- Made an exception to the amount of the people
we are supposed to rule.
- What does that mean, exception?
Look at this baby.
Oh.
(upbeat music)
Hey, good morning everybody.
Welcome to the Vlog.
And fall is definitely in full effect here in Michigan.
Lori and myself have a very busy day.
So we are just gonna take you along.
What do we have going on?
We have a tour.
- A tour, a long birthday party.
- Like a two-and-a-half hour birthday party.
- And the reptarium.
- And then open up at the reptarium.
So there's gonna be very little time
for anything but insanity.
So I figure we're just gonna take you on the entire journey.
Want to get goin'?
- Yes, we need to.
- Let's go.
So like I mentioned, it's gonna be full on today.
Lots and lots and lots to do
so it's gonna be a really fun day.
I live for days like today, for whatever reason.
I always like it when it's just packed.
Where it's like there is no way I'm gonna be able
to get all this done.
I think that's when I kind of do my best work.
So regardless, just checking around here.
Seeing what's going on.
For some reason these lights aren't on.
So that's the first thing I've gotta figure out.
Oh, you know.
Well, that's weird.
Oh, you know what?
It's because the time change
and we didn't change the clock.
Okay, that makes me feel better.
Whenever I come in and lights aren't on
I'm like, what's goin' on.
And of course, like always, I just go around.
See my girl Bella here.
Make sure everyone is okay.
First thing I have to do
is literally just walk around and see.
Abasuku's over here.
And it has shed on it.
I wish I could peel the shed off,
but Abasuku's not an animal that you can really touch.
If you try to pull that shed off,
you're probably gonna lose a finger or something like that.
But just kind of again, looking around.
Fetty Wap says hi.
Hi Fetty.
My frogs.
You know I'm gonna feed my frogs.
But we have about maybe a half an hour
before my first tour shows up.
I think they're coming from Traverse City.
It's an hour long tour.
And then I think that we have 15 minutes
until our birthday party.
And like Lori mentioned,
our birthday party is a two-and-a-half hour party.
There's a 45-minute presentation,
then there's a cake and ice cream type of thing,
and then it's hang out at the zoo for the rest of it.
And then we have only about 15-20 minutes
before we open up for the reptarium.
I have to also check out a lot of stuff over at BHB.
Like I mentioned, we have to come over to BHB
and make sure everything's okay here,
because hey these animals are just as important
as the reptarium.
They may not get the attention
that some of the other things do,
but these guys are absolutely amazing.
And every day we've got
to make sure everything is good with these guys.
Just take a look at this albino checkered garter snake.
Oh my gosh these things are so crazy.
We have a bunch of new ones that'll be up to breed next.
'Cause quite frankly a lot of our breeding Garter snakes
are 12-13 years old.
So they're getting to the end of their run unfortunately.
That doesn't mean that they're not gonna still be around,
but they're definitely slowing down a bunch.
Of course we have the Mexican black kings
that I always show you guys 'cause they're just so amazing.
But again, this is what I do.
I come in, I just kind of look through,
make sure that everything's okay here at BHB
before we get over to the reptarium.
And we are so glad that Eric and Mary are back tomorrow,
because it has been crazy here this last week
tryin' to get all their work done.
Quite frankly, I mean, Kelsey and Jessica
and everyone have worked so, so hard.
This is that lavender het for piebald that we got last week.
Oh my God, that snake is absolutely insane.
And of course speaking of insane to,
this is the actual lavender piebald,
or what they call a dreamsicle.
The snakes have settled in really well.
We do need to soak a few of 'em.
Again, we didn't want to do that right off the bat,
because hey you don't want to get 'em shipped in,
set 'em up, get all the stress goin' on,
and then stick 'em in water right away.
So there's just a few snakes
that have just a little bit of stuck shed on 'em.
This week we'll go ahead soak 'em up, get them going,
and then try to feed 'em for the first time.
Because we have a bunch of people
coming for the birthday party,
we have to bring the tables upstairs
so that we set the tables up
so that they can have cake and ice cream.
So I've got to get all
the tables and chairs from the basement and bring them up.
(upbeat music)
Okay, one job down.
Remember last time I told you that Ricco was in shed,
but he had calmed down
and he was back to his normal puppy dog self?
Definitely very energetic,
but not at all a biter once he's been back here at BHB.
So basically went around,
things look really good here at BHB.
We have our tour about to start any minute.
So let's head over to the reptarium.
So everything looks good enough here to.
Honestly, it was a really busy night last night
so there's a lot of smudges on the glass
that need to get gone over.
I mean it's amazing how one night can really change things.
I mean just finger marks everywhere.
You know who gets it more than anything is Bowser.
I mean his tank, I swear to God,
there's lip marks on his tank.
All kinds, so crazy.
So they actually get done when Andrea and Bruce get in,
but for now we just gotta get ready or this tour.
Get it in there.
Because again, it is gonna be an insane day today.
Tour, birthday party, reptarium.
Oh my God, it's gonna be awesome.
So my first family is here.
And you guys are from Traverse City.
- Yes, sir. - Yeah.
- [Brian] Which is awesome. Owen is here to have some fun.
You guys are all here to have fun.
So anything in particular you want to see first on?
- Perdida.
- Perdida, that's a good choice.
Let's go look at Perdida.
- Alright.
- Oh my gosh. - She is so pretty.
- So can please pet her?
- [Brian] Yeah, you can do whatever you want with her.
She's super, super docile.
- Wow look at you.
You are so strong.
You can tell how strong they are.
(upbeat music)
- So like Brian said,
what we're doing today is taking you along the day
of everything we have to do.
So there's a lot of behind the scenes things
that most people never would even realize go on.
And a lot of that stuff is what I take care of.
One of the things on my list today
is trying to come up with ideas and research
on some things that we are going to have
here at the reptarium for sale as well as on the website.
But we've got this beautiful display case right here,
that we love and looks beautiful,
but it's a little bit empty.
So I've got a few ideas.
So part of what's on my day
is doing a little bit of research
on what kind of cool things that we can have
that will be reptarium exclusive
that will be available for you guys.
Again, like I said, sometimes there's a lot of little jobs
that need to be done that aren't glamorous or ever seen.
But whenever those things are around,
those are the things that I have to take care of.
(upbeat music)
While I have the camera,
I just figured that I would share something with you
that I personally love.
There's a lot of things here at the reptarium
that I am getting a lot of enjoyment out of.
And one of these is Bowser's tank.
I tell you what, I love the fact that we have this glass
and that we can see him all the time.
And when he comes out, like he is right now,
I just love seein' his cute little face.
And I know a lot of people who come
and visit here love that to.
But, like I said,
that was just one of the little things here
that makes my day and I thought I'd share it with you guys.
Elvis getting his daily walk.
(upbeat music)
- I gave it a shot.
- Are you done?
Like it's someone else's turn. - Oh, no, no.
- It's so, it's calming almost.
- It is.
- Well you know what's really funny?
There's places now popping up all over the place,
including, the first one I think was in New York
and now they're kind of popping up,
where they actually charge for snake massages.
Where they actually put snakes on you and
- Oh yeah?
in fact that they kind of move like that
Alright, just wrapping up the tour.
I hope you guys had a good time.
Did you have a good time, Owen?
- Yeah.
- Awesome. - Absolutely, I loved it.
- Crazy good time.
- [Brian] Thank you guys so much for coming to visit us.
- Thank you.
- [Brian] Definitely come back and see me sometime.
- We'll do.
- [Brian] And we'll come see you sometime, alright?
- Absolutely. - Absolutely.
- [Brian] Okay, we'll see you guys.
You have a great day - Alright, thank you.
- Thank you, Brian.
- Awesome time on that tour for sure.
Next up, we have this big birthday party.
It's a two-and-a-half hour birthday party.
So it's gonna be so much fun.
I have to give a 45-minute presentation
teaching the kids about reptiles.
And then we're gonna do some cake and ice cream.
And then they get to run up the reptile zoo.
We'll be pullin' animals out, havin' a great time.
So again, just one more big thing on the plate today,
but it's gonna be absolutely awesome.
Literally have five minutes
before the birthday party starts.
And you guys know that Lori
pretty much does all of the heavy lifting
when it comes to things around here.
So she's setting up the birthday party.
I kind of have an idea of what's goin' on,
but I always just wing everything.
In the meantime,
I just figured I'd pop over to BHB,
take a look at a few things to get myself in that mood
of let's go have some fun with some reptiles.
Look at this baby.
Oh, wow.
Look at this baby rhino rat snake.
Oh my God it is so adorable.
It's got the little snout.
And what's funny is that when they're babies,
that little rhino horn always goes straight up.
It straightens out straight forward.
Oh, look how crazy that little monkey is.
It's okay, buddy.
And of course as they get bigger they turn green.
But my gosh, I've never seen one act like that before.
That is so cute.
And it's really weird how things change over time.
This is actually a 50/50 high white California kingsnake.
We use to work with a ton of these
and then over the years we got into the more aberrant ones
that are really high white.
Almost like the high white banana type stuff.
And now we're getting back into the 50/50's,
because you just don't hardly ever see these guys anymore.
So we're raising up a small group of these ones.
We cannot wait for a couple years
to start producing these amazingly beautiful snakes again.
It's crazy how variable scaleless Texas rats can be.
I'm just looking through some of the ones
that are kind of getting well started right now.
Look at how beautiful that one is.
And again, they come in orange, yellows, reds,
all kinds of stuff.
This one is definitely got a really kind of cool,
unique color and pattern to it.
And that's what's so neat.
It seems like each one of these guys
is just completely different.
But okay, I've been kind of putting things off long enough.
I better get over to Lori and give some help
'cause this party is about to start.
Lori, did we get everything set up?
People, I see people are starting to show up.
How many people are in this party, by the way?
- It's a lot.
I'm not gonna lie.
I made an exception to the
amount of the people we are supposed to rule.
- What does that mean exception?
- I don't know, we'll find out.
- Oh my.
This is the first I've heard of this.
You just throw me to the wolves here.
We're gonna have a good time.
- You're the the one who normally does this job.
- It is true.
- So don't even at like that.
I would normally just, bring as many people as you want.
- Exactly. - No, it's good.
- So we're all set to go?
- We are good to go.
- Alright, we're gonna have a good time.
Two and a half hours of fun.
So yeah, it will definitely be a big party.
But it's gonna be really fun.
I'm really looking forward to this,
'cause this is the first long birthday party
we've ever done.
And I think it's gonna be absolutely cool.
We're gonna learn a lot.
We're gonna have a lot of fun.
Even though we've got two and a half hours,
I'm gonna be honest with you,
I have a feeling that at the end of it
it's gonna feel like it wasn't long enough.
Because we have to do a presentation,
then we have all the presents and all that stuff,
and then of course hangin' out with the animals.
So I have a feeling that we're gonna
actually run out of time, if that sounds weird enough.
But it's gonna be so cool.
We're getting ready for the presentation.
Kids kind of coming up over here.
- Hello.
- What's goin'.
It's gonna be fun.
We're gonna have a good time.
So we just teach 'em about animals
for the next half hour, 45 minutes.
And then we do gifts and then they open up.
We'll just hang out with a bunch of animals.
It's gonna be happening.
- Kids are crazy.
(upbeat music)
- All snakes have scales
- Whoa. - What is that?
(loud talking kids)
(upbeat music)
- We're half way done with the two and a half hours.
I think it's went well, to be honest.
- It has, honestly.
Yeah, we're crushing this, but holy crap.
- There's a lot of people.
- A lot of people. - It's a big party.
- But it was fun.
The kids were really into it.
I hope they learned some stuff.
We still have, right now we have 'em.
Everyone's sitting down just doin' pizza
and then I think gifts
and then we'll still have some time
to take out animals and stuff.
'Cause they really wanted to hold stuff.
- It's goin' good.
- Yeah.
It's been fun, it's been fun.
It's definitely been good.
First time, again, first time that we've had the tables out
and pizza and stuff with it.
I think it worked out really well.
- Yeah.
- We'll wrap this up.
And then literally 15 minutes
after this is wrapped up we - Yeah.
- have to open up the reptarium.
So definitely gonna be a gong show day for sure.
(loud talking group)
- [Boy] You see, I have the yum in my tum.
- [Boy] Yeah.
- [Group] Happy birthday to you.
(quiet mumbling)
(loud crosstalk)
- Just wrapped up the party.
Definitely chaotic, but really cool.
I mean everyone was really cool.
Everyone really had a good time.
We had a good time with them.
The kids were super passionate.
The parents seemed to really like it to.
- Yeah.
- So that was a win.
I mean it was our first kind of go with that.
- It was.
It was insane.
Now we know what to do and what not to do.
So we will take those tips and move forward.
- But I think everything went pretty smoothly.
- Oh no.
- I mean timing was good, everything was good.
So it was really good.
Speaking of timing,
we have 10 minutes before we open from the reptarium.
So the crew has been kicking butt
cleaning up, mopping, everything else.
10 minutes 'til we open up for the reptarium.
The continuation of this crazy day.
- How are ya? - Good.
- [Brian] Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome.
Hey how are ya guys? - Good.
- [Brian] Welcome, welcome.
How's it goin'?
- [Brian] Welcome.
- Hi. - Hi, how are you?
- Good how are you? - Welcome.
- [Brian] Hi, how are ya?
Welcome, welcome.
Tortoises are always a hit with the kids.
We had Speedy out a little bit ago.
He was runnin' around.
- Sam, get your fingers away.
He'll bite your fingers.
- And even tarantulas tonight seem to be a big hit.
Which is pretty cool.
Did you hold him?
- Yeah.
- Oh, you did.
How'd you like it?
So, so.
We always are gettin' people over their fear of spiders.
It's funny, people walk up
and they're always terrified
like no way that I'm gonna to do that.
And then they see a bunch of other people doin' it
they're like, alright I'll do it.
And it's always way better than they thought.
(upbeat music)
- So you came visited me
and I had her hold a bunch of really big, heavy snakes.
So now I figure I'd give you a break
and have you just hold a small one, Helen.
- It's light.
- [Brian] Well thank you for coming to visit me.
Are you having a good time?
- Yeah.
- Okay, cool.
Well thank you so much.
One of the things that's been interesting
about the reptarium, and this was really Lori's idea,
is that we give people the ability
to really buy BHB animals here.
We don't sell stuff at the reptarium,
but Lori was like, hey if we're gonna be here
we might as well do it, right?
- Yeah.
There's so many people that want to come and buy from BHB
and we're not open to the public.
So I figured this was a good way
to where if you wanted to come and pick something up
or go home with a souvenir.
(loud laughing)
Like these guys are.
- [Brian] So tell me, have you thought
you were gonna get an albino ball python right away
or was it just kind of when you're here
like, hey we should look at this?
- Yeah, like that.
- [Brian] Really, so you didn't even think about this.
This is like just an after thought?
- Yeah.
- [Brian] Oh my God, that is so awesome.
- It's an awesome souvenir.
It's a beautiful animal.
Yep.
- That's awesome.
So, yep this is a beautiful albino ball python.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
Let us know if you ever need any help with it, okay?
- Alright, thank you.
- Thank you so much.
One of the things I really love
is being able to share animals
that you wouldn't normally see at normal places, right.
And this 100 flower rat snake
is one of a great example here.
I just love being able to share that with people.
And you said you have a ball python, right?
How cool is that?
What do you think of this guy?
- I love him.
- [Brian] That's awesome.
- So today has been a very crazy, a very hectic day.
We still have a few hours to be open here at the reptarium.
But I'm not gonna lie, it's a lot of fun.
Having people come here and have such great experiences,
and loving reptiles really makes it all worth it.
So we're just gonna power through these last couple hours.
Hopefully have a restful night later tonight.
- So there it is guys.
Another day at reptarium wrapped up.
It was a good day.
A very busy day.
Thank you Lori for keeping my day extremely busy.
- Oh like I have anything to do with that.
- Yeah, you book everything.
You book every single thing.
But it was really good.
I appreciated that when they came.
It was really great tours, birthday parties.
The people that came in tonight were absolutely incredible.
For now I'm gonna go ahead and shut the Vlog down.
Do you have anything else, Lori?
- I'm ready to eat, go to bed.
- Okay.
So I hope you guys have an absolutely amazing day.
As always, your support means the world to me.
Truly, truly we do love you guys so much.
Do me a couple favors before we get outta here.
Can you.
- Smash that like button.
- Turn those post notifications on
so you know when we upload a video.
Make sure to comment down below.
Tell us something awesome about you guys.
I'm gonna have Lori comment back on this one.
So make sure you do it, okay?
- Okay.
- Be kind to someone today.
And I promise I will see you guys tomorrow.
(upbeat music)