Hey, good morning everybody?
And welcome to the vlog,
hope the start of a new day is absolutely incredible.
I have a ball,
I have some chicken,
I have some forceps,
You know what that means?
We're going to feed some big monitors.
What do you say We start with Elvis.
Come on, Elvis.
You guys know we feed big snakes all the time.
So I figured let's changed it up a little bit
We get Elvis out here.
Come on buddy,
Of course he is target trained.
Come on, buddy
Up here, up here, up here, up here.
Come on. Up, up, up, up.
Don't be lazy.
Don't be lazy. Up, up, up, up, up up
all the way up, all the way up.
There you go, buddy.
And you could see, he is definitely dialed in
when it comes to eating and following this baller out.
I'm gonna go ahead and get him down.
Oh, come on Elvis, let's go buddy.
Back off me, back off me.
Come on, come on, come on, come on.
There you go, buddy.
These target training is so much fun.
Again, it's enriching for them,
but it's also fun for us.
Because we can have him basically do just
about anything, right?
Like this, come on Elvis
chase, chase, chase.
Look (mumbles) come on, buddy.
He has eaten that little piece like
I want that little piece too.
Come on buddy, here you go.
Here you go. Here you go.
Good job buddy.
And the thing that's great
about this target training as well,
is that we put the blue ball away.
Now, we don't have any chicken.
I can go down
and I can actually just pet him like nothing.
He actually equates that blue ball to food.
So that way,
when we are open to the public
and someone accidentally goes
like this to pet him, they don't think that
their little fingers are chicken nuggets.
So it's a great way to kind of, again,
enrich the animals because we're training them.
We can get them to do all kinds
of things like climb most of us
and do all kinds of crazy stuff.
But at the same time,
we can break him of the food mode
because he realized if there isn't a blue ball,
there's not going to be food.
Elvis is absolutely wonderful.
Four years old, Asian water monitor.
These guys can leave up to 40 years.
So he's going to be around a long time.
You can see he sees a whole is a chicken stealer.
What an amazing animal.
So again, we feed giant snakes all the time.
I figured let's go ahead and just feed giant lizards today.
Come on Toothless
Let's go, come on, come on.
Come on crazy monkey, out of the cage.
There you go, buddy.
And of course toothless is just
like Elvis, an Asian water monitor,
but of course he is a black dragon.
Come on, buddy, up here, up here.
And he'll come right up my leg too.
Come on, come on buddy,
come on, come on, come on, come on
come on, come on, come on.
Keep coming, keeping coming (laughing)
And usually I can get Toothless
to come all the way up my body,
all the way to the top.
We'll see if we can get him to come.
How high can we get him to come today?
Come on, keep coming, baby.
Keep coming, keep coming, keep coming.
And one day he's going to be just as large as
Elvis is, and he's absolutely incredible.
Now we've had Toothless since he was just a little tiny guy
about a week and a half old.
So we've been able to really do even more training with him.
Of course, we got Elvis when he was about a year old.
So there was already some things
that we have to worry about.
With this guy,
you don't have to worry about taking the ball away.
You can literally pet him.
Watch this, I'll pet him,
and then I'll hand them a piece of meat right afterwards.
And then I can pet him again, just like this.
This animal is gonna be absolutely amazing.
He thinks my shirt is a piece of chicken.
He thinks that that little orange piece
is a piece of chicken.
Here we go, buddy.
There you go, there you go sweetheart.
And again, you can only imagine how
amazing this animal is going to be,
again, it's melanin stick which basically
is a recessive mutation that causes is it
to be solid black like this,
which is just absolutely incredible.
And when this guy gets five, six foot long
that is going to be one impressive lizard.
Again, I wouldn't call this a giant lizard right now,
because he's just a little guy,
but one day he is going to turn out to be amazing.
But again, unlike Elvis, you don't have to break him at all.
You can see,
I can literally pet him right on the face.
He doesn't care.
He never minds being pet,
he never minds anything.
He is an unbelievably habituated and socialized lizard.
And that's what you can do.
If you get these guys young enough
that is captive born.
Again, these guys are probably,
have two, have three generations,
maybe even have four generations out of the wild.
From (indistinct) but there's a bunch
of other people now producing these black dragons
and they are unbelievable.
I mean, definitely it's crazy
to think that this animal one day
is gonna be six foot,
and it's gonna be this docile
where I can just literally feed it
and then pet it like nothing.
What a cool animal.
And of course we talked
about Toothless being a melanin stick water monitor.
Of course, Aba Suku is a melanin stick Nile monitor.
Now, the difference is like I had been mentioning,
there's a lot of melanin stick water monitors
being produced right now.
Whereas on the Aba Suku is
the only melanin stick Nile monitor.
And I shouldn't say that 100%
because I did see a picture of a baby
I think two years ago that was in Africa,
but I haven't seen a picture since,
so it may be out there, but if it is,
I don't know where it is.
And look at this girl (laughing)
She is something else.
She is a monster too.
And interestingly enough, melanism
although this is the only one of the Nile monitors
what's interesting is there's an entire Island
in Indonesia that has melanin stick water monitors
and has come to think about it.
I think that melanism is the only kind
of recessive mutation that you can find in the wild
in several different species.
For instance, here Eastern garter snakes
there populations down, in Ohio
there are melanin stick jet black
which is interesting entire populations.
And looking at her, she is such a good animal.
I love that animal so much.
And there's even here in Michigan, there's black squirrels.
Interestingly enough, mammals.
When I was a kid, you'd see one or two black squirrels.
And that's it.
Now about 50% of the population
in this area are black squirrels.
So that melanin actually is a successful mutation.
Because it doesn't take away from anything.
They can still hide.
They can still blend in with things.
So they're not like albino are bright
and predators are going to pick them off.
But at the same time they absorb the sun
keep them a little warmer too.
So it actually works out good, but I tell you Aba suku
although she's extremely rare, she is an absolute ripper.
And with any luck next year Chicken Strip
will be big enough to breed her
and maybe we'll get some double heads (indistinct).
And it's certainly been a while since
we fed Argumus Prime for you guys.
And some people have even been asking...
Argumus come here, come here, Whoa, Whoa
slow it down, buddy.
Slow it down.
There it goes.
And a lot of people have been asking
like what happened to Argumus Prime?
Well, I tell you, I can tell you exactly what
happened, Argumus come here
monkey, monkey Argumus Prime.
The male Argus monitor turned into argus primus.
I don't know Mrs Argumus Prime.
Anyways, point is that argumus actually is a girl.
She started to lay some infertile eggs.
And so we kind of been leaving her alone to
be totally honest with you
but as you can see, she's absolutely wonderful.
I'm going to try to get her back in here cage.
Come on little monkey, come on
back up, back up, back up, back up.
She get so excited
that she is absolutely crazy, but yeah, that's right.
Mr. Argumus's Prime is now Mrs Argumus prime,
but as you can see doing very well.
It's just an absolute ripper.
I mean, again, that animal, when it starts to get food
it just goes absolutely ballistic.
So we now need to get a male Argus monitor
and hopefully we can breed her because again
she just started laying infertile eggs.
We're like, where are these eggs coming from?
At first we thought maybe we were feeding him eggs.
He was passing through his body
but then we realized pretty quickly, okay
he is a she and that's the way it goes.
So now Argumus's Prime is a girl
and is doing absolutely amazing.
And just as feisty as ever.
Of course, we've got my boy Tazzy here now.
Interesting enough Taz has been
off of food for the last few weeks.
So we're going to see
if we can't just get him to eat without even targeting him.
And we'll see what's going on.
See if he wants any interest in food at all.
Any interest there buddy?
You want some food baby?
Doesn't seem to have very much interest.
I mean, he's kind of just going around looking through it.
Now you may ask yourself, you know
that sounds like a bad thing?
That all of a sudden Taz isn't eating.
You can see.
He certainly looks nice and plump big old fat tail
all that type of stuff.
I'm not really concerned about it.
So what happens is that certain lizards in particular
Argentines blue tegu come
from a relatively cool area.
Argentina is actually cool in the winter time.
So these guys will go
into a brumation same thing happened last year.
Tazzy didn't eat basically from maybe middle
of December all the way till almost the end of February.
We're going to continue to offer him food.
But it's nothing to really be concerned about
to be totally honest with you.
I'd love to see him eat.
We try to give them treats.
Sometimes he'll try like different things
bugs and eggs and all kinds of stuff.
The stuff that he really loved.
But the fact is he's probably just
in brumation mode and that's very common
for them to be totally honest with you.
So hey, Taz didn't eat today, but again
that's just the way it goes
and I'm not worried about, he still looks great.
He looks healthy.
And for now he's just a lazy bum.
Of course we've got Beetle Juice, the lace monitor.
And we don't do targeting with this animal right now
because all we're really trying to do is they get used
to us with getting fed.
So that it actually likes us
here, here, go buddy, there it is.
And you could see absolutely turned
on like you can't believe.
And again, I just want Beetle Juice to kind of be friendly.
And so what we're trying to do is continue to
build the trust.
It's coming a long, long way.
And again, it comes right up
to the front of the glass like you're seeing right now.
Whereas typically it was like afraid of us in the beginning
it would run away, run up top of the tree, stuff like that.
And we can actually even get this to come
out on our arms to eat.
But right now I'm just going to kind of build that trust
of actually feeding, getting a nice good meal
into and... You see is just a beastly that's for sure.
Now I'm going to try to go and just give them a little bit
of a rub right on his chin, just to see like that.
And you can see he's, you know, he's getting there
but he also is like, all right, I'm done.
You don't get food for me.
I'm going to go back.
But he didn't run away.
He just kind of moved away quickly.
Those are little threads
of things that we're building right towards the future.
I have no doubt that this guy is going to be just as calm
as Elvis one day and it's gotten so much better
in the kind of eight months that we'd had them already.
I can't wait till he becomes just one
of those amazing animal ambassadors that we can take out.
Cause I tell you what out of all the monitor lizards
Beetle Juice might be the most beautiful one we'd have.
All right so Flapjack, the black girl monitor.
I'm not going to lie to you.
I'm not going to take him out.
I'm going to actually just target him in the cage.
And we're going to slowly work on this kind of thing.
We're going to bring the target over.
See if he's come on their buddy, come on up here.
He comes, come on, buddy.
There he goes. There he goes.
You can see he's such a cute little dude again
after getting bit, I'm not going to lie to you.
I don't want to get bit again by this animal.
Now I know there's no doubt
that he is going to get really, really docile very shortly
but it's just a matter of like gaining that trust again.
You gotta remember baby monitors, you know, they're little
they have to have big attitudes to survive in that world.
And it's just like a lot of things like
burmese pythons when they hatch out, they're super aggro.
And then as they get bigger, they become very, very docile.
And it's just because that baby mentality
that's how they survive.
They survive when they have that kind of big attitude.
And think, see if he's going to take one more
there you go little buddy.
I think that that's going to be about it for him.
But I think when he gets about, you know, six to
eight months old, we're going to really be able to
start handling him.
And when he's in a big adult, it's going to be so
absolutely incredible.
And it is funny because we had them out the other day
and he started to smell like maple syrup.
I mean already, even at this size, it's so crazy.
So he's doing really well.
I'm going to stay away from Flap because like I said
that was six hours of me feeling really horrible.
So I'm going to try not to do that again.
But in the meantime, I'm just going to keep them fed
keep them growing.
And as he grows, he'll mellow out
- A little bit of an update with baby Kush.
when we actually get to start feeding him
because he's a look, a little hungry right now.
You're actually noticing a lot more calmness
to him right now.
And this is a big part of what I was hoping to work
with a lot with him, especially because we do want to get it
to a point where at least we can have somebody to
potentially feed him without there being him going
after your hand and rather him go after the ball.
So that does make it actually really, really cool
that he's so calm right now.
And then it does have a lot to do
as we're making sure we're feeding him well,
but not too much.
- Well, it's not lizard, but
I have a few pieces of chicken left and these little
alligators are the cutest little monkeys in the world.
They're ready for some food.
You ready?
Come on buddy.
Oh my God.
They're so cute.
Come on guys.
there you go.
One last piece.
Who's going to get it.
Ah, you're going to get it.
Oh my gosh.
They kill me.
They are the cutest thing in the world.
Now I'm in lizard feeding mode.
So we're going to go ahead and feed some cockroaches off
to a few things and already...
Nova! Relax.
Okay. Just eat one.
Just eat one.
Don't look at the bucket
Here, here buddy( laughing)
Oh my God.
See, I had made the mistake
of showing them the bucket and then he was just like
I just want that whole bucket of food.
You are such a monster.
I tell you what you are crazy.
I tell you there's no doubt
that a children's book should be written about Nova.
Look at this dude.
He's like the cookie monster, but he's the
the bug monster for sure.
C is for cockroach,
It's good enough for me.
C is for cockroach,
It's good enough for me.
Cockroach, cockroach, cockroach, start with C
that's so horrible.
Okay. Stop that.
Cut that out(laughing)
- ( instinct)
- Nah, not if I have her
I have her enticed with mesmerized by...
- Your singing?(laughing)
- Yeah my singing
My separate Sesame street, rendition,
hey listen I grew up on Sesame street man.
- Did you? I feel like that...
- Oh my gosh!
- How old were you when you were watching that, 35?
- I was 25. Sesame street was around
a long time ago when I was a kid.
They were around it.
- Wasn't really?
- Oh my gosh.
Yeah. When I was a kid on Saturday...
- I didn't know that. I though Sesame street was my gen.
I though you were 47 like ( indistinct)look at that
Sesame street. (laughing)
- All right. Let's feed little Lilith here.
Come on, Lilith
You want some food?
There you go, girl.
There you go.
Come on, come on Silly,
eat it, eat it silly.
It's a weird one,
of course we separated Lilith bound
from Nova just for a little while to beef her up.
Cause I'll be honest with you.
Nova wouldn't leave her alone.
He wanted to breed her like crazy.
So I think I'm going to do.
I'm just going to throw some cockroaches in here.
she's not taking them off the tongs
like I hoped she would, but she's definitely going to eat.
She's getting really beefy now.
Which means she's going to be
in great shape for breeding season.
That starts here just in about a month and a half.
We'll put them back together and then we'll hopefully
get the first clutch is about six to eight weeks later.
So with any luck this year, if we're managing it properly
like separating her out, beefing her up
breeding her at the right time.
Hopefully we can get two
or three clutches this year and save them all.
Hatch them all be really, really cool.
there she goes.
She see in the cockroaches down there, she's just like
I don't know what to do with them.
There she is.
There she goes.
Some animals just don't like to take things off a tong.
She just wants them in there, which is completely fine.
Throw a few and never get her beefed up.
She's looking good.
What year did Sesame street start?
Let's see.
What year did Sesame street? 1966.
- What? Was it the same characters or
have like other people in it?
- Yeah, they were dinosaur big bird,
- I though its the same (indistinct)
- No its the same character 1966.
So see, I wasn't even born when they started, so there
screw you youngsters.
- Youngsters?
- All right. Let's see if Karma real quick.
Karma is such a weird animal the way it's like
for some reason, the stickiness on his tongue isn't good.
So you have to literally like go back.
You got to wait for it to strike
and then go back into its mouth with the food.
It's just the most bizarre thing.
When Karma was younger
he used to nail them like no problem at all
but now weirdly enough, it's just done that.
It was just really goofy.
So we just have to baby it, which is completely fine.
It's a beautiful, beautiful animal.
Loving to change up today.
Feeding lizards instead of snakes.
That's for sure.
We'll give karma one or two more
and then we'll wrap it up for the day.
And I know you guys have grown a cost
of me feeding giant snakes like Ivy here
which by the way is doing really well.
She's deep in shed.
That shed cycle should help her get completely good.
I haven't seen any bubbles or anything.
I'm so, so thankful.
Thank you guys
for all your positive thoughts and energy on that.
If you enjoyed this video, do me a favor.
Here is a playlist
of feeding that you could watch forever.
Watch one, two of them.
It helps my channel a tremendous amount.
I appreciate it.
Up here you can subscribe to my podcast channel on this side
we are getting close to that 3 million mark.
Please hit the subscribe button to this vlog channel.
Turn your post notifications on.
Have an absolutely wonderful day.
Remember be kind to somebody
and I promise I'll see you tomorrow.