's so much variety in retics, you know.
They all look different and after all,
I mean a big snake is so impressive.
I mean trying to cover the bases
with lizards and amphibians and tortoises and turtles
and you know, I think big snakes are an eye catcher
and I love them
and people love to come in and experience them.
Yeah we do kinda have a lot of retics,
let me know in the comments
what you guys think about that by the way.
In the meantime, she looks incredible.
Look at how she's just gripping that wall
and this is actually probably
the better enclosure for her
because when she was in Ivy's old enclosure,
it was a huge enclosure but it wasn't really tall, right.
These guys like to climb, they like to get up.
To be honest with you guys,
I wasn't sure if this was gonna work.
I now think this is the right snake for the enclosure.
Let me know what you guys think
and she looks unbelievably wonderful here
and I wanna talk to you guys just a little bit
on an experiment that we're about to undertake.
- Hm.
All right well.
What I have here is a rack
that our stuffed snakes are gonna hang on.
So I gotta figure out how to put it together.
This should be fun.
- [Brian] Good luck out there, Lori.
- I know.
(laughs)
(upbeat music)
- Come on now, I don't feel confident
that you know what you're doing.
- [Lori] Looks a little bit different... (laughs)
Metal screws are used.
- [Brian] You want me to do this?
I think that's for these right here.
- Well, good that you can say it.
But I'm saying that none of the things in the supplies
show ones with wingnuts.
All of the pieces are right here.
- [Brian] So who cares then?
We'll come across it when we come across them.
Let's go.
(laughs)
- I'm assuming this doesn't have that thing on it, though.
But it's the only self-locking Allen head screw.
Does it look like I have an Allen key?
- [Cameraman] Do you have an Allen key?
(laughs)
Do you have an Allen key?
- You don't have one for this?
- Brian!
- I thought it would come with it!
- Yeah, well here's the big!
I thought it would come with what it says,
but guess what?
It came with these!
(upbeat rock music)
- [Cameraman] Brian, I'm so proud of you
for building this whole thing.
- [Brian] By myself?
- [Cameraman] Yeah.
- [Brian] By myself, too!
(knocks woods)
I think that's good, man.
Just building a display, you know.
- [Cameraman] It's cool that like you did this,
all by yourself now you get to look at it every time
and say like, "I built that!"
- Without help.
Without any help.
My cobra.
(hisses)
Patrick, Patrick.
Patrick, any clue?
- So confused!
No, are you forreal?
No!
- [Brian] Shh, quiet!
Quiet.
- [Cameraman] Mm-hm, mm-hm.
- I'll be right there.
Don't say a word!
Guys I'm pretty excited about this.
Ben, I want you to come over here.
- [Ben] Okay.
(laughs)
- [Brian] Got a good look guys,
this was a surprise clutch from a mangrove,
I knew they were breeding, I knew they were swelling up
but this girl laid,
we didn't even have a nest box in
because we didn't realize that she was
this close to being ready to lay.
I am going to try to take these out
without her getting too upset at me,
but I wanted to share this experience
with my friends over here Ben and Lorenzo over here.
- How you doin'?
- [Brian] They're my buddies
and we worked this project together
and it is pretty exciting,
just we got two, four, six, eight, nine eggs!
- [Ben] Nice!
Nice. - [Brian] What?
Seven eggs was the largest clutch I've ever had.
- [Ben] Nice.
- They're a little dimpled but not too bad,
we caught them in time
so how exciting is that guys.
- [Ben] Awesome. - The first eggs of the year.
= [Ben] That is so awesome. - [Brian] Mangrove eggs,
so now we only have 100 and something days
for them to hatch.
- [Ben] Yeah!
- So three and a half months from now,
we'll be showing you guys some baby mangroves.
We have a couple other females,
look like they're gonna lay anytime.
Now I've gotta get nest box in with them,
but I am over the top happy.
Pretty wild guys,
you can see Lilith is right down here by Nova
and the only time she comes down is
when it's breeding season,
so it's getting close to maybe
getting some more eggs from these guys for this season.
Remember last year they kinda had a late season,
only had two clutches.
Typically they'll do three and even four clutches,
so the fact that Lilith is coming down
makes me believe she's starting to kinda get into a cycle
and maybe we'll get more than
just two clutches this year from these guys,
that's pretty exciting.
Like I said, she never comes down
and yesterday I spotted her down
and then this morning again with Nova.
(water spraying)
Obviously the Amazon Basin's doing well,
we gotta get its misting systems obviously on her,
as well as a bunch of other stuff
and everything is settling in really well,
super happy about it
obviously Salt and Pepper.
Pepper, hey buddy, what are you doing?
It's really good to see this type of stuff,
of course we got the Cuban cross up here doing well,
Moo Moo down here is doing amazing,
we know Al Macino's been,
he was like the oldest resident, right, I think so.
As things are getting settled in,
it's cool to kinda see how they're doing.
The iguanas are such a huge hit,
I mean everyone from the crew loves them.
They're so interesting
because they just hang out on the walls,
obviously we know that Ivy has just loved her enclosure.
Interestingly enough, this morning I came in
and I just put some plants in here just as placeholders,
they're gonna get set in permanently
but came in this morning
and all the plants were kinda rearranged,
telling me she is coming out at night and kind of exploring.
I'd love to get a camera on her sometime, so.
Things are going well,
the turtles obviously are still hiding out
but they're getting a little bit more kinda curious
and they're coming up a little bit more often
so things are going good,
obviously spending time at the old Reptarium
is always amazing as well,
but I did wanna check on the Bells monitor really quick,
still hanging out up here,
really coming a lot of intelligence and socialization
is going on really good, oh.
Hi, Perdita!
So things are coming together pretty well,
the animals are all settling in really good
which is really the thing that
I'm always the most concerned about
and you know, making sure that everything
is super healthy and obviously, hey fella!
Hi, baby!
Hey, Elvis.
The truth is that's the original Reptarium.
Now things were, you know, you gotta adjust, right.
Vast majority of animals do really well
but every now and then you get an animal
that just doesn't like the new environment,
and maybe it's a little bit stressed out, stuff like that,
so, so far so good with the new expansion.
I'll keep you guys updated
but so far everything seems to be doing amazing.
Oh, and by the way I forgot to mention
that Diddy and Dixie have been
loving their new enclosure, too.
They're out right now.
They're just soaking up the morning sun right now
and that's one of the things that's really cool,
the sun rises this way so they come out
and they can bask in the actual sun,
get a little UV in them,
so it's coming together really well.
(upbeat music)
Obviously Potato is always
hugely popular here at The Reptarium,
and remember we used to have
a Northern blue-tongued skink named Erwin
that was over and then we just,
you know moved it out because we're like, we needed room!
You know?
We had other animals that need to go into enclosure
so Erwin ended up going back over to BHB,
well guess what.
Erwin also is gonna come back over,
I'm excited because the one thing about Potato
that's a little bit tough is
it doesn't like to eat for people,
so a lot of times we offer feedings when we're open
and people wanna feed Potato and it's just so lazy,
it just doesn't eat often
so Erwin was always really good,
so another option for kids or whoever
that can feed an animal.
So Erwin's a little bit more lively too,
so it'll be cool, so.
Let's get this cage set up
and we'll go get Erwin and release it back over here
and there'll be another animal
kinda checking off the list of empty enclosure.
(upbeat music)
Now obviously I'll get some plants in here
and a little bit of a hiding spot for him as well
and let him kinda settle in for a little bit
but for now I just wanted to get him in here, looks awesome.
Kids are gonna love him.
You guys ready for that experiment?
So a lot of my zookeeper friends and zoos that I travel to
talk about a lot of
cohabitating of animals, species, stuff like that.
So I've always been trying to think like
how can we do that to take that kinda zoo approach
and you guys remember the first animals we kinda got,
you know, donated here were
those red-footed tortoises
that are living over at BHB right now.
Then we try and think, where do we put them?
Now these guys aren't a desert tortoise, right,
they're a higher humidity subtropical,
tropical forest type of a tortoise,
they come from the same region as the iguanas do,
so I thought to myself, you know,
this might be a really cool enclosure
because iguanas stay up top,
they're always gonna be in the trees,
on the walls, stuff like that.
They really don't spend anytime on the ground,
so the tortoises can be on the ground.
Also they eat a very similar diet,
you know a little higher protein for the tortoises,
but the iguanas can have a little protein as well, so.
We can have food bowl up here for the iguanas,
and then food down here for the tortoises.
The only thing I have to keep an eye on is
can I get the UV to penetrate far enough
in the basking light,
it's gonna be something
I'm gonna have to work on a little bit
but I think I'm gonna go ahead
and move the tortoises in here,
see how they do over the next week or so
and then we can decide
if this experiment works, you know, so.
And I think it'll be really cool
because kids can be down here seeing the tortoises,
we can bring them out and stuff like that,
should be pretty dope, so.
Let's just go ahead, get them and see what happens.
(water splashing)
These guys really should love
this huge enclosure for them to
kinda walk around and stuff like that,
definitely a nice upgrade
for the way they've been kept for a while,
so let's just go ahead, see what they do.
I'm pretty excited about this,
I mean it just kinda came to me
when I was thinking about like
where am I gonna put the redfoot tortoises?
I thought you know, this could be perfect.
Again, kinda goes to what
all my zoos friends keep telling me are cool at zoos,
cohabitation, you know you get different layers.
I mean, some zoos even keep like
dart frogs and venomous snakes or tree boas
in the same habitat so,
I mean he looks so, oh,
look at them just cruising around.
Oh my god, I think this is gonna
really bring a lot more life to this enclosure, too
because now we have the arboreal side with the iguanas
and we have the terrestrial side with the tortoises, so.
Again, we'll just see how they kinda fare,
we'll give them a little bit of time to settle in
and what do you think, Lori?
- Oh my god, they're so cute, I can't stand it.
(laughs)
- They're so cute, aren't they?
I think this is gonna work out really well.
- Yeah actually, I am so shocked
that was actually a pretty good idea.
(dramatic music)
(laughs)
- [Brian] Yes, there we go, let's see,
we'll see how it goes.
- [Lori] Yeah.
- Hopefully they do well.
(upbeat music)
So guys as you can see,
Lori is working diligently hard on the gift shop there.
Lori, how you think it's coming?
I think it looks beautiful, huh.
It's a lot of work.
- It's coming, it's coming. - [Brian] It's a lot of work.
- Definitely not there yet, but it's coming.
- [Brian] But it's pretty cool,
I mean you guys can kinda get an idea
obviously we have our Zebella and Salt and Matilda
and then these are all the other things
that we have in the gift shop,
these things are so cool, there's so many cool animals,
I love, look at how cool that is.
Of course Reptarium shirts are finally gonna be available.
Are they gonna be on the website?
- No, they're separate ones.
There's ones on the website.
- [Brian] Website, and then these are...
- They ship direct to you,
these are ones purchased here only.
- [Brian] Oh okay, gotcha.
So and then of course we got hats now
and all kinds of other stuff
and little tortoises so,
again the gift shop area is definitely coming together,
be ready tonight?
- I hope so.
(laughs)
- [Brian] All right.
- What an eventful day, right.
I mean obviously a lot of work,
just a couple days left
before the grand opening of The Reptarium
which we're so excited about
and guess what, the BHB season
is officially underway with eggs,
I mean you know mangrove eggs are awesome,
we got a couple more clutches coming.
It's pretty incredible
and thank you so much for joining,
I hope that you enjoyed it,
appreciate you guys so much.
Did you know that I have a podcast?
If you didn't, it's called Checking In.
You can subscribe to it right over there,
we have a podcast, I think you're gonna enjoy it.
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Have an absolutely wonderful day
and be kind to someone.
I promise I'll see you guys tomorrow.