Reptile Fight Club - Can People Get into Keeping Reptiles Through Venomous Snakes?

Episode Date: December 20, 2024

In this episode, Justin and Rob discuss if people can get into keeping reptiles through venomous snakes?Who will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!Follow Justin Julander @Australian Addiction Reptiles-http://www.australianaddiction.comIGFollow Rob @ https://www.instagram.com/highplainsherp/Follow MPR Network @FB: https://www.facebook.com/MoreliaPythonRadioIG: https://www.instagram.com/mpr_network/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtrEaKcyN8KvC3pqaiYc0RQSwag store: https://teespring.com/stores/mprnetworkPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/moreliapythonradio

Welcome to Reptile Fight Club. I'm Justin Julander, your host, and with me as always is Rob Stone. How you doing, man? I'm doing great. Excellent. Excellent. Yeah. Things are pretty good around here as well. And life's good. Heading out on a cruise next week. So that should be fun with the family. And I'll have to make sure to turn down the heat in the reptile room, but I think it's kind of cold out there already. So the winter is upon us here in the West. So I don't know about you, but it's getting cold around here. Yeah, absolutely. Not the best. I'm dreaming of herping and that's about all I can do is live vicariously through others that are out there doing that and warmer climates than mine. Uh,

yeah, but I, um, Jordan just texted me. He just got back from his trip and he sent, you know, 20 pictures over. I'm like, Oh man, he, he finished strong. He, I think he saw, uh, well, maybe we'll save it for, we'll get him on. Yeah. He can come and talk about it. But several, you know, many species of python. Wow. And, you know, a lot of cool other stuff.

So it should be cool to hear his recap of a pretty epic, huge trip across most of Australia. It started in South Australia and went, you know, kind of across the top end and over to the East Coast. So pretty impressive. Yeah, he's hardcore. He went with his whole family all that way. So it's pretty cool. So hopefully we can get him on here to talk about that sometime soon. Did they have to circle back or was it a point A to point B? I think it was point A to point B and they flew out of like Brisbane area maybe. I know one of the pictures he sent was of a southern angle head. So they're a little further down the coast than Cairns. So I know they were in Cairns for a bit.

And I know he's got family over there, like cousins that live in, I think, in Brisbane area. So, yeah. Cool. Yep. That's a pretty epic trip. I'm excited to get some of his stories recorded because pretty amazing story. At least a big one that I'm thinking of. But, you know, also finding some cool animals.

So looking forward to having him on. So hopefully he'll agree to come on. Right. Well, that's part of it. Yeah. You know, right. In the sense of,

um, for as much as he's done, I don't think he's been on any podcasts. Right. So, yeah. Right. I think,

I don't know if he's kind of laying low or he just doesn't like the limelight, but yeah, that guy's, yeah, he's the real deal when it comes to herping. So it'd be good to get him on here at least. And right. Get some of his input, especially on herping and some of those. to get him on here at least and get some of his input especially

on herping and some of those maybe i should reach out yeah yeah well um i don't know what else we breeding season's kind of in full swing i've seen some locks and some good signs so hopefully uh things are moving forward my womas are in their new caging and i think they seem to be enjoying that and i see some kind of naturalistic behaviors which is kind of cool i did some you know fake burrow types systems yeah i remember you mentioning that yeah and it seems like they're using them you know and kind of coming out to bask in the light that's just outside of the entrance of the burrow type thing so it's kind of fun And they've been locked up quite a few times. I don't know about the blackheads.

I see the female has been hiding a lot lately. She's not interested in food. So I wonder if she's grab it already. I bumped up their light. So she has more. I think last year I didn't give her enough heat after she had ovulated. And I think I didn't want to repeat that problem. So I turned on her lights a little bit more. I turn them down in the summer because it just gets

so hot, you know, if, if the lights are on all day. So I just come, have them come on in the morning and then in the evening and then, but in the spring and I guess middle of winter, I don't know, I'm going to give her a little more heat, but yeah. Interesting. So when you say more for duration or are you changing the bulb? Duration. Yeah. Just duration. So they can get, you know, up to kind of that. I think this time of year it's lower, like, you know, high eighties, maybe up to mid nineties or something right under the basking spot. But the male's been out out cruising around but i haven't seen the female much uh so she's kind of hanging out in the nest box a little more so i don't know if that's a good sign or not i mean she comes out in the morning to bask and then in the evening as

well so maybe it's which which ones are those or what's the background western blackheads i thought so originally from casey lasazzick's direct lineage, you know, from his breeder animals back. Ryan Young dug somebody up that had, you know, a pair that he purchased directly from Casey that, you know, were of a specific bloodline or whatever. And then Ryan was able to get some animals from him. And i got a pair from ryan so okay yeah interesting and the the babies i i moved them up to the next cage size and well a couple cage sizes above where they were and they're uh seem to be doing well they're growing um the little eye guys so it's right that's a couple years ago right yeah yeah last year's clutch i i mean i basically collected the eggs as she was

laying them but they were kind of weakly shelled and i don't know i think that's i think it was a heat issue they didn't she didn't have enough heat early on because she goes really early like she lays like in february or march so that means you know counting backwards she should be close to ovulation or ovulation around this time. So I guess I, that's what I figured how I messed up last year. It's always, I don't know, what can I screw up next? It seems, but what do you do? And then, uh, putting a few new pairs together this year. So we'll see how that goes. I some holdbacks uh stripe spotted pythons and some um granite spotted that i threw together as well so see if any of those yeah they were kind of a

disappointing surprise when the granites hatched because they were supposed to be pure cape yorks and they were not so i was kind of bummed out about that. And I haven't had much luck with Cape Yorks for a number of years. I think my pair is kind of done. So what do you do? Right. They have to pick some up again. So it used to be the Fantastic Four, but now how many? I know, right?

The set at this point? No, because I don't have the pygmy bandits and uh um i i taught a facebook friend uh she got imported some from europe like you know paid a couple hundred bucks for him brought him in from europe i'm like oh man i'm gonna have to give that a try just wait till she breeds them and you know because they're it's an adult I think, or some older animals at least. So I'm like, man, I didn't think she was going to be able to do it. It's like, oh, good luck. You know, I wish you the best.

And then thinking, oh, there's no way. And then she's like, hey, I just got my pygmy bandits for me. I'm like, what? Shoot. If I would have had more faith in, you know, put in an order for a couple, had her bring some more over while she was at it, you know, split the shipping costs. Because that seems to be the biggest challenge, getting them shipped over. So pleasant surprise. But yeah, so there's some in the country and that's encouraging. Yeah. So I saw Warren Booth posted some on the chat.

So he's got a pair from Nick, I'm sure. So I'm like, I guess I missed that. Yeah, yeah. He posted them this morning. So you'll have to check them out. They're really nice looking. So I'm like, well, I guess he's higher on the list. I did talk to Nick about them, to be fair, but I didn't want to pay the price he was asking.

So I was hoping to have something to trade that he'd want. Yeah. No dice? No dice. Yeah. Maybe down the road. I don't know. So, yeah.

But things seem to be progressing nicely in the herp room and hopefully have some good clutches this year and paired up some inlands as well and some jungles and so yeah we'll see what happens there's a little late last year right so hopefully it's the bounce back yeah yeah i don't want to go too hard though because that's i don't want to over correct and produce like a ton of stuff you know so and i also got some some more caging, so filling up some more gaps in the room. I've got a big gecko tank for the leaf-tailed geckos, and I need to move that into this room, my podcast room, because it's a lot cooler down here than it is in the herp room. And they're just not designed to be at ambient herp room temps like 80s. They're like a 70, 60 degree animal rather. Those are the, you know, the, I mean,

I found their cousins at like 50 degrees and they were out hunting and stuff. I'm like, this is insane. What a cool, tough gecko. So out in the middle of the winter, I could see my breath. And here I am in shorts and a t-shirt, you know, but as soon as I found one, I'm like, Oh, I'm much warmer. The blood pumping. Yeah. The adrenaline rush heated me up nicely. So cool stuff. Awesome. Well, um, how's your season going? Have you paired much up or are you? No, all my stuff is spring. till later spring on the front end so yeah

everything's good um i actually for the first time possibly certainly the first time in volume uh got some uh chicks and was feeding those out as sort of a differential thing i've done quail before otherwise it's mostly mice but yeah so that was interesting and um the funny bit on that, right, because for years and years, right, there was so much focus on, oh, if you feed them that, then they'll never go back or, you know, whatever. And just as kind of, you know, everything was my peak times to feed are kind of March, April, and then September, maybe the end of August through into the beginning of October or something like that. So for the most part, and then it's sort of very intermittent after that. Um, so I had ordered those and, uh, yeah, so I was like, Oh, feed out a bag of 25 and it's just sort of, so then I'm

putting two or three into some of these things in there. Uh, it was amazing how long it took them to take them. Um, because again, for the most part i'm you know everything is mice otherwise and so i think there's that's very streamlined compared to you know these wings and feet and all this stuff so it was taking longer than i was used to um and then you could tell that that felt heavy to them so they it sort of sat heavy for a day and you know it was funny that the next night again just sort of in the reptile behavior sense, the next night they were all out looking for something else. And that would include whether they had one, two or three. And then it was the night after that, that then they were all hidden away for like two or three nights.

So that the next night they're like, hey, let's give it another shot. And then after that, they were like, OK, let's go sit on the heat and try and work through what we got going. But then, you know, I just happened to have, I was like, oh, well, let me try these other mice and things. Maybe a week later. And every single one I offered took one. So that like, you know, the whole idea of if you feed them a chick, you know, or quail, they'll never eat. I haven't found that to be my experience at all. I think that's probably more an artifact of trying to feed them too frequently or feeding them too much so that they just don't have the drive to eat. And then sticking a mouse in their face and going, oh, no, I've screwed it up. Yeah, because they won't eat again.

And I know that Eric has talked about that as well, where he's like, yeah, I'm mixing in mysterads, quail, certainly. And this would have been you know he's been talking about this for several years at this point but it was like you know so i don't know if he was doing chicks or not or whatever but um i do think there is some utility to kind of stretching them out and so that was sort of the thought with these chicks is like yeah um a they're readily available right because they're really a functionally a byproduct of other industry of of human you know um and uh so i was like yeah let's give it a shot it says it's you know the the functional range of weight but you know the average weight uh um per chick in the bag was something like what would be a sort of weanling mouse through to like two adult mice you know two adult mice

and i was like okay so there's gonna be a real range here and just sort of picking which one to give which and whatever but uh yeah i don't know it was interesting kind of all around so i'm excited to keep keep trying it not as a consistent thing but as a yeah it's just a treat now and then or yeah something to throw in the mix it up a little yeah absolutely and i think i don't know the rat rats to me rats are super smart they definitely are are cool i've had them you know a pet rat and all those things as a kid and that sort of stuff but their hair is so coarse that to me even when you know we feed them at pro exotics and all or at the zoo or whatever they honestly

they feel kind of gross you know i don't know if it was just as you're manipulating them you're going like i can't imagine wanting to eat that you know they kind of go that greasy there's it's almost like their hair either holds or or accumulates more oil you know or their skin does i don't know to me they just it's something a feel to them even super clean you know i'm not talking about grody roaches or whatever but just i'm going well i guess nick nick ate him right at carpet fest but i look at it i'm like you know sure a mouse the chick seems more appealing a rat just doesn't seem super appealing to me yeah well and to be fair nick did peel the rat so it didn't have its skin cooked it on the barbecue it wasn't it wasn't uh you know he didn't oh natural yeah just take a take it down whole yeah you have to eat it like a snake yeah well thought warm it up a little

i'd say it's like a duck eats like a duck uh yeah so i don't yeah i don't know if you've if you've done that or if you yeah i mean heidi and i were breeding quail for a little while and and it was mostly eggs and i actually uh threw a couple eggs into the jungle carpet python enclosure and they ate them and i was like i did not expect that because it's a smaller egg. I mean, basically, you know, didn't even like fill up their mouth kind of thing. You know, they, but yeah, she, she ate it and, and swallowed it down. And I think I even like kind of tongue fed it, you know, and, and she just like gently took it and like knew what to do with it. So that was kind of cool.

Um, but, uh, I didn't have much more luck with eggs. You know, I thought, oh, cool, somebody took one. It's just like she's going to eat anything you put in front of her except a rat. She's a mouser, so she's perpetually hungry, it seems. But yeah, I think that one weird thing is I had some holdback jungles from her and the and the male and they're both mousers. Like they won't touch a rat even when they're extremely hungry, but I offered their offspring a rat and they took it without hesitation. And I was like, Whoa, this is, this is cool. You know, I,

I didn't expect that. And the other jungles I have, I got some from Jordan a while back and they're all rat feeders and everything. So, you know, the, I guess that's the kind of the thing that I worry if I fed them a mouse or a bird or something, then would they go back on rats? You know, do I want to risk it? But, you know, I, I'm sure it would be fine either way, but you know, So maybe the answer is it's,

But I think once they have, yeah, once they have rats, you know, I don't know. I just suggest that maybe the reason people have, obviously there's utility to feeding rats, right? A, it stretches them out. B, just in terms of market dynamics, it's, you know, more practical to feed one small or medium rat than it is to feed what's the equivalent weight in mice probably four or five adult mice and both from a practical purpose of price uh in terms of what that would cost and you know price and time right and even if you're drop feeding it's like if you're leaving multiple items often there's probably wastage there where they just don't necessarily work through the whole group or what you know so either your time or um actually losing some that aren't consumed so i don't know i was listening to something was it oh it was a podcast

um talking about feeding and they were talking about they they fed like much larger meals than people typically fed who was that anyway i want to say it was like uh will william philippac maybe it sounds vaguely familiar but yeah i i can't remember exactly who it was but they were talking about feeding larger food items and seeing you know some wild pythons that are eating you know and of course there's the you know the rock python eating an antelope and things like that you know but it can't get away it's more likely to be seen right because it can't hide in the same way that sure and maybe it was a specific group or something you know like but oh it was ball pythons because they're saying they feed theirs like meals that people would think would just be way too big but they were just fine they'd eat them and they'd

come back for more you know and and i i remember Ben Morrill, he did his PhD work with some of the records from TSK, from the Southerlands, and basically came to the conclusion that you can't feed a ball python too much. Like, they never reached the point where it was, like, to the, to them and the snake or whatever. So like, oh, they're fat or they're that guy. Yeah. They're, they're not, they're not productive anymore. Like you fed them too much or something, you know, that kind of thing. So it seems like, like, yeah, we, we would have to try really hard to overfeed a ball Python, especially in a large collection like that. So I don't know. It was really interesting really interesting but yeah i guess i'm not sure why i got onto that but yeah the whole size and and uh you know i i think too like some things we feed too much and some some snakes especially pythons i would think would be very a lot of pythons anyway, are very efficient, you know, and I think about Matt Somerville's, you know, two mice a year and they were full of fat bodies and just, you know, overweight for that species, but you know, that kind of thing. Yeah. I mean, I think the other part of that too,

though, right. Is that it has to be the system that works together. So I agree. I think maybe it was William that was talking about that. Obviously, if you're going to be feeding those big meals, you're going to, or you will run into issues if you're not really providing access to solid heat to promote the digestion. Otherwise, you're going to get the, you know, either it'll take longer or it won't be as efficient. Neither you're losing stuff on the front end or stuff's coming back up. So it has to be a whole approach, right? If you're keeping snakes in the Barker Phillip sort

of style, there's a reason you're going to tend to feed smaller and more, you know, either more frequently or not. Right. You know, smaller meals more frequently is because they don't have that extra thermal capacity to digest a giant meal that they're sitting on. Right. And then the whole, there was a paper that was published with different temperatures and meal sizes and things and looking at efficiency and that kind of thing. I think I want to say it was with Southwestern, it was with Imbricata, but I can't remember exactly. I know we put some quotes in the book. In the book?

Yeah. But I do remember, I it was gavin's research that showed or he maybe he mentioned this where on a podcast uh that if you feed greater than 20 percent of the snake's body weight then that's when the organs expand and you know all that changes occur but if the meal is less than 20% of the body weight, then that doesn't really push it into that phase. So kind of an interesting thought, you know, that smaller, more frequent meals may also have the benefit of not ramping up all the organs to change. And maybe, you know, it doesn't mess with them as much as like feeding multiple large meals in a row where they're kind of up and down and up and down with the size of their organs. So I don't know.

I thought that, that that's been kind of sitting on my back of my brain. Yeah. That's super interesting. I'm trying to think then in, in a non neonate context, if I ever offer an item that would be more than 20 of their mass i think the answer is no like yeah i'd be curious because i mean a big rat what are they like a couple hundred grams yeah and i mean you'd have to feed what a thousand gram python a 200 gram rodent 20 of its weight so that's a pretty substantial meal. That's a, you know, a pretty good size rat into a, not that huge of a snake. So picture like a three foot chondra that you're putting, but then again, people did that, right? They just don't stay that size for very long.

They grow much larger. Yeah. And you wonder too, like, like i mean you know thinking of of kind of that in the whole context of biology and uh you know big big males you know obviously some males want to be big but then at the same time you see reduced uh reproductive capacity and such yeah at least associated with obesity maybe not necessarily size like if you're a wiry but you're giant because you drink a lot and you can take down all the other rival males maybe you know i don't know there's a there's an advantage to that right at least in the context of you know species where male combat right now yeah so that was yeah that's interesting i know the boys were talking about that on uh well the men the guys were talking about that on uh um carpets and coffee

or no on their breeding episode i was just listening to that the other day oh yeah with with keith yeah i have those queued up i haven't listened to him yet i'm excited yeah yeah it's uh pretty good discussions and some interesting topics for sure. But in that same context, you know, the, the size and combating males, they were talking about combating males and if it, um, multiple males is a good thing. I, I, maybe we could cover something like that in the future, you know, having multiple males, um, so many ideas yeah exactly i mean obviously it's probably um the uh modus operandi for a lot of different species you know like the diamond bichons with the mating balls and things like that or or anacondas or i think you had some species that you're

yeah the solomon island tree bows did the same thing yeah where sort of one would work and then the next one as it got tired out, the next one would go. And where you might need that many males just to keep up with such a large female with more energy or capacity to get out of there and push them away. Exactly. Yeah, it was fascinating. Interesting. Okay, well, good things to think about anyway. Right? I don't know. It's always great to, to get together. It's always complex. It's like that's all these things suggest, well, I could see it being A or Z, you know, or anywhere in between.

Right. Yeah. Or both. All of the above, you know, can it work? And I think there was something not too terribly in the past where I saw like diamond pythons that had injured each other in the wild. Like there was a one male defending a female or something like that. And like some of the other males had like scar like bite marks from the male. And he was aggressively, you know, trying to fend off the other males from the male. He was aggressively trying to fend off the other males from the female. Obviously, that's not the normal for them. I could be getting this wrong. Maybe it was Coastals.

That would make a lot more sense. It seemed like it was, whoa, that doesn't fit. It was asynchronous rather than what you would expect. Yeah, because Coastals, you'd expect that. I think this was a diamond and it was defending females from other diamonds. Or it was at least an intergrade or something. Right. Well, that's what I was about to say.

I was like, where was this from? Exactly. Yeah, because if it was intergrades, maybe that fits and it's a little more of the the other side coming out yeah so i don't know yeah when when one parent's a pacifist and the other's a warmonger where does the child fall so that's interesting but yeah i um you know that nature is so dynamic and changing and, you know, like thinking about taxonomy and all those, I was listening to, um, the IPERS talk with Chris Applin on his podcast and, uh, and, uh, you know, they had some interesting topics that always, uh, I, I, I, a lot of times I'll get ideas for this podcast just by listening to

other people talk about things and, you know, I, a lot of times I'll get ideas for this podcast just by listening to other people talk about things and, you know, that, I guess that's kind of how this was born anyway, is like, um, people don't challenge things that are said, you know, like that, you know, let's, let's dive into that a little more kind of thing. So a lot of times I'll be yelling at my phone or something, ask them that, ask more about that or challenge them on that kind of thing. But I guess I heard, right. That's the, I think it's a little bit less so in, you know, our, for the most part, reptile podcasts are pretty accessible. Most people are pretty open to feedback and, and whatever, but you know, I know, uh, it's someone had compared the experience of listening to podcasts to being that of a ghost where you're listening to this and you're,

you're yelling into the void. You're saying, no no what about this so right at least this is our forum to to enunciate ourselves as ghosts exactly yeah for sure and maybe someday somebody will come up to us and go i recognize that voice i've been yelling at you all this time and you never hear me well it happened with owen on our first yeah exactly wait you're owen the owen mcguire here in our little establishment absolutely after he's gotten engaged right yeah that's funny. Oh, my goodness. All right. Well, we got another listener request, which is very appreciated because sometimes we are. Well, lately we've been very busy. So, you know, the podcasting day rolls around and we go, wait, today's podcasting day.

What do we got? You know, so we really appreciate, you know, your, your suggestions and, uh, happy to, to talk about whatever kind of topic you may, uh, like to hear about. So keep them coming. But this one's from, uh, an international listener from Eric. I believe it's, uh, Vakto, but if he's German, he lives in Germany. And so I would assume that's how he pronounces his name. But I'm no German expert, although I lived there for a little bit and speak some German. But he wanted us to talk about, and I should have given him the option to jump in. He messaged earlier this or pretty, pretty recently.

So I thought, Hey, we need a topic. Let's go with it. So I didn't give him the chance, but Eric, if you'd like to, uh, come back at some point and, and when we invariably fail to present all the arguments that are sort of circulating in his mind, then yeah, absolutely. We can circle back. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, that, that offer is open, although we, we kind of neglected to, uh, provide you that option this time around, maybe next time. Um, so, but thank you for, uh, writing in and letting us know what you'd like to hear about. So, um, the topic that was suggested is, is Venice venomous, keeping advanced reptile keeping and are venomous keepers advanced keepers? So I think, you know, this has, you know, a little bit, I guess we're not necessarily

venomous experts or keeping, we don't keep a lot of venomous. I've kept some in the past and I think you have as well. And he was, yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, we have some experience there. And I was definitely not an advanced keeper when I kept a couple rattlesnakes, which may not have been the best idea, but turned out to be okay. So, we may expand this to cover a little bit more broadly the topic rather than just focusing just on venomous keeping because of our lack of experience in that regard. But, uh, so hopefully we don't get in too much trouble with Eric. Um, so, but again, thank you for writing in and we'll, we'll do our best. So, um, I guess

that's the, uh, the fight topic for today is, uh, do you have to be, or should you be, I guess, uh, I guess the should or have to be a, uh, advanced keeper to be a venomous keeper, um, versus can you start out with venomous? Is that a, an option? Is that a possibility? So I think one side may be a little bit harder to defend, but let's flip a coin and see who gets to decide which side they defend. Tails. It is tails. It is tails. You have won this week.

What would you like to defend? So, yeah, as you say, so the one side seems, I think there's a clear to me there's one really compelling piece and then i'd love you know you to uh contrafactual what you put out so i will take the uh sure in at least one contingency that jumps to my mind okay and then there's a couple um couple kind of subsidiary points that I had in my mind. So sure, I'll try and defend, but I will check, yeah? Go ahead and get us kicked off. Okay, so which side?

I'm the – yes, the advanced keeper? Oh, it's a – okay. Yeah, yes, you should be an advanced keeper. Okay, before you keep enemies. I mean, yeah, that's kind of the obvious thing. Like, uh, if you are, have experience with other species, maybe especially the ones that bite frequently and you can avoid getting bitten and, you know, get some, uh, sense of working with animals and understanding their body language, um, you might, uh, you know, have, have a better shot at avoiding

those, the, the downside of keeping venomous, which would of course be a venomous bite. I think while, you know, each kind of group has their own body language and just because you're good with one doesn't necessarily mean you'll be good with another, which kind of, I guess, goes your side. Um, you could still have some experience working with snakes, handling snakes, uh, avoiding the pointy end and, you know, um, that, that sort of thing. But, um, and I, I think that's, I, I guess that's where I'll start, you know, is, is having experience with others may help you in regards to, so if you're an advanced keeper, you have a lot of experience with a lot of different species before you dive

into venomous, it's probably a reasonable and a wise idea. Right. Yeah. So there are a bunch of different, I suppose, qualifiers and things that had run through here. So I'll, um, toss those out kind of as we go, but the, I do think, you know, the, the contrafactual to the point that you had made as well, if you're not, um, you know, if you're gaining, uh, yes, you're gaining experience, but you might also be gaining negative practices, right? If you're, if you're used to corn snakes, even though you're, uh, maybe you're conceptually, you've applied this idea that, oh, it's actually a Cobra. It's not a corn snake, you know, um, or, you know, whatever the case may be, right. Whatever's in your mind as you're doing this, I'm going to engage with it in that way. If it isn't actually, then it's possible that you're developing habits that you

think are useful, but in reality, there's a subconscious pull of actually, you know, it's a corn snake. And so you're kind of gaining this repetitive skill, right? But that it's actually doesn't have the utility that you think that it does because it actually wouldn't work in that context. And then when you actually make the switch, right? When the, when the, the, the game is for real, right? Maybe, you know, in times you, you might not, that experience that you have, it'll, it'll help in the sense of, OK, I know the snake needs fresh water on this schedule feeding what, you know, obviously the ability to keep animals well is a skill that's accrued over time.

And experience is huge for that. I'm just saying that if you're it's possible. Right. And we even see it in the field sometimes where it's like, you think you're going to act one way and then you wind up acting a different way, right? When it's for real, that doesn't, your experience doesn't necessarily cleanly translate always in all situations. So I do think that's true. To me, the kind of fundamental point,

I think that I saw of saying when we were having this conversation, when would it make sense is when only that one thing will do, right? When fundamentally your goal is to keep that one thing. I don't think keeping a simulacra is probably even fair to the, you know, fair to the animals that you're doing it with, right? If you only, your only interest is in keeping whatever it is, you know, the thing that jumps out because it's so different and you sort of

hear people talk about it in this way would be like keeping a king cobra yeah which obviously is yeah that came to mind for me as well that's very you know we would traditionally that's very advanced right but there's there's really nothing that's that's an equivalent animal to that sure you could there are things that are closer to it but if the only thing that we'll do is you say, I want to have one king cobra, then I don't know that it really will be fair to the animals or fair to yourself if you're saying, well, I need to keep corn snakes for 10 years before I could try doing that. I don't know that that sense to me was theoretically someone could have exposure to, uh, train or training in interacting with venomous animals, but no exposure to keeping animals at home or no, maybe no exposure to keeping animals at all. Right. Maybe, uh, you know, I'm picturing like the Thai Red Cross snake shows or whatever. Right. So that's daily interaction with venomous snakes, but maybe you have someone who's only engaged in the handling and doesn't actually know,

hasn't kept a snake at home. In that context, I guess you would be an advanced, advanced in your capacity to interact with the animals, but a new person to keeping an animal in a box. So that, that was sort of the thing that has jumped out was like the construction where maybe it makes sense is someone where only that one thing will do. And it really isn't fair to the animal or to the person to say, no, no, you must put in all this time having these interactions that are not what you're seeking, even though as we all know, right. Be open-minded. Maybe, maybe that'll open a new window. And it turns out you love Sumatran short tail pythons and it's not just King Cobras or

whatever. I suppose that's conceivable, right right we need to be open to that possibility but assuming that's not the case you know maybe you could have someone who's a new keeper but has uh crude training so that it's not obviously the downside right when we're talking about either venomous animals large veranids as you highlighted um large constrictors in those contexts we're really talking about the risk both to the person interacting with it and to everyone around them right that's the and we've seen that unfortunately in terms of these venomous snake contexts where like okay a venomous snake that gets out and much less gets out of the person's you know room house whatever and into into the wild that that's incredibly dangerous and is for a good reason.

The reason people that don't like snakes will love to pass legislation saying you can't legally keep them. I mean, certainly in Colorado, we can't keep venomous snakes. Yeah, same here. Yeah. Interesting the law is written that way, at least at this point. And maybe we can get to – maybe that will crop up here at some point but uh you know it's super interesting because you know that that really is ammunition to that and i can understand why i don't think even even the most uh strong-hearted herper amongst us can't appreciate the fact that

it really is a public safety risk to have venomous snakes wandering around you know non-native particularly venomous snakes just wandering around the neighborhood yeah now i guess um you know we might define advanced keeper a little better because i don't necessarily think you know i think you've made a very strong point that keeping corn snakes is not going to prepare you for a king cobra unless you're gathering them for food down the road you know that might help but i think maybe when we say advanced keeper maybe we we mean more a responsible keeper you're willing to put forth the time to go train um with somebody who does have experience with venomous you have the funds to be able to afford you know the the type of caging that's required to have anti-venom on hand, um, and not just rely on some zoo to be charitable to you. Um, I think those

kind of come along with experience and with maturity in, in any reptile keeper, uh, you know, as you go along, maybe at some, in the beginning you either do an impulse buy or you're just so excited you want to get it and you don't do your research and you just buy it because you saw it and you liked it and you wanted it right now. You know, I think that's kind of what we look at as a beginner move. And then all of a sudden you read a few YouTube or watch a few YouTube videos and read a couple online articles. And now you're the expert and you're telling everybody what they're doing wrong. You know, obviously that is not an advanced keeper move. And so, you know, I think we could maybe define it better that way. If you're going to be delving into venomous, you do it the right way. You don't rush into it. You don't do it irresponsibly. And then, therefore, you're going to have more barriers in place to negative things happening. Now, obviously, you could be the best keeper in the world and still get a bite or still have issues.

But you're going to have those things in place that's going to minimize the damage or minimize that risk to your life. And I think in that regard, you're an advance keeper and you're going to, you know, and so I do think for sure in that regard, you should be an advance keeper, at least in, you know, in your brain. Yes, your intellect, your approach to it. Yes, exactly. Yeah, I've been lately. So I had a big backlog of her podcasts and it's that I've been working through. And it does seem like there's been a higher percentage than sort of what we maybe what we used to see or what I typically would consider people who got into reptiles later rather than sort of everyone says, I've been hearing it a lot and kind of framed as, Oh, mine isn't the traditional story. And that's sort of been the, you know, sort of common refrain at a higher, higher clip than I'm used to. Yeah. And there was one that was super interesting where, um, unfortunately I can't think of it or even trying to think of which show, yeah. Which, which show it was on or whatever.

I think it was the – oh, it will come to me. But it's the guy who – I'm supposed to go on there soon. It's the one with – he calls it a salamander cave. I think it was a guest on that show. It's not really good. I'll figure it out. So it's a newest show. It's not right there. I'll figure it out. So it's a newest show. He's from the Midwest.

And it was someone, I think it was some guy in the Midwest who said, he said, oh, I'm almost 60. And his son, they had gotten garter snakes. And next thing you know, he has these snakes himself. Was it the expert in the idiot? Is that the podcast? It could be. That wasn't the one I was thinking of. But it could have been on that channel for sure.

Because I do remember hearing that story. What I'm talking about, right? Yeah. And it was like – so I guess that's sort of what I'm imagining. So that sort of satisfies at least some of the criteria that you were laying out in terms of advanced, in terms of approach, resources approach. And if instead, rather than Pythons or Colubrids or whatever, his fixed idea was, you know, it needs to be a blue Insularis or it needs to be a King Cobra. It needs to be whatever, presuming that's legal. In his jurisdiction, it's like, if that's the only

thing that'll do, I guess I can, I can see that, you know, again, those seem so extreme, uh, even to me that, you know, I guess the easier thing would be a Gila monster. If a Gila monster was the only thing that they could do, I do think that is more accessible. And it actually, this, this whole conversation kind of recalls when Phil and, uh, Scott mentioning him again, um, we're on here and you, I think it was on here, right. And you guys were chatting through like, essentially are, can you learn how to keep venomous reptiles without keeping them or without handling, can you keep them without handling them? You know, can you shift cages or are you missing the experience? Yeah. And, uh And yeah, so I think it kind of all fits into that same conversation.

And I guess I could imagine a context, again, I think a king cobra is a whole another level of thing, you know, in the same way that a leopard gecko is not an iguana, is not a croc monitor. You know, that does seem like an extreme example, but something like a Gila monster does seem relatively achievable. I guess the key underpinning there is that does call to mind the Gila bite in the U.S. What, a year or two ago, where the fella had collapsed and wound up dying. The super interesting thing, speaking of reptile podcasts, Stephen Maxey was on Snake Talk talking about venom in the last month or two. Really great episode. I

would highly recommend that. Dr. Maxey is a super interesting guy up at the University of Northern Colorado. His story itself is very interesting. There was a ton of, it's one of those, I'll definitely have to listen multiple times, the complexity that's being presented, the complexity, subtlety, nuance that's being presented there is really, really good. It does a good job with it. It's just so confusing, right? It was one to call our own experiences to mind or at least we could visualize this is I guess the three-finger toxin in Boiga irregularis is essentially exactly the same as in cobras. It's just that somehow it doesn't – it is incredibly problematic our different nerve receptors and things, our proteins and nerve receptors.

But it's actually the same structure. It's just how – so again, speaking to all this sort of subtle complexity, right? A bite that wouldn't be bad in a person but is fatal in birds and – I think it was birds and lizards um well it seems like too you know juvenile well toxins kind of change during the they do yeah he gets into yeah they both get into um levels of toxicity what they're supposed to interact with yeah quantity is another issue um yeah absolutely so the interesting why why i I bring it up beyond just presenting a tangent would be that he mentioned specifically that case and seemingly what happened. And I do wonder then if there are underlying medical conditions or externalities or whatever. components of Gila monster venom is, um, particularly reactive to, it dilates blood vessels, which can cause your, a drop in blood pressure. And seemingly the reason he would have

collapsed like that would have been sort of a response, his physiological response to dilation of his blood vessels causing him, you know, his blood pressure to drop rapidly. The, of course, that begs the question, well, why is that the first time in 100 years that that's happened? And it does make me wonder whether he had underlying conditions that would predispose that to be a problem, right? If he already had low blood pressure or had externalities that would factor into that. And it reminds me of the law school doctrine in tort that the eggshell skull doctrine, right? So if you interact with someone, if you punch someone in the face and it turns out they have some condition where a person who normally, a normal person taking that punch in the face has no problem, but this person fractures their face,

that's on you. You take them as you find them. This is the you know, unfortunately, it comes from a case, you know, in law that someone's underlying condition, even when not obvious, you know, you're still liable for the result, even if it's not anticipated. It all kind of popped together to me out of that of saying, well, I wonder if there was something about that where there's it would cause in nine hundred and ninety nine out of a thousand people, the reaction would be this in this particular person, the particular effect that's particularly prominent in this species happened to, you know, we got the worst case nexus. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That mix of whatever factors are involved just resulted in the worst outcome, you know, like. Right. They'd be highly atypical unusual. Yeah, exactly. And I mean, there's, you know, they've discovered some things that are certain regional groups are more susceptible to different things than others, you know, so it's genetics plays a role in a lot of these things. And, you know, you, you might, everybody might consider a brown tree, tree snake safe, but it has some weird interaction with your people from police acts or whatever, whatever it would be. So yeah, that could be a factor that people just don't consider. And I mean, yeah,

I think unfortunately, you know, we live in a society where everybody loves that crazy. What's the word? I always space this word out. The news, news likes, you know, the murder stories or the, you know, guy gets bit by venomous snake kind of stories, you know, where, where I'm sure if you're a responsible keeper and something happens, I think of like Terry Phillip, you know, Terry has how many interactions a day with venomous snakes and, and he's been bitten once and it turned out to be a wild, you know, prairie rattler, you know, like what are the odds

that that's the one that got him you know whereas the ones he's working with in in the zoo all day right the famous clip that would go around of him looking people are always so shocked at how normal and routine all his interaction you know he's filming and it all looks so normal and that's the part that seems atypical but in fact that's what's kept him safe yeah exactly and kind of a funny aside that video of him feeding the cobras that was at one point attributed to me that they said that i was the person feeding the cobras which i i had to correct them i'm like actually that's my buddy terry but yes that's funny it's kind of funny. But, you know, I think, you know, to whatever. Now, of course, people that are, you know, I'm macho guy, I'm going to get this cobra and nobody can tell me what to do, you know. And frankly, I really do think there should be a pathway for anybody to keep a venomous snake if they want to. I mean, sure, put hoops in the way, they have to meet a certain criteria. But I think in some ways, if you just say no,

blanket no, you're going to promote some irresponsible behaviors. Because somebody, like you said, if that's what you really, really want, you're going to find a way to do it, whether it's legal or not. A lot of people are going to say, no, I think the risk to keep that outweighs the risk of me getting caught keeping that, you know, that kind of thing. Yeah. But then the consequences, if it gets out, are, you know, oh, now we've got to make a bigger ban on every snake, you know, that kind of thing. So our, why can't I think of that word? The, oh, sensationalism. Yeah, exactly. I can never remember that word for it. Well, I guess I just did, but I can seldom remember that word, um, when I need it, but, um,

sensationalism kind of dominates the sphere. And so, you know, if anything happens in that realm, you know, there's going to be extra focus put on it. It's like, you know, the recent shooting of the health care CEO that's dominated the news. My daughter was complaining. She's like, what is going on with this? I don't know what this is about. And I keep getting all these stories on my social media feeds about some CEO and dead or something. I'm like, oh, my gosh, you know, she's not seeking that. But it's coming to her because that's kind of what our society thrives on, especially in America.

You know, like that sensationalism and and these crazy events like a snake bite. Just draw people in and make them want to watch the news if there's reports of a snake bite. I know there was a ton of discussion about the recent inland type end bite. I never really looked into that. I should have for this discussion. But, you know, I guess that really draws attention. So I guess that's part of being an advanced keeper, I guess, in this regard, since we're defining it how we want to right now. I'm saying you've got to be media aware as well and know that if anything bad happens, it's going to be overblown and you need to be prepared with some kind of way to combat that or see through it.

So, for example, if you're prepared, if you have your anti- Vendon, you're, you're, you've kept them properly and it was just a fluke. It's legal. It's legal. Yeah, exactly. You're following the rules of your state and you get bit. It's less of a sensational story because they're not like, Oh, this, you know, he has no experience and he's keeping this snake and he didn't have auntie Vivenom and he had to beg the zoo and they saved his life. Those kind of things. Whereas if it doesn't even make the news because it's so mundane because you've covered all your bases, I would suggest that's probably a responsible way to keep a venomous snake. And now, unfortunately, I think a certain group are drawn to large snakes or large verandas or venomous snakes.

And now I'm not going to lie. I was drawn to those. I wanted a giant python. I still want a giant veranda at some point in my life. It's just that interaction with a Komodo or a water monitor. Veranda is just cool. Now, I could probably get that from the wild. And so I'll probably just stick to herping and seeing my venomous snakes and my verandas in the wild rather than trying

to keep them in my garage. But so I would suggest that might be an alternative to keeping them in captivity is to go interact with them in the wild. And now I've seen some pretty crazy behavior from people handling him in the wild, but it doesn't seem to make the news like a guy in, you know, Indiana getting bit because he had this illegal Cobra in his garage that got loose and now is on the loose in, you know, in the neighborhood. So I think those kinds of things, you know, can, can really, uh, help, help at large, you know, our community and things like that. So if you're drawn to those thrills and spills, then go do it in the wild because then you're in some other country because there aren't any giant Python. Well, I guess Florida, Florida, man. So, a different country anyway. Yeah, exactly.

So, yeah, that would be my recommendation. Yeah, I think that's fair. And I mean, part of it too, right, in terms of the sensationalism of the whole thing is, you know, it's what the, you know, dog bites man, normal story, man bites dog, you know, that sort of idea is that yeah if you're you know someone in its normal context if someone got bit you know in thailand by a king cobra or something like that that's unfortunate you know obviously unfortunate but it's not it does it'll be like oh well that's well that's what happens when you go to the jungle right the same person is going to be viewing the indiana story you know and i don't that's not even where it was right but in our sort of universe here that that is more man bites dog whereas if it happens over there it's just like well that's why i don't go to thailand or whatever it would be yeah exactly because i wonder too because um we have the two the two buddies in florida one got bit by a wild

cobra in africa or you know southeast asia wherever he was and the other one got bit you know it wasn't it at uh i don't know um crutchfield's place uh the i don't know okay the tattoo artist that keeps oh yeah uh anyway you know i wonder if there's a difference in the reporting of those stories but then again it did happen in florida So maybe it was just, oh, that's what happened. A different country anyway. Florida, man, gets bit by a snake. Not as dramatic as somewhere else. And I think the other part of it too, right? And something that we're constantly aware of or think about or whatever, even in the context of the brown tree snake stuff, is that it's like, well, we, you know, our constant refrain is that foreign protein is foreign protein and you kind of in the same way we're you know if you're engaging with that um without due care then you're taking the risk that it turns out you're the the eggshell skull relative to that protein in people right um i know one fort right there was the unfortunate

you know nippers friend that died right over the summer right when he got bit by something what a viper in georgia um the country of georgia um that isn't perceived to be that bad but he had an anaphylactic reaction to him yeah yeah you know so that it's you know which is wild um and i think that's part of this i I mean, you know, everybody knows wingsuiting is dangerous, but there's lots of people who go fly in wingsuits. I mean, not lots. I mean, you know, relatively few. Same with like free climbing and things like that. i i think if you are keeping venomous snakes and you know chasing venomous snakes and handling venomous snakes a lot there's much greater risk of course of of dying of venomous snake bites so um but again if that's what you're passionate about and that's gonna make you feel alive then i have no qualms with you doing that as long as you are responsible about it, you know. And I think that becomes what an advanced keeper is, is a responsible keeper, maybe.

Right. Well, and the other part of this, too, kind of, you know, combining all those different ideas is defining venomous in the first place. Right. And again, in the in the context that that could be variable. Right. What's one of the most popular pet snakes nowadays? Right. You see them all over Instagram digging down. It's a Western hognose. And, you know, certainly that that's not nothing. What's going on there. Right. And well, my my coworker, they have a pet hognose and it that one of their daughters kind of called out. Oh, the snake bit me. And they said, oh, you know, are you OK? Yeah, I'm fine.

And then like a few minutes later, it's still biting me. And they're like, oh, crap. We just thought it bitter and let go. Yeah, let go. Latched on like a few minutes later, it's still biting me. And they're like, Oh crap. We just thought it bitter and let go. Yeah. Let go. Latched on like a feed. Yeah. And so they, so of course, then they went in and kind of helped get the, get the snake off off of her finger or wherever. And then they watched her finger kind of balloon out and they got really worried and took her to, you know,

into the Instacare or whatever and got her checked out in the by a doctor, you know, nursing staff or whatever. So and she she didn't have any severe or long term consequences, but it did swell quite a bit and was fairly painful and, you know, was a smaller snake. They didn't expect that reaction to occur. So, but again, they, they understood like this could be potentially dangerous. So we're going to take the precautions and take her into the insta-care, you know, I've heard of other keeper. Oh, I heard a great story about this keeper that got bit by a venomous lapid in Australia. And he called his friend and said, I've just been bit by X. And, you know, I'm going to wait it out and see what happens, see if it was a dry bite.

And, you know, I'm feeling OK. And then all of a sudden he just stopped talking. Like and the friend friend freaked out and ran over there. Now, from the person who got bits perspective, they could remember like everything that was going on. They were just paralyzed, basically. They couldn't move or talk or respond. So the friend comes bursting through the door, and then he sees his friend on the ground.

He's dead. He's killed. The snake is killed. And so he remembers hearing all this. And then the friend came over and realized he wasn't dead got him to the emergency room they administered antivenin and he came right out of it and was right fine you know so like but again with the complexities of this stuff right the pre and post synaptic stuff so right there's a huge difference in terms of the efficacy of antivenin right depending on all these different peculiarities

yeah exactly and some i mean you can have a reaction to the antivenin and have an depending on all these different peculiarities. Yeah, exactly. And some, I mean, you can have a reaction to the antivenin. Another wonderful story of responsible behavior is Ben Morrill. He and his friend, what was his name? I met him a couple times out here. But anyway, they were on a scout trip, and Ben and his friend had found a rattlesnake and had pinned it and picked it up and they were showing the other scouts, the fangs or whatever. Well, one of the scout leaders comes up and he said, what are you guys doing? And he

said, oh, we caught this snake and we're showing, you know, and, and one of the scout leaders took a glove and hit the snake. Well, oh, it's Brent Brennan. Brendan was holding it. Ben's friend, Brendan. And the snake swung and bit him. So he got bit by the snake because this scout leader knocked it out of his hand with a glove. It's like, what are you thinking? You know, and then he went to the emergency room and they gave him antivenin.

He was allergic to antivenin and started having anaphylactic shock so they had to combat that you know so they're going back and forth between venom and anaphylactic shock i don't think he had any long-term consequences i don't remember him missing a digit or anything like that right you know he went through some painful moments there just because of some idiot that you know wasn't even involved with the handling you never know so right you know you even have externalities exactly you have to be aware of others that are you know may have a wild hair to smack the snake out of your hand while you're holding it you know which is ridiculous so wasn't there the marco shea right where he had gotten bit in brazil when it's the isolated field station. I think it was on word on the snake line going way back in terms of the podcast and whatever. I think he was talking about this where they were using expired antivenom that didn't look clear because it was the only thing available.

And it was sort of, OK, well, we'll give it a shot. And I think he went temporarily blind. Wow. You know, from, yeah, like as a reaction to this anti-venom. Yeah. Wild. That's great. And I presume, maybe, presumably, whatever, when he was on one of his several parts with Nipper and Phil on Venom Exchange Radio,

that maybe they talked about it as well. But I think the first time that I'd heard it, you know in that context of word on snakebite so yeah uh yeah i mean yeah there's obviously a lot of a lot of things that can occur and i i think it was uh joe mendelsohn um we i we're gonna have him on the podcast uh um in a couple weeks here but he uh and he you'll have to correct the record when he's on here but we hopefully he'll tell this story but he was handed a bag with a snake and a graduate student had misidentified it and he

reached in and grabbed it and it bit him and he put it back and realized what it was it was a highly venomous snake and he just sat there saying well this may be my last sunset so i'm gonna enjoy it and he just sat and watched because he was too far away from any medical help and and had no you know and so i there probably wasn't even anti-venom for this species where you know where they were out in the middle of the jungle or whatever so um but it turned out to

be a dry bite and he's you know was fine but yeah, those kind of things, even in a professional setting like that, where you would think the graduate student would be a little more cautious or, you know, a little less cavalier. And same for, you know, the researcher where you're not reaching and grab a snake just because somebody told you it was fine. You know, that kind of thing. You think you would look in and ID yourself. But when you're tired and you've been herping all day or, you know, doing this survey or whatever, you might not be thinking straight. So, and, and I do think that probably falls in line with part of the, you know, venomous keeping, uh, being responsible venomous keeper is that you, you can't do things you know like you have to be on your game or else you're gonna risk a lot more than you know what other regular leopard gecko keeper is risking yeah yeah so that's kind of something to keep in mind i think the worst bite i've ever taken was from a rat from my feeders and my rats don't bite like i don't i think i've been bitten once and it was like a fluke weird thing

where i stuck my hand in the rat bin to grab a grab one of the females or something that was gravid the male ran over and just latched on to the meat of my you know palm and and gave me a deep chew there yeah i ended up having to go to the to the instacare to get it you know get some antibiotics and get it get this rat bite cleared up because my hand started swelling and i'm like oh man i work with all these snakes that everybody's so worried about and the worst bite i get was from a rat you know yeah i think mine is too you know from a pet shop you know working in a pet shop you know man what 15 20 now 20 years ago or whatever. Yeah. And that one was just

mean. I don't know. There was no mistake. That one was just, it was just out for my figure. You expected it. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's crazy. So I don't know. Yeah. There's lots of caveats, of course, to this, but you know, I think as long as somebody is, is conscientious, they take the necessary precautions, they cover their bases in regards to, you know, considering the sensationalism of the news or whatever in case they do get bit. I think there probably is no reason why somebody couldn't start with a venomous snake. So I guess, you know, we can kind of this very elaborate set of circumstance that we've talked about here but yeah i don't i don't think it makes sense to fundamentally say no never right hey because that's rarely the case right then you couldn't

grab some singular circumstance where you'd say that that makes sense in reality it's about you know there are plenty of people with experience who i wouldn't, who, for whom it would be a very bad idea. And there are people just with their personality and experience and with the right approach that it might not be. Yeah. It doesn't mean it's a great idea, but it might not be a bad idea. Exactly. And, and I mean, I think there could be other species that might scratch that itch. I mean, I don't know if it's what the draw is necessarily. I mean, I guess it's different for everybody but you'd think they're a lot like for example you know in the u.s we've got the uh whip snakes coach whips that kind of those kind of snakes which are basically

yeah without the venom you could or dry mark on yeah i mean it's probably you could see kind of the same sort of behaviors or activities or responses and things like that and not have the risk of envenomation. So I guess if you if, you know, you're keeping it because it's dangerous, because it's life threatening, because you want to thrill, you know, it's probably not a good reason. Yeah. Or are you just really fascinated with that species and you just really want to keep them for whatever reason. That or nothing, you know. Yeah, exactly. Then maybe that's okay as long as you take the necessary precautions and things. I don't know.

I guess in my mind it's – well, part of it's my wife when we got engaged. She said, you have to promise that you won't keep venomous snakes while we're married. I said, okay, I guess you're worth not keeping venomous snakes, you know? And so I, you know, just like the state law, just go ahead and do snakes. And that's what I said. I'm like, it's kind of an easy choice because I can't keep them anyway. So I won't tell her that, but you know, yes, honey, I agree not to keep them in captivity but uh i don't agree that i won't go uh play with them in the wild yeah absolutely so um and you know that's not to say that i might not get bit in the future in the in their habitat because you know we've kind of come

close on a couple occasions a few living landmines, as we call them. Yeah, absolutely. Eight rocks out in West Texas and Arizona. At least the one positive to that, right? And maybe this, again, speaks into the considerations if you're going to try and keep them. And you really highlighted this in terms of making sure you had the antivenom. But then it would also be the additional step of making sure anyone who would prospectively treat you is familiar with the fact, A, that you have it and B, what that care would look like, even use and would trust your supply, right? I know that becomes a big issue too, right? It is,

oh, you do have your own antivenom, sure. But if you haven't, don't have a pre-established relationship and procedure, then if you just turn up, they're not going to, what didn't, someone tried to turn up and they thought antivenom was just venom that they had milked from the snake, right? They just had it like in a vial. And if they put that into it, they're just doubling down. So, yeah, I mean like you can see why a physician would be – look at that skeptically, especially in the moment if there's been no prearrangement around it. I think that's part of it too is having, is having that, uh, emergency plan and making the doctor in your area aware of it, aware of it, or the, at least the hospital, you

know, Hey, I'm keeping these snakes, you know, I'm right. And if you're not willing to engage that conversation, then that tells you all you need to know, you know, on the front end of the sign, you can't even talk to someone about it. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I think, you know, otherwise, I mean, I guess, you know, we live in America and Americans like

dangerous things. I mean, how many, how many guns do people own? I, and, you know, maybe I'm, I have a little bit of a different attitude because when I was thinking, you know, do I, do I want to own a gun? And I thought about, like, I counted up all the events that I had known about. People I've known have had either good or bad experiences with guns. They've defended themselves from an attacker or something. I counted up one, maybe two of those events where they defended themselves. I counted up 12 or 13 of people either... With negative outcomes of serious consequences. Yeah. To, to a gunshot or whatever. And I'm like, okay,

the risk is not there for me. I don't need a gun. I, you know, I live in a very, very safe area, you know, and to that same point, are you adequately trained to ensure to avoid negative outcomes? Well, and I sleepwalk too which is you know a wild card where you know i i have these waking dreams where i think i'm i'm experiencing something and i'm asleep you know but i'm walking around and so yeah that that factored heavily into that decision that's probably not a good choice to have a throw a gun into that mix. Wild card. Okay.

So, yeah, I mean, I think that's the kind of consideration you need to take because it is a serious thing and it could have consequences not only for you, but those around you, those in your city, those in your state, those in your country. If it's a crazy enough thing, thing you know our country doesn't seem to want today's modern super animals yeah exactly we need guns for flying squirrels and electric eels oh my gosh I can turn five guns into one gun

yeah so for all of you out there I can turn five guns into one gun. Yeah. So, for all of you out there who just need to keep a venomous reptile, we're not saying that it can't be done. You can do it. It could even be your first reptile, you know, what am I trying to say? Captive. Your first captive reptile. If you do things responsibly in reasonable order, I don't see why that wouldn't be the case, but be advanced, be responsible. Yeah. The criteria there is incredibly, incredibly hard to the point where I can

theoretically imagine someone I don't know. haven't known this person whoever that would be right yeah that that would be a a very unique uh person out there i think so yeah yeah not saying that it can't be done well i mean one of my first pets was a rattlesnake you know i it wasn't fine man his ears gonna be burning wasn't sc Wasn't Scott's first pet or certainly interaction or something with, I think, a red-bellied black snake or something like that? In Australia, I think it happens more often because the quantity and the rate of interaction and all those things, it happens. Whether they know it or not. Right. They're thinking of a snake and they don't know it.

I was watching some YouTube video and it was in Australia. And I think Brother Nature, he's like a YouTube guy, flipped a piece of tin up in Cape York and found a female death adder with a bunch of newborn babies right next to her. And he was like picking them up with like tongs and putting them in the palm of his hand. These little baby death adders and like i'm like uh i don't know if you should be promoted and you know he put in some disclaimer at the end of the video like do as you know don't do as i say now does that do or whatever so like i don't know if that's really going to carry the same message as somebody going oh wow you can hold those you know like come like, come on. And you know, I,

I guess when I was over there, I had a friend that was cleaning out a death adder cage and he handed it to me and said, here, hold this for a second. I'm like, this is a death adder. What are you doing? You know, like, okay, okay. I'm good. Take it back. You know, it was just kind of like, Oh man. Yeah. And of course it didn't bite me. And sure. But, and it was as captive and calm and easygoing. But still, you know, it's like, here, hold this hand grenade. You should have 20 seconds, you know, it's okay. Wrong ratio, 19.

So, uh, just, you know, think it through. It's a big decision, a big, a big consequences if things go wrong. Absolutely. Yeah. Potential death. So, you know, that's a serious thing. Now, I mean, my work, I, I tell people this all the time that come and work with, you know, I'm like, always keep it in the back of your mind this is a deadly virus don't get complacent just because you've been doing it for long enough and you know you're you're good at it and you know now it's like i can chat with my friend while i'm infecting these mice or you know it's like no yeah the most dangerous thing you do is hold a vial full of consecrated concentrated virus in your hand it's not not great you know so be? So be, be always remember that. And I think that applies here. Always in the back of your mind, I'm, I'm messing with a snake that

if it bites me, I could end up dead, you know, and act accordingly, you know? And if you, if you don't want to be alive, that's not the way to go out. Don't do that. Do us a favor and don't do it that way either. So if you don't care about your own life and so you're going to keep reptile, that's not a good reason either. That's not being advanced or responsible. Well, hopefully we did okay there, Eric. Yeah. Hopefully.

I'd be curious to the extent that there are points that we didn't kind of hit on or if there's sort of the conceit of the thing is even different than what we had imagined. Sure. Yeah. And I think, too, I mean, we said, oh, we might expand it into other areas, but we didn't really expand it into other areas. We kind of stayed on venomous. And I did give up my venomous snakes when i did find out it was illegal and i gave them away to somebody else so um who i certainly shouldn't have said it was illegal exactly yeah and uh yeah i guess i should have looked up the right in that part of i mean i'm sure i'm not using myself as an example of good behavior here. This is kind of the, you know, yeah, it turned out okay.

But when I was living in Germany, my parents were watching my snakes. And my mom came in my room and heard the rattlesnake just rattling away and was looking in the cage and couldn't see. And then she looked and it was sitting on top of the cage. I don't know how it got out or anything. And they don't know how either. And it was like a top of the cage. I don't know how it got out or anything. And they don't know how either. And it was like a few inches from her face. And this is a con color, you know, like a faded rattlesnake. A very nasty bite.

Yeah. And I was so glad that my mom didn't get bit on the nose by a con color. That would have been horrible. So, you know, the risks are there. And she, you know, got out of the room as quick as she could. Shoved a towel under been horrible so you know the risks are there and she you know got out of the room as quick as she could shoved a towel under the door you know like called my dad you gotta get home the rattlesnake's loose you know and they they got it you know they my dad came home and it was just sunning itself on the windowsill and he just you know got it back in

the cage with the hook or something so So, but not a great experience. And that was another reason when I got, you know, got back from Germany, I'm like, okay, I need to move these on to somebody else. This is not worth losing my mom to, you know, that kind of thing. It's not just necessarily us that, you know, faces those consequences. So, all right. Well, yeah. Let us know if you have anything else to add or want us to cover in this regard but thanks again for the suggestion eric and we appreciate it and had fun talking about it it's a interesting topic for sure because i do i really enjoy venomous snakes i mean they're cool some of those rattlesnake species i I'd love to keep those, you know, those white specks and, you know, maybe a willard eye or something if they were legal.

Things like that are just really cool. So, I don't know, maybe when my wife passes away, I can start keeping venomous snakes as an old man. Oh, goodness. That's what I tell everybody. Once Heidi dies, I can take up wingsuiting and free climbing and venomous reptile handling. Do all those risky behaviors she kept me from. You made it two days further. Oh, boy.

Yeah. Good times. further oh boy yeah good times well any anything cool in the world of herpetology or herpetoculture that you've seen over the last bit yeah i've been well as i say mostly it's been this podcast stuff the show with dr maxi was great um that sounds good yeah the um andrew holy cross on with uh on snake talk as well super interesting so that's focused on uh origino's principally obscurus and uh dustin had sent it to me and i'd said yeah i'd seen that on there i was you know it certainly had it saved in the queue but he was like no no really and i i tend to agree there's a really meaty section in the middle that I think will be helpful. You know, not that it gives anything away, but just in terms of the ideation and thinking through and like it's supportive of some ideas and also, you know, instructive and guiding on, on others and things. I still, you know, it doesn't make the Palencio possibility seem that much more plausible, but nevertheless, you know, at least it doesn't hurt. Right. And it was super interesting. So yeah, both of those were super good.

Additionally, I've been listening to a lot of the colubrid and colubroid. I think we are going to talk to Zach about something that'll go into our what field herping mega series, our herping to a list mini series, a specific idea there that I think will be really good. I'm excited to talk to Joe Mendelsohn. I'd love to talk to Corey Martin here about the trip, Jordan Parrott here about the trip. And I know we both have literally dozens of other people that we're trying to make it work with. So, yeah, hopefully the sort of content that we've been putting out is of interest because I think the stuff in the near future will be similar. So hopefully that's good news.

Cool. Yeah, I was listening to Scott and Ty Iper on Chris Applin's podcast over where is he at? Is that Trap Talk? I think so. He's putting out some really cool stuff though. His talk with Brian was cool. Yeah, that was awesome.

Their trip over there. So, kind of fun. So, I'd recommend that one too with the IPERS. Some new news to me was the description of Varanus citrinus. I didn't know that had been described. So we had both kind of had that common memory of seeing these what are called blue stripe monitors or whatever that were up at Crocosaurus Cove. And yeah, I guess they've been formally described now so that's kind of cool um kind of over they occur over in kind of

the um gulf of carpentaria yeah gulf of carpentaria region and it's kind of cool another now if you know for the list her right in me i'm like oh great now i got another, for the list, her brain and me, I'm like, oh, great. Now I got another form for the list. Yeah. I always thought it would be not even a form. It's a species. Yeah. So depending, you know, new species.

So anything that's actually a species is probably a form. So, right. Yeah, exactly. I mean, obviously it was known about for many, many years before. I saw it in 2011. And we saw in 2019. Yeah. And it was described in what 2022 or 2023 yeah yeah um yeah i'm sure there will be more described absolutely the list will grow and we're expanding give me more reasons to go back to australia there are worse things yeah for sure um what, ah, there's other

stuff I've seen, but I'm, my brain's kind of fried. I think, I don't know, but yeah, lots of good stuff out there. I, uh, um, love hearing about herb trips. So I'm excited to, to, yeah, chat with some things. And I i'd gotten that uh podcast the snake talk podcast it fallen off my list for some reason so i hadn't been listening to that for a while so looks like there's a lot of good content there to catch up on so thanks for bringing that to the forefront of my mind again yeah absolutely so good times well um i guess that'll do it for us and uh cool thanks for thanks for listening. And we'll hopefully catch you again next time for Reptile Fight Club.