- Hey good morning everybody, and welcome to the vlog!
(air whooshing)
I hope the start of your day is absolutely increidble.
Yesterday was almost 60 degrees outside,
today it's like 20 degrees and we had an ice storm.
So, the good news is that means there could be some good
breeding when it comes to the pythons.
So, let's get over to the shop and see what's going on.
As always, there's always that thing that says
it's more an art than a science
when it comes to breeding reptiles.
Basically went through almost the majority of the animals
and again, no real breeding going on.
And anything significant,
I think there was like four locks so far.
So it's kind of a bummer.
I thought, for sure, that because of that low pressure
from the storm front and stuff like that.
Looks like we have a little bit of courting going on here,
so I'll just go ahead and leave those guys alone.
Check the last few things,
but what happens sometimes is the front side of a low system
is what really spurs them on.
So it's the drop of the barometric pressure.
Once the barometric pressures actually drop
sometimes it can go the other way.
So, I really thought we'd come
and have 12, 15, 18 locks today.
Looks like we have maybe four or five at the most.
But hey, I'm not complaining.
Still awesome that we have a few more.
We're moving along, but again,
every time I think I've got things figured out
you know, I realize I don't.
How absolutely insane is that, right guys?
Of course this is just a UV or blacklight
that is shining down on a scorpion.
It's crazy how these things glow.
Now, basically what's happening here
is that there's a chemical, that fluorescence,
that's in the hyaline layer
which is kinda in the cuticle of the actual scorpion itself.
Now the interesting thing about the hyaline layer
is that this chemical is unbelievably long-lasting.
Not only does it fluorescence like this,
but, believe it or not, it can last millions of years.
Scientists actually have found scorpion fossils
where the cuticle itself, that outer layer,
is gone, it's just a fossil, but yet the chemical
in the hyaline layer still fluorescence.
How crazy is that?
After millions of years.
I mean that is just absolutely crazy.
(flashlight button clicking) Look at that.
I could play with this all day long.
And, I was actually inspired when I was out at Nerd
and they showed me a blacklight flashlight
just like this one right here.
Now, interestingly enough,
when we got back from Nerd, guess what?
This just showed up.
So, I'm assuming that someone at Nerd sent us this,
so thank you for that.
- We're gonna check out some stuff under blacklight.
I hope it shows up on the camera
'cause it doesn't really show--
This is kinda what a cow looks like
under your regular lighting, right?
And then what we're gonna do is we're gonna take
our UV blacklight and shine it on here.
We'll shut the lights off real quick
and see if we can get a look at it under the blacklight.
Take a look at this.
Take a look at all the different colors that show up.
- [Camera Man] There's all kinds of pattern in there.
- [Nerd Handler] You can see all sorts of spots
that you can't see under the regular light.
Really cool, albino girl, and take a look at--
- [Camera Man] Wow!
- [Nerd Handler] All that crazy color that pops
when you look at it under the UV blacklight.
So, this is me and Jeremy the other night
at one o'clock in the morning running around the facility
with this blacklight just shining on everything
trying to see what shows up the coolest.
This is your standard albino piebald ball python.
So, you know, you can see a little bit of that patterning
there but it's got the white patches on it.
All right, could we hit the lights?
Take a look at it under blacklight.
- [Camera Man] Oh my God!
- [Nerd Handler] Check that out.
- [Camera Man] That is ridiculous!
- [Nerd Handler] That you wouldn't be able to see under
your regular lighting.
How cool is that?
So now I'm just going through with the flashlight.
- [Camera Man] Look, it says R-I-C, Ric.
- [Nerd Handler] Ah, this is the Ric Ball.
- Geez, Morty, wow that's a Ric Ball right there.
(men laughing)
- I wanna kinda play around with the blacklight a little bit
with some of our snakes now after seeing what Nerd did.
This is actually an Asian Forest Scorpion setup right here.
The first one I showed you was actually
an African Emperor that's really cool and really tame.
But, I can never find this little guy.
So, I think I'm gonna go around
and just see if I can find him with this blacklight.
And this is how you would actually find him in the wild.
You can take these out into the desert
and they luminesce just like this.
Oop, there it is!
Look at that little monkey right here.
Now, these guys are not nearly as friendly
as the African Emperor scorpions for sure.
And the thing that's interesting is that scientists
don't really know exactly why they have that fluorescence.
They think that there's a chance
that it could potentially protect them from the sun.
Maybe they use that to kind of identify with one another.
Or even the chances that maybe it wards off predators.
I mean, who knows?
Regardless, mother nature is incredible.
And look at this guy!
See, a soon as I come near it its claws are up.
If I put my hand near it it's gonna sting me for sure.
But, what an incredible animal.
I tell ya, mother nature is amazing.
So let's just find a couple other snakes
or other reptiles that maybe this could be--
I'm not gonna get any work done, guys.
I'm gonna be playing with this all day.
(slapping)
- That's domestic abuse (laughing)
- [Host] And it's on camera.
- We got, ooh, this is a girl, she laid?
- Yeah, so this is one of our Dracula-line ones
from Tiki's Geckos.
- [Host] She is so pretty.
Oh my gosh, that Tiki (stutters)
That Tiki's Dracula line and Deadpool line is amazing.
Of course we're still waiting on Deadpool.
So, excited that we have some more eggs from this guy.
So, let's see what we've got.
Hope they're fertile.
They look good, huh?
Or well, what do you think?
- [Female Handler] They don't look as good as her first one,
but this one looks like it's fertile.
Like, you can kinda see the pink in there.
- [Host] Okay, yeah, the other one looks a little bit goofy.
- [Female Handler] These are her first eggs
and they look a little bit more calcified.
- [Host] Those look really good, yeah.
- I'll set 'em in here anyway
and we'll see what happens with 'em.
It's her first year, so this sometimes happens
where they won't all be good.
- Well hopefully, we'll see what happens.
The first two look really good.
Again, unbelievable, that red line is amazing.
Got some really good stuff coming up.
Deadpool hopefully will be soon.
Fingers crossed, that's the one I'm gonna freak out about.
- I know, I feel like she's teasing us.
She'll sit in her box and then not lay.
- [Host] Well hopefully, we'll keep you guys posted.
More gecko eggs, right?
- Yeah, so these are our, these are Cave Geckos,
but they're a different locality
than the common kind that we carry.
I don't know how to say their scientific name,
it's really long.
This is the female. - Is she smaller?
- [Female Handler] Yeah, they're a little bit smaller.
I got the male in here too.
- [Host] Yeah, and they don't have all that orange in them.
They're more reticulated.
They're like a real busy pattern.
- [Female Handler] Yeah, they're a little bit lighter
in the color,
and then their eyes are a little more orange-y than red.
- [Host] They're really cool, I like 'em a lot.
So, are these the first eggs we've got or?
- Last year we produced some.
This'll be our first eggs this year though.
- [Host] Okay, cool, awesome.
Let's hope that they're good!
There's one, there's one right there.
- [Female Handler] These are huge for her, aren't they?
- [Host] They look monstrous for that little girl.
Look at how small she is.
That is amazing.
Oh my God, that is so cool.
And they look really fertile, really good.
- Yeah, these ones look perfect.
That's exciting.
- [Host] That's super exciting.
Say "Irish wristwatch" - Okay.
- [Host] Five times fast.
- Irish wristwatch, Irish wristwatch,
Irish wish, Irish wristwatch, Iris wristwatch,
Iris wristwatch, I can't do it.
Irish wristwatch, Irish wrish-watch, Irish,
Irish wristwatch. - [Host] You ready?
- Yeah.
- [Host] Irish wristwatch, Irish wristwatch,
Irish wristwatch, Irish wristwatch,
Irish wristwatch. - Wow, that's good!
I think it's my lisdexia, get it?
- I'm definitely having a good time with my new toy.
(heavy bass music)
And it's pretty cool just walking around with
this blacklight looking at all of the baby ball pythons.
There are some pretty amazing things.
Take a look at this right here.
This is actually the banana super chocolate.
Oh my gosh, I thought this thing was purple
and beautiful in normal light.
You get the blacklight and oh doggy, that thing is gorgeous.
And then this one here is actually a banana
NG cinni-instripe.
That thing is ridiculous.
I told ya, I could just sit here all day
looking at these colors on these animals.
And actually, with white snakes
sometimes you can see patterns that you won't be able to see
without a blacklight.
This is the pastel-camo banana ball python.
You can start to see even a couple little black frecks
starting to come out right there.
With the banana gene you get that black freckling,
but you can't see it with the light on.
And then of course that camo pattern
completely comes out under the blacklight.
Whereas the lights are on and you can really
not even see pattern on this one.
This one, if we had a blacklight,
this would be the Barney ball python.
Let's take a look at what a blacklight will do
to an albino black pastel (laughs)
Oh, doggy, are you kidding me right now?
That snakes is crazy!
Oh my gosh.
That blew me away, that is absolutely ridiculous.
Hope you guys know by now that we started a Podcast called
Checking In, tonight, actually five o'clock-ish
Eastern Standard Time.
We're gonna have Max Strong on.
Guy that's really cool with a bunch of animals
like lions and all kinda stuff.
We're gonna talk to him about that.
Of course, Laurie and Noah will be with me too
so again, check out the link in the description.
I'll pin a comment.
Join us tonight live for probably an hour,
maybe even two hours who knows?
I don't know.
Podcast please subscribe over there as well,
we really appreciate it.
I'll see ya there.
Laurie...
How are you?
- Fine, why?
- [Host] How's your mood?
- (exhales sharply) I don't know, tired.
- [Host] Is this a good time to talk or no?
- Probably not if you want something.
- [Host] Well, I want at least to talk to something.
Will you at least be level-headed if I ask you something?
Or is this just terrible time?
- [Exhales Sharply] I don't know.
Do I need wine?
- [Host] Yeah, should we talk after work?
(Laurie laughing)
I've got an idea and an animal for the new Reptarium
that I really would like to do--
- No sloth.
- [Host] Nope, no, no sloth.
It's a reptile, it's a Reptarium.
- It's a Reptarium? (laughs)
- [Host] It is a reptile
and I think that you probably won't be supportive,
but will you listen to me and hear me out?
- Is it another retic?
- [Host] Will you listen and hear me out?
- No (laughing) I will not listen
if it's another reticulated python.
- [Host] So it's not just a normal,
another reticulated Python. - Of course not.
- [Host] No, so listen to me, listen.
You know, people like big snakes
and when they come in it's very wow-ing for people
to have big snakes, okay?
Now, obviously we have some really nice.
We've got Perdita, we got some other things like that.
But we don't have a big retic that's nice.
A big retic, a nice big retic, right?
We've got Lucy, which is awesome,
but no one can play with her.
And obviously Daisy isn't great about handling
and stuff like that because she just hates to be handled.
So, I've got a friend that has a really large retic
and I think it would be a really good addition
to the Reptarium.
Now listen, this is what I'm saying,
it's bigger than Lucy.
Larger than Lucy, it's just a pretty,
it's called a Blonde.
It's a pretty normal-ish looking retic,
but light a lighter.
But like it's 21 foot and over 200 pounds.
- That doesn't make any sense,
that's not an animal you could even bring out anyways.
It's too big.
- [Host] No you could bring it out!
- Okay so four, five, seven people at a time
would bring it out?
- [Host] No, like two people could bring it out
and then people could be around it.
It would be really cool.
I just think that it would be a show-stopper
and something that would be nice to add to the Reptarium.
Will you consider it?
- Where's that gonna go?
- [Host] So this is what I was thinking.
I was gonna probably move Sunrise to the new place
because she's got a really large enclosure
right now and we got some large enclosures
so that way we can draw people to the new section.
So we could kinda dissipate.
And then we have that large enclosure
that's almost the size of Lucy's enclosure
that we could put this big snake in.
And it would be easy access.
It would be right next to Lucy,
it would be really easy to access it.
It's lower on the lower level
and it's just a huge snake.
You don't have to give me an answer,
just think about it, okay?
- Okay. - [Host] Are we okay?
So the answer's not no yet, right?
- Yeah, I'm not saying anything (laughs).
- [Host] All right, so I just wanted to bring it up to you.
We'll talk more later.
All right? - Okay.
- [Host] We'll have some wine first.
- Mmmhmm. - [Host] Okay, sorry.
Thank you, bye.
If that albino black pastel looked crazy,
this is actually a candino that already has a lot of purple
so let's see what has--
Oh, interesting enough the purple kinda turns
white-ish looking.
This one was underwhelming
whereas the other one was overwhelming.
I really thought that the purple in these guys
would super pop.
Weirdly enough, it kinda turns more of a white-ish color,
but, still, none the less, beautiful patterns.
The albino's definitely pop with the blacklight.
I mentioned earlier that the leucistics under blacklight
you could actually see some pattern to it.
Now you can certainly see this is a pure white snake
but look at all of that freckling that's happening there.
That means there's some other mutations in this.
This isn't just a super fire.
This is a super fire and something else.
Looks like it might even be a pewter,
like a pastel and a cinnamon.
You can see that pattern makes it really cool.
Then look at that dot right there on the side.
Really interesting how, again, under blacklight
these guys can just shine
and you can see right through to the pattern.
Then here's another blue-eyed Lucy.
Look at that, oh my gosh.
There is a lot of pattern on that.
There's dorsal kind of dotting, dashing.
Then these white splotches in it.
No idea what the mutation is here,
but certainly there's something else beside
just blue-eyed leucistic,
because that's got a tremendous amount of color.
And that's the thing, if you ever have a blue-eyed Lucy
and you want to know if there's other genetics
often times you could just take a blacklight
like this and see.
So, let's say you had a blue-eyed leucitic pinstripe,
you could see the pinstripe pattern and you'd know.
In this case, not sure exactly what the mutation is,
but certainly something else is goin' on here.
- Tell you what, you probably saved a bunch of money
not getting them at Disney Land, right?
- [Laurie] They don't sell 'em anymore.
- Really, what?!
- No, I guess most cars don't come with antennas.
- Oh yeah, that's true.
- [Host] Yeah, 'cause it's not the '40s anymore.
- Yeah, 1930s (men laughing)
- And Dory, Guy lost her in the carwash last week.
- [Men Together] No!
- Maybe she went back down the drain
and is in the ocean again.
- She was ready to retire.
She was missin' an eye, it was really rough, so.
- I'm sure, that's awesome.
I wanna go to Disney World.
- I've literally been down here for hours.
I think I've looked at every single snake
in all these racks
just kinda playing with this, it's crazy.
This is a pastel vanilla bamboo womma.
And look at the colors coming through on that thing.
Again, I'm kinda surprised.
There's been some animals that I've looked at
that I thought were gonna be really cool
that I was a little disappointed.
And then other animals like this that are unbelievable.
I mean just all the pattern and contrast that you don't see
under normal light.
Again, eventually I'm gonna have to get some
work done today, guys.
But, I'm having a blast down here.
I'm gonna try this actually is a candino
that has a little bit more purple coming through already.
Oh my gosh, yeah.
That's a lot different than that first one
that just kinda turned white, isn't it?
Wow and look at that head pattern on it too.
Oh my gosh, that is crazy.
Now that is a purple snake right there.
That is what I was expecting with the first one we did,
but it just kinda turned white.
Whereas this one is unbelievably purple.
Oh my gosh.
If I could just make a snake
that looked like this all the time.
Back to another blue-eyed Lucy.
This is a super russo, so I'm anxious to see--
Oh my gosh!
I was really anxious to see what the pattern is
and there's a lot of it with these super ruossos.
Again, this is a pure white snake under a normal light.
It's just crazy that when you just have a different spectrum
how it can change to see all of that pattern in it.
Wow, I'm blown away.
I'm havin' a blast, man.
All right guys, I definitely do have to get back to work,
but this was so much fun.
I don't know who sent this,
I think it was the guys from Nerd,
so thank you if you guys did.
And if it wasn't, whoever did, this is the best gift ever.
If you ever have someone on your gift list
and you wanna get something for 'em
a blacklight like this will keep them occupied forever.
So, OK, I gotta get back to work.
Let me know what you guys think.
Some crazy stuff with that blacklight.
If you enjoyed this video can you Subscribe to the Podcast
channel right over here?
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of videos if you so choose.
Over here you can hit that Subscribe button.
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Remember to have a wonderful day
and be kind to someone.
I promise I'll see you guys tomorrow.