- About a year ago
I started the unboxing reptile series
where people would send in their animals.
You get to see my first impressions of the animals
and you would see the animals.
And then they'd kind of just disappear off-camera.
They'd go into their newly set up enclosures
and I wouldn't really show them that much.
So I thought I could give you kind of a recap,
starting with episode one
on what actually happened to the animals
and my experience with having them.
So we can jump on in with the very first animal
that I unboxed.
This one is coming from Virginia
and there's one animal in here, it's a snake.
So I'm just gonna make sure I don't cut the snake
and I'm just gonna cut straight into the bag.
So this ball python's super warm,
because the heat pack fell on it, which is okay.
It feels like it's maybe 100 degrees right now,
which is definitely higher than you'd want.
At most, ideally they'd be like 95.
This was a ball python
and as you can see,
he had some really weird reactions to everything kind of.
He was just acting very bizarre
from when I first took them out of the bag.
It was very abnormal, I hadn't seen this before.
The only thing it's slightly resembled
is it didn't really look anything
like a neurological issue from a certain gene or morph.
The closest thing it resembled was inclusion body disease,
which is very deadly and very contagious,
but I never really hear of it in ball pythons.
So because I didn't know what it was,
I immediately separated him, put him somewhere else,
and just kept him away from all the other animals.
And then after the video, I got that other clip
of him on the floor just wriggling around like crazy
and I realized that it actually was not a disease
or an infection or anything.
I talked to the person that sent him.
He was perfectly fine before.
Of course, people can lie and say that,
oh yeah, he was fine, because people do that.
But this case was different.
They had pictures of them, they had a lot of info,
and they had had them for a long time.
And what I think actually caused this
is some sort of brain damage,
because the heat pack that he was boxed with
actually fell on him.
And the heat pack,
I think it gets about 115 degrees on the surface,
so that coming in direct contact with his head
for even just a few hours could have actually caused damage.
I think I mentioned this in the video, but I'm not sure.
He did not survive very long after unboxing him.
Ironically, the very first animal I unboxed in a video
did not survive.
He died so quickly there wasn't even time
to set up an appointment or anything,
but I was really just like,
okay, let's monitor them for a few days,
see if he improves.
He didn't eat or anything,
which this isn't too abnormal when they first come in.
But yeah, he just died randomly shortly after.
So this is the only time it's happened,
but it was actually a really bad start
with this ball python.
And here we are, he's ready to go.
This is a Russian tortoise.
Next up was the Russian tortoise.
He was quite the cutie.
I'll admit, I don't 100% know
which Russian tortoise this was,
but I'm pretty certain it's the one that's sold in August.
So he actually took quite a while to sell,
'cause I think the unboxing was in like November.
Russian tortoises don't have huge demand with us.
I think we also just had him for a while,
I hadn't actually listed him for a bit.
Gotta make sure he's healthy and normal and stuff.
And they're so easy to have around
that I don't mind them being here for awhile.
But he did eventually sell an August for $220.
Then in September,
because it was somebody that actually bought him locally,
we were able to do a local pickup.
Yeah, they just met us in between,
'cause they were like less than an hour away.
And they got to pick him up.
They actually thought that we had a storefront,
'cause they got to the address that we sent them
and they were like, where's Emerald Scales?
Where are you?
It was actually just a Target address,
'cause it's all just done out of my house.
So yeah, if we ever do local pickups,
it's just gonna be a general parking lot or something.
So don't get excited that you're gonna get to see
some pet store, there isn't one.
And I haven't really heard too much about him since,
'cause a lot of people just don't update us.
They'll ask us if they have questions
and they might send us an update picture.
He had a really cool four by two foot
handmade wooden kind of turtle table,
which are pretty common to do.
And as long as you can get the right lighting and heating
and that the humidity is fine in the room,
this works just fine for Russian tortoises
and the couple had done that.
He had a nice varied diet
and they completed everything that we ask from customers.
So last I heard he's doing well.
This next one is coming actually from North Carolina.
Let's see what, oh, it's a bearded dragon.
This is a female.
I think it's a normal bearded dragon.
Bearded dragons are an iffy one to sell,
because a lot of people see them as this easy, beginner,
simple animal that don't need too much.
That can have a super small enclosure
that you just throw some bugs to.
But this person was actually extremely well prepared.
They bought him on April 20th, 2020 for $140.
Beardies don't usually go for as much.
We do sell the adult beardies
for what some people say is expensive,
but it is kind of rare to find healthy,
adult bearded dragons,
'cause so many people do not raise them properly.
And those that do raise them properly
normally keep them their entire lives,
because basically all the other beardies
either die as juveniles, because they're cared for wrong,
and then the last few are rehomed to people like us.
He shipped to Kentucky,
which is actually pretty close, just like two states.
I don't know where Kentucky is.
One state over, two states over?
Somewhere just a couple hours away, I think.
And we actually had a ship day set up,
but we had to cancel it,
because Kentucky's weather
is just all over the place sometimes.
There are certain states that I hate shipping to.
Illinois is probably number one.
It's always so cold there and then it would be warm
and then immediately it just changes to freezing.
So Kentucky is sometimes like that as well,
but it is a bit easier.
Especially in the spring
it wasn't too difficult to find a day.
But yeah, this one was shipped the day after.
Again, this is one I haven't heard from the person
since sending off and saying that he arrived safe and sound.
And most of the time, that means that all went well.
Okay, so next up, this is one from someone named Jackie
who actually does not rehome animals to us,
but rehome animals for us.
We've got the animal here,
which we'll look at in a sec.
And you might not be surprised
why I'd took this leopard gecko of all,
because it's beautiful.
The next one that was sent in was actually requested by me
to be sent to us.
At the time I had a couple other people taking in animals
where if we were at max capacity,
which is basically just too many
for us to comfortably care for,
we'd start redirecting shipments to other locations.
And this leopard gecko went to one of those.
When they sent pictures to us to list on Emerald Scales,
because then they would basically ship it
from their location once it sold on Emerald Scales,
they sent pictures for me to list on
and I actually thought that she was a really pretty gecko
with a pretty cool looking morph.
And this was when we wanted to do some breeding projects,
so I actually had her send it down to us.
I just paid the shipping.
And we're like, yeah, we'll breed her
with some of the others,
'cause we have some really cool male leopard geckos here.
We literally just haven't done it yet.
It did not become a priority.
After getting her shipped down
so many more projects and things came up
that the time to actually invest into breeding the geckos
just was non-existent.
So she's still just chilling with us, doing just fine.
At this point, I don't even really wanna breed,
because I didn't realize after this
how many more animals would have to be rehomed.
So not a priority.
But for now she'll just hang with us.
So this is a species that we actually don't take in.
It's a red-eared, no, what is it?
Yeah, it's a red-eared slider.
(mumbling)
This is a big turtle.
Next up was a female red-eared slider.
She was actually free to basically buy,
because we can't charge for red-eared sliders.
They're invasive in North Carolina
and North Carolina just doesn't want
to encourage people to sell them,
because it increases the likelihood of more being released.
At least that's what they say and think.
I don't think that it affects anything at all.
You can easily find red-eared sliders
for sale all over the state.
It's illegal, but it's really not enforced at all.
But I generally try to,
generally, I shouldn't say generally,
but I try to follow the law the best I can
and there are tons of reptile regulations
and we do adhere to them as I'm pretty sure 100%.
So yeah, basically she just gets listed
and then the person pays shipping.
But the people sending them in pay a little bit,
so that it's not a complete loss on our part.
Her name was Cici.
She was raised as a baby
by somebody living in Manhattan, New York.
And he had trouble keeping her in his apartment,
because although the apartment was,
I assume, okay with it
or he just didn't tell them or something,
he was trying to start a human family
and the amount of space and time that she took up
just wasn't doable.
So he had a lot of trouble kind of sending her to us.
Originally she was actually gonna go
to the Dominican Republic,
because he had a family member that lived there
willing to take her.
But he said that he couldn't, again,
due to more regulations.
International shipping is very difficult with living things,
so understandable.
And so he decided to send her to us.
So she's one of the cases
where people either A, think that because she's free,
we won't care where she's going,
or because she's free, the care doesn't matter as much.
I guess that's the logic some people follow it.
So originally, she sold in February on the 13th
to somebody in Michigan
and they also bought a rainbow boa.
They had this really gross 55 gallon enclosure.
She was big, you saw how large she was.
She needed at least like 100 plus gallons and a 55,
even if it did look good, wasn't gonna cut it.
But it was just this grungy looking thing.
It wasn't great.
The boa set-up wasn't great either.
So we ended up canceling this order and just declining.
They were kind of upset,
but I'm used to it at this point.
So she was relisted on the site
and then she sold February 22nd,
just a few days later to somebody in Massachusetts.
This person literally just said,
how much space does she need?
I just bought her.
And I told them how much space.
And they were like, okay, just refund me, I can't do that.
And so she was listed on the site once again.
The third time she sold was a month later,
March 30th, to somebody in Georgia.
And they just never replied.
You place an order, you get a confirmation.
We then say, complete your Emerald Scales order.
When you get that, you send a picture of the enclosure
and the diet and info.
They never responded.
So after two weeks it just auto-canceled
and she was listed again.
Finally, April 16th,
this person actually bought three turtles
and they lived in North Carolina, just a few hours away.
In addition to the three aquatic sliders,
they also bought a snapping turtle.
They had separate setups for everything
and everything was actually up to par.
She got 100, a little over 100 gallon tub set-up
in their backyard,
which as long as it's properly set up,
North Carolina perfectly works for outdoor slider setups,
so that was good to see.
And they were actually good to go.
Even though they were in NC,
we shipped because it was a bit too far.
It's still overnight shipping
and everything arrived safe and sound.
And finally, this really big,
the biggest actually red-eared slider
I've seen in-person found a home after four tries.
The last box we have is coming from California.
And oh god, it's a little bigger than I expected.
This is an Asian water monitor.
The next animal, the monitor.
I think it's an Asian, was it an Asian water monitor?
I think.
I don't know monitors crazy well,
other than Savannah monitors.
This is probably the most well-known animal
from the unboxings.
But, of course, it's the one that I can't find the order to.
Some orders, after a while they just get archived
and I have to dig them up
and I usually try to save them all.
But I literally just can't find this order.
So I don't remember specifically who or where it went to.
The thing about monitors is most of them
are very specific animals with very little demand for them.
Not many people actually want Asian water monitors.
However, those that do are really on top of things
and they usually sell quite quickly.
Yeah, usually these people are pretty well-prepared
and it's rare that we have to cancel or decline people,
because they really do know what they're getting into.
If you go to, say, a pet store
and you see someone buying one,
it's going to be this little, tiny, cute baby lizard
that they're just going to pick up for cheap.
But when they go on Emerald Scales
and they see it's bigger,
not necessarily an adult, but like sub-adult.
Yeah, they're normally more prepared.
So luckily, there's few issues there.
We've taken in three red tegus,
along with an Argentine black and white tegu,
which we have right now.
Hello.
It's a friendly one, look at that.
And then finally, the last animal in this video
was a red tegu, a very sweet one.
I definitely like red tegus.
Not something I'm looking for myself,
but they're very personable.
A lot of people say they're dog-like.
I don't really like dogs though,
so I kind of disagree,
'cause I like the more than dogs at least.
And she sold for $500 to somebody in Georgia.
It was an eight by four foot enclosure.
I think it was like a whole part of a room.
Like they kind of converted part of one of their bedrooms
into a tegu enclosure.
Some people literally just want to free-roam the animals,
which I don't accept.
But this one, they actually had a floor down with substrate
and the humidity was regulated and they were careful.
If you were to like, even in this room, say,
if I put something all over the floor
and put dirt in it and just sprayed it with water,
the humidity in the house,
normally houses you don't wanna go over 50% humidity,
'cause it can cause mold and other issues.
It can be finicky, but if you do it right
you can dedicate large parts of rooms to animals.
And that's what this person did with the red tegu.
I'm always very careful with these.
You really need someone
that's gonna dedicate tons of time to.
And normally I like selling the tegus to people
that don't have too many animals,
because you want them to be able to dedicate a lot of time.
We don't really normally ask like, what else do you have?
But if they were willing to dedicate a whole half a bedroom
to this one animal, that's a good sign
and I was very comfortable with them.
So that's the first seven animals that I ever unboxed
in a video and all their updates.
Although the very first one died,
the other six, I'm very happy with who they went to.
Some, obviously, it took a little while to sell.
Others went almost immediately,
as soon as they were posted on the site
and the very first person was prepared.
All these experiences since then,
'cause this is almost a year ago basically,
they have helped us improve a lot
and figure out how to make the site easier
and how to more quickly and efficiently verify people.
So it's been a great learning step
and it's only improved from here.
But it's a good start.
If you enjoyed this video,
I'd be happy to give you updates on the other animals
in the other unboxing videos,
so just let me know in the comments what you thought.
Not to mention helps the YouTube algorithm.
That'd be it for this video.
I'm Alex and thanks for watching.
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