Reptile Fight Club - Rodents: Is it better to breed or buy?

Episode Date: December 16, 2022

In this episode, Justin and Chuck tackle the topic of Rodents: Is it better to breed or buy?  Who will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!Follow Justin Julander @Australian Addiction Reptiles-http://www.australianaddiction.comFollow Chuck Poland  on IG @ChuckNorriswinsFollow MPR Network on:FB: https://www.facebook.com/MoreliaPythonRadioIG: https://www.instagram.com/mpr_network/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtrEaKcyN8KvC3pqaiYc0RQMore ways to support the shows.Swag store: https://teespring.com/stores/mprnetworkPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/moreliapythonradio

Welcome to the MGR Network. To another episode of Reptile Fight Club, I'm Justin Julander and I am your host this evening or morning or whatever time it may be. When is what? And here with me is Mr. Chuck Poland. Say hello to the people, Chuck. Hey ho, how you doing? Yeah, so things good? Things are good. You're getting snowed on. What the... I know you don't know what that is.

Well, I know I am aware of a thing called snow, but yes. I guess you did grow up where it snows. Yes. Yes. I left there and never came back. But, yeah. We are getting dumped on it. It's wonderful.

It's nice and light and fluffy. Good powder. Heading up tomorrow to carve a few tracks. You just took the question and ran with it right out of my mind. I was going to ask if you were shredding the slopes this weekend. Nice. Heck yeah. Yeah, my in-laws are going to come up on Saturday.

We'll go out and do a little skiing with them. So hopefully it comes back. I guess it usually does. So it'll comes back. I guess it usually does. So it'll be good. We picked up my daughter. She came home from Costa Rica, so that was exciting. All right. Good to have her back.

All the Jew lenders are back in CONUS now, huh? Almost, yeah. Well, they were all back in the U.S., yeah. Yes, that's CONUS, Continental United States. Oh, CONUS. You've never heard that? I have not. All right.

Well, that's a very – I guess maybe that's a military – I don't know. To me, that's how I heard it, but I guess I've always kind of heard it around military people. It's good to know. Yeah, there you go. CONUS. If somebody says CONUS to you, they're not trying to call you a name or something. You military people and all your abbreviations. Hey, acronyms.

Dude, you know what? CONUS and CONUS and CONUS. Yeah, I think the acronym thing is a little out of hand because even I'm like, I literally have to take an acronym and associate it to like, okay, what are we talking about here? And then take each letter and try to figure out what it would be. Because they just over-acronym everything, and it's grossly ridiculous.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Listening to them talk, it's almost... Yeah, we deal with a few government employees, and government employees do it a lot, too. Yeah, we do. Anytime we have a few government employees, and government employees do it a lot, too. Anytime we have a military government employee, it's pretty crazy when we're dealing with somebody from one of the military research groups or whatever. They're always using all sorts of funny names and weird stuff, and they're doing dumb shit. That's us. Yep.

Yep. Welcome to RFC. I'm with CP, and I'm JJ, and we'll get underway. Wow, that was pretty good. That was pretty good. They were pretty short acronyms. We need bigger ones, I guess, if you want to sound legit. Well, A-E-H-C-C-E looks like they got lots of copies in hand. Did you catch that one?

Australasian Lapids, Husbandry, Captive Care, and Ecology. Jesus, man. By Scott Anti-Iper. I saw that it's available on Amazon now's available on, uh, Amazon now. I did see that. So that's awesome. I need to get your copy copy. I know me too.

Yeah. I think they've kind of sold out all their copies or I think they have, they said they had a few left in, in Australia. So they got like a truckload or Scott about blew his tires out, uh, bringing all the copies home. So I know that feeling and I know the wonderful joy you're going through now, Scott and Ty of boxing all those books up and sending them out to everybody that's ordered one. It's a, it's a barrel of monkeys. It's a laborious gift that you're giving. Oh yes. Yes. So congratulations on the release of that

book. I think we might have mentioned that before, but I thought I'd mention that there are copies available. I think Eco's got a few. So that's who I'll be buying it through. I think I'm waiting to see if I get Christmas money or something that I have to spend on something, because I never know what I need. I did pick up a generator, though, so that's going to be a nice little piece of equipment that I have in my back pocket in case we lose power with all the snow or something. I can heat the reptile room.

It's getting cold, so I had to turn on the heater in the reptile room. It's got down into the 60s or maybe even the high 50s overnight so yeah it's a little little chilly for my taste in there so yeah bumped up the heat a little bit and we've got everybody kind of going through their winter slow down so that's been a little nice kind of slowing things down in the reptile room pairing things up getting things together paired up some pygmy pythons i need to throw some other stuff together got the jungles paired up i need to paired up some pygmy pythons i need to throw some other stuff together got the jungles paired up i need to pair up some inlands but i guess they can go anytime uh the blackheads seem to be at it and doing good and need to throw some womas together too

but yeah tis the season huh look at you yeah that's a lot i'm kind of behind the times i think i probably should have thrown them together earlier, but what do you think? You're not out yet. Yeah, I think you're all right. That's true. That's true. But it would be nice to get a few more WOMAs and blackheads this year than last year. Hopefully it goes better.

But, yeah, the inlands are doing really well. Man, there's some that are turning out really nice so yeah i saw that hold back you uh you posted on the chat nuts dude that thing's crazy i know really really well really will be crazy animal so exciting i mean it just went through just went through that shed so i'm hoping it's gonna keep developing nicely like that because yeah it's it's funny because you kind of look at them you're like okay that one looks all right and then you then it sheds you're like oh wow yeah and then another one sheds you're like oh wow that one but so i'm just keeping back two males i may even just keep the one i don't know i'm trying to see

how how i feel but um i'm getting through the list i guess there's no rush because i can't really ship until it warms up a little bit or at least after the holidays you know i i don't mind shipping as much you know as long as it's not too crazy cold but like as long as it's going somewhere a little warmer or yeah or you know it's not crazy weather going on then it's yeah i feel ship in the i feel like yeah i feel like my hardest thing is it's like usually find a ship here it's usually like the connecting hub in indianapolis or like you know wherever the where wherever that connecting hub is that's where i like look at those temperatures where the box is going to kind of sit for a while or whatever. Um, that's where, that's where I kind of worry, but yeah, it's, I never really have much of an issue and it's like,

I could ship out of here most, you know, winter, summer and not use a heat pack or anything insulated, but I just worry like in the, in the interim, but, uh, you know, at the same time too, like I, and, and, you know, I think you need to be responsible about it and you but you know at the same time too like i and and you know i think you need to be responsible about it and you you know but i think oh yeah a lot of people freak out about you know with an insulated box and and and it depends on the species definitely depends on the species um stuff that's you know most carpets that do all right man i think you know you can ship into cooler weather uh fairly safely with carpets so um yeah i'm kind of with you on that ship it when it's when it's cold than when it's hot you know

hands down yeah hands down no no argument there so hey man shipped a an adult pair of brettles and they got to their location and they were like the, the guy's like, oh, they're dead. They're, like, frozen. And they got lost, you know. They were in transit for a few days. And he got them. He's like, oh, yeah, they're totally gone. And I'm like, dang it. So I'm trying to figure, you know, get them a refund or, you know, whatever.

And then, like, he came home from work, and they were crawling around the cage. I'm like, it's a good thing he put them in the cage, you know. I think he put the box in the cage and then kind of left it open, and then he came him in the cage you know like you know i think he put the box in the cage and then kind of left it open and then he came home they were crawling around just fine it's like never mind they're they're they're out and about and they're happy so i mean and that's what i'm saying is like i think people discount the the the metabolic shutdown that these animals do when it gets really cold um you can get really, really lean as far as body metabolism. But I wouldn't go mucking around with losing animals in the mail

around Christmastime in winter in North America on a regular basis just to test that theory or anything that's that's that's uh yeah that's bollocks but yeah conus you don't want to be shipping in conus during dude dude dude conus don't play uh good stuff yeah that's right yeah uh, I got to pick out my male diamond python. So I got a pair waiting for it to warm up a bit or also to slow down with the holiday shipping. So that'll be nice to have a new project. That's badass. Yeah. You'll love them, dude.

They're so fun. Yeah. So fun. Yeah. I need to probably, as always, I need to move out a few animals, I'm sure. I need to list a few for sale or sell them locally as pets. Yeah, my temperature graph is slowly tightening towards those lower temperatures. And so the daytime high and the low time low are getting down there.

And I had my male diamond. It just was like in the corner of the cage hadn't moved in like three days and i was kind of like i'm a little concerned like are you okay and um the other the other day it was very cold and i said you know i'm just gonna the the the female she's like nope into the into the hide where all the moss is and is like buried and like she's you know she's probably uh experiencing maybe the 60s the low 60s in that area but i was just like yeah i'm gonna pull this guy inside and i just threw him in a tub in the house for the night and, uh, let him kind of, you know, warm up to whatever the low in our house is at night, which isn't super high, but, and then just put him back out. And, and, and then he went right into a hide and I haven't seen him.

So, you know, it's like, you know, it's like that, that whole thing we talk about with like the Terry thing about reptiles making good decisions. And, you know, I don't know. I don't know if he was fine and he was just like, yeah, he's like, Hey,

uh, what are you doing? I was, I was good. Or whether, you know, yeah. Um,

like finally it's, it's the temperature I want. Yeah. And go pulling him out. You know, it's like, or if he's just sitting there going dirt. Yeah,

exactly. i don't know what to do i'm outside yeah and he was really cold and he didn't even try to bite me which is grossly uncharacteristic for him so that guy is like ah did you just get a did you just get the the uh i mean usually diamonds are pretty laid back right i mean oh man no these two are the drawer well so so they're um they came from todd maybe that's yeah that's the problem everything i've ever gotten from those likes they're like no psychotic exotics is not just a name it's a lifestyle raw you know what i mean they're like yeah like the the i've got uh albino variegata from him and they are the biggest like it you get it the minute they figure out that

somebody's in that cage the flattest head you've ever seen and they're just psychos like spazzing out like flipping out striking everything like and you can get them out and you can handle them but it's like you know both of both the diamonds and the variegata that once you get them out you can handle them but they're like they may take that opportunity to just like turn their head and fucking latch on to you and they do not let go and they're like then then they get all pissed and they start wrapping you and pulling and it's like you punk so you know then you got to get them with the warm water treatment and they'll let go after that and they're fine but it's just like yeah every every time and it's cool i you know me i don't mind a feisty snake, but it's like, you know. Yeah.

Definitely. That's – yeah, I'm hoping Terry has a little bit calmer animals. I guess we'll find out. Yeah. But, you know, they're here to stay, so I'm not too worried about their temperaments. Yeah. And I don't – you know, I don't handle my stuff a ton, a ton. And, I mean, I would say my tracier are, like, calmer than than the carpets most of the carpets that i keep even the big coastals will take a swipe at me um i just don't

i don't trust i just don't trust them like i don't handle them a lot and i just don't like fully trust them especially because those coastals are huge um and i do not want to get bit by those things yeah that that doesn't seem appealing yeah no not at all bite from those yeah no good times yeah so well yeah um yeah i get i uh just aside from pairing stuff up and shipping out a few books and posters still, it's been pretty normal. Nice. That's good. Good times. I guess if anybody wants a copy

of the book or a poster of the Carpet Pythons, hit me up. I think there's still time before the holidays. Depending on when this comes out, I guess. But, yeah, shameless plug. If you're interested, shoot me an email.

You can find my info at australiandiction.com. But still a little bit of time. And, I don't know, not to toot my own horn, but I'll just toot Nick's horn because, you know. Toot, toot! Toot, toot my own horn but uh i'll just toot nick's horn because you know toot toot toot toot um the uh the more complete carpet python i would i recommend the book it's we put a lot of work into it and had some fun with it so i hope uh i need to get some more feedback from people we ought to have somebody on to see get get some fights going about uh how the taxonomy splits we made and see see what you know how it's being received over in australia i need to catch

up with uh some folks over there too so one of these days i don't know not a lot of talking on on the phone time i suppose um that's nick's job yeah yeah all right well what do you think you ready to fight yeah what do we uh do we have a oh my gosh there's stuff going on in my house oh man i'm doing some construction over there no one would think that's what it sounds like between between the dogs and my family just you know barreling through the house like yeah yeah yeah yeah i'm recording over here we can maybe we can do this at the end but we're planning on doing a holiday show next week so i guess depending on when you hear this uh look us up on youtube for the for holiday show i don't know last year we we didn't do one but npr and the australia aussie harp podcast and i think another group did it we're

like man we're we're missing out on the fun we better do a holiday show so we'll have a few uh guests and uh get some get some good times rolling for the holidays to kind of finish out the year and then get some shows going for next year in the new year. Yeah, stay tuned. We'll dress Justin up like a reindeer. It'll be live, so you can see him. And you're going to be an elf, right? That's correct.

That is correct. There we go. Yes. Okay. I will be an elf or I will dress up as Mrs. Claus. I did enjoy the NPR holiday show. I guess we can talk about that at the end. Yeah.

Let's go ahead and fight. Let's talk. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So. I'm fired. I'm amped up. I'm fired up. Are you?

Are you? Put your dukes up, son. We're going to talk about the fuzzy critters today, the feeders. And the question is... I thought you were talking about the Mackinwookies. The Mackinwookies. Should you breed your own Mackinwookies or should you buy frozen Mackinwookies? Oh, man.

So frozen feeders versus breeding your own. Which is better? Well, you have to buy an oversized freezer to fit your Mackinwookies. That's true. They have to be bigger than the freezer to put your podfathers in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's correct. That's correct.

You need a Mackinwookie-sized freezer to store your frozen Mackinwookies. All right. This is not a threat towards Owen. We are talking about feeders today, and if it's better to breed your own or buy them frozen. All right. Well, let's give the coin an old toss around. See what side you want to pick here. So go ahead and call it.

Let's see if your luck carries over to this week. Heads. It is heads. Nice. The luck of Chuck. I guesscember is your month nice you got the the lucky streak this month well what do you think you want to say yay breed your own or nay buy them so um because i am a man who has bred my own but I currently do not I will take the no you shouldn't breed your own rodent

side of the argument and I know since you do breed your rodents this kind of makes sense with me so and of course as you know in typical fashion you make it first

you don't even need to say it. Please don't. Don't even say it. Hey, and cheers to the holiday show, and thank you for having great chemistry with me, Justin. I agree with those guys. We have good chemistry. We do well together, so cheers, my friend.

We do. All right. No, I've really enjoyed doing this show with you so yeah well we'll save the sappy stuff for later but yeah all right fair enough fair enough put your dukes up get to work let's go yeah you make this show man all right well i'm gonna come out you know swinging with the obvious thing it's so much cheaper to breed your own rodents um you basically pay for the you know for your i guess you're you're paying a little bit for your time you know you got to put some time into it but uh you're you're paying for the supplies and

around here you know i'm i'm picking up supplies at the local feed store so you know a bag of shavings is maybe 12 bucks and I have to maybe use, uh, three of them a month. So, you know, not too bad. And then, um, food, uh, I think the, the feed store I get it from has their own line of rodent chow. And so I buy, you know, kind of like that's the staple for a lot of them. And then I buy the Missouri, a bag of Missouri rodent block, the breeder block, and use that for my breeder rodents. But so, you know, it's, you know, the feed costs have gone up. And so I imagine that's why the price of frozen rodents has gone up tremendously lately too so uh and and then uh well i'm gonna start out there so okay you know the costs of uh

i mean you have to have a place to put them but you know the house that we got has a has a place and so uh it may not be ideal right now especially especially after the and I probably would have been happy to take the other side because right now I'm dealing with Rodent McGiddon. And I just had to go out there before we started recording and switch out the lines because a couple of rogue rats are still loose. Although I believe I've got them all now i said that you said that last episode just so we're you know yeah yeah so but i uh go ahead yeah you want to well i mean i i think that's the the main draw for me is is having a lower cost you know cheap it's it's a lot more cost effective to breed your own yeah i mean i think i think um my you know my big like blah with rodents is just the amount of work it's a it's a constant amount of work to stay on top of them they get you know they're obviously

stinky stinky animals and if you do not stay on top of that it they get, you know, they're obviously stinky, stinky animals. And if you do not stay on top of that, it gets, you know, it gets overwhelmed. The smell can get overwhelming. You know, you, you really, for your own health need to do it in a very ventilated area, which requires, like you said, you're fortunate enough to have, you know, uh, um, you know, a disattached area, a barn or whatever, uh, you know, storage area where you can do it. And, you know, there is that additional resource cost because you're buying the food and you need to build the racks or make the racks and, you know, you've got water that needs to be changed or you need to invest in a watering system that works and, you know, you're constantly kind of having to do that upkeep.

So I, you know, I agree with you that, you know, there's a convenience there on the back end with always having available rodents of all sizes, which is just a fantastic part of bringing your own. Hey, you took my next point. Oops. Anyway. You're nipping my points in the bud here. No. I'm sure everybody saw that coming. But I do definitely think there's – yes, I agree with you that the cost of buying your own rodents

is definitely subject to market fluctuations, but, you know, just like feeding yourself, I mean, it gets expensive to feed yourself. Uh, it gets expensive to feed other things like the cost of everything is going up. So, you know, it's, it's, to me, it's kind of just like, well, yep, that's the price of doing business. And, you know, I think when those costs are high, you can kind of look at, well, how, you know, how many people am I breeding this year? Am I how many rodents do I need to feed? You know how, you know, you really can start to look at, you know, what your invested necessary cost is. And I think with how we tend to overfeed stuff, it's easy to feed too much or to buy too much.

And I've done that in the past where I bought a bunch of frozen stuff and I feel like, man, what? I miscalculated this because I'm well over six months with frozen stuff and I still have it. And I'm like, ah, I should have done a better job at calculating what I needed here. So I think what I would say is as long as you can calculate your efficiency and you can find, and I guess the other thing I would say is the closer, if you can find somebody breeding and selling rodents closer to you, which a lot of people do their own startup kind of rodent thing, and if you can find a supplier who's close to you, that is definitely a way that you can cut some of those costs out, especially in the shipping department for, you

know, buying your own rodents. And, you know, for me, I agree with you that, you know, having feeders always available is nice, but just being able to go out to my freezer, pick out what I need, thaw it out and feed it off and not have to do anything else is the, you know, no stinky garage, no, you know, extra anything I need to do to that extra money I'm paying, I'm paying to somebody else for the problem, right? And maybe if my collection was bigger, you know, if I had a big collection, then maybe some of that starts to make, you know, the calculation starts to change. But I think for most people, you know, their collection is modest enough that, you know, that it's a, you know, kind of how you want

to slice it. Do you want to do the extra work or do you just want to pay somebody else to do the extra work? And I think, you know, for where I am in my life and, and, you know, for God's sakes, I'm, I'm almost dead. So my time is precious to me. Uh, I will just pay somebody else to, to, to do that. Right. Cause you? Because every second counts for me. That's good. Nearly dead Chuck here. Yes. Well, don't die yet.

We still got to finish the show. I would say you're right. I mean, there is a little bit of a convenience there. But it can also become an inconvenience because if you buy too many of one size and then you then your animals grow beyond that size you're sitting on something and it's taking up space in a freezer and and um you you know you run the risk of having it get freezer burn or go bad, you know, whatever, lose quality, lose nutrients or whatever, you know, in the freezer. And so, you know, I think, I think sometimes you can lose money, uh, that way as well by, by not being able to use what you bought because you didn't plan well,

or like you said, you know, maybe you took too long to feed it off or didn't feed it off quickly enough, and so it's getting freezer burned as you're waiting. Also, a lot of the rodent companies ship it in Ziploc bags. When I freeze down extra or surplus rodents, I can use one of those vacuum sealers and do it upright and do it upright and have, have more quality frozen rodents and stuff like that. Um, and, and I found that I, you know, I, I've, I've done a lot of, uh, rodent sales, like I'll sell frozen rodents, not so much anymore. I haven't really advertised it and I kind of got sick of doing that meeting people and stuff to sell them.

So, you know, I'm not really helping my case there but you know you can you can make some extra money selling off your surplus rodents and and i i had a uh you know when there's kind of ma and pa pet stores a lot of times you can just take in a load to them and either trade for goods or or sell them off and you know have store credit or get cash in hand you know walk out selling your selling your feeders that way too um and i you know i've had requests from different even rodent breeders in the state have said hey if you have extras enough extras you know let me know i might want to buy them from you that kind of thing so there's all there seems to be an ever-present need for feeders because the job kind of sucks. So you're right.

I mean, it is stinky. It is a pain. But once you get a good system, you can get it takes me maybe an hour or two at the most. Now, winter presents a problem. I've been having to worry about frozen hoses. If water gets in there and it freezes, you're not able to fill up your reservoirs for the rodent watering systems or something. That's been a pain. I had to spend a lot of time trying to thaw out a hose that was outside, you know, that was long enough.

And one of my faucets up front doesn't work, so I had to buy some, like, little covers for the outdoor faucets so I could turn them on during the winter. That's kind of, that was a bit of a struggle last week. But, you know, once I got it figured out and I got the hose thawed out and, you know, drain it out and put it in the garage or something, it's not a big deal. But there are those added hassles. But, you know, I think the risk of wasting frozen rodents, you know, it happens. I think it happens to most people, you know, you, you don't need that size anymore. Or if you do, you're feeding something that's way too big, something way too small, or trying to feed something small, you know, something too

large for it or something like that. Just trying to, you know, use up what you have. So that's another risk of, of buying. Yeah. I mean, I, I definitely think probably some of the, the, the issues and usually I agree with you, you can get a system going down pretty well, but I, you know, I always had issue, um, sometimes watering issues where the Edstrom valves would continue to leak and the tub would flood. Obviously, any type of escaped rodent is not good, especially where I live. An escaped rodent is not in my yard. It's in my neighbor's yard. I don't need that smoke. And, you know, I think probably my biggest frustration was I was breeding rodents in my garage and it's not a an air conditioned or climate controlled environment. And, and so I would, and, and, you know, there, there is, um, kind of a, you know, I, I found a system that worked that like when it would, you know, I would, I would freeze all of my excess, uh, live stuff that, that didn't get fed off. And I would save it for when

the summer got so hot, uh, that my, uh, my colonies shut down. And that's a big issue with breeding rodents is they need to be kept cool. Otherwise they get too hot, they will shut down and you will, your production completely resets until they get back into a thermal regime that is, it works for them, which, you know, that, that can totally suck. And so, you know, that can totally suck. And so, you know, there's definitely kind of that, you know, it goes to a convenience thing, whereas I don't deal with that anymore. I just have to make sure that what I'm buying is, you know, sized right and the quantities are right. And it's really kind of a going through your your collection and

kind of you know making you know uh measuring twice and cutting once i believe is the phrase that might kind of apply here um so you know i i just i think for me having you know as i said old guy not a lot of time left uh on this earth uh i would rather spend it you know doing animal you know doing doing snake stuff rather than doing rodent stuff um but yeah oh thank you for that uh second reminder of your mortality and you know that was that's good to remember chuck is very old now that's correct i'm I'm not going to tell you I'm the same age because I like to think I have a lot more years left than Chuck's making it out to be. Aren't you older than me? You're older than me.

You are. You definitely are older than me. Which just means I am facing my mortality much better than you are. But according to the NPR folks, I i'm an android so i will never die what continue yeah so you are a sweet lady ddp fueled android rock climbing fool yep that's right so i agree with that um i i think another big thing too that i you know realized pretty quick when i tried to get frozen rodents for my early collection was that Heidi did not want frozen rodents in her freezer touching her food, you know? So, you know,

you have to worry about getting your own freezer to store those rodents unless you have a very understanding wife. Well done. You're getting out in front of my next point here well done yeah that's uh that's another expense you know you gotta buy a freezer and and uh find a place for it and all that kind of thing yeah now i mean you have to do that too if you're freezing down your excess uh from your live collection um i did find that uh i i bought a CO2 tank from the local air supply place. Yeah, West Air. Sailing away. Air gas.

Yeah, one of those air gas shops or whatever. And I got the tank. I bought the tank probably in 2015, and it's still going strong. Like, I use it maybe once every few weeks. Was it like a 25-pound tank? It's about three foot tall. Yeah, that's probably about a 25. 50 pounds, like maybe the four-footer or something like that.

Those are 50s. I mean, the tank wasn't too bad. I mean, it was what 150 bucks or something that's not bad and then that's not bad the regulator was maybe another 50 or something so it wasn't too terrible and that's been really nice because i can you know just uh i just can uh gas them instead of having to euthanize them another way or feed live so that's really convenient but it's yeah it's lasted me a lot longer than i thought it would i thought i'd at least have to take in the tank to get it refilled you know with

co2 or whatever but you know that's a uh an approved humane method for rodent euthanasia so yeah that's a nice thing to have so you know the having that aspect of it um makes that makes that that aspect or that idea of having to euthanize the rodents yourself not too overwhelming or terrible um see i just let somebody else have the blood on their hands mine are already euthanized and they're you know neatly packed you just it's like going to the sun that Yeah, it's like going to the store and buying chicken rather than slaughtering the chicken yourself and gutting it and doing all that. So, you know.

I don't gut my rodents. No, I know that. I'm just saying. I know. You get it. Yeah. You know what I'm saying. You know what I'm saying.

But, you know, so I guess, you know, the freezer's kind of sixes because you probably need one, too, if you're breeding your own rodents for the excess. And, you know, it is, like you said, there is kind of some ebb and flow of their production. And so you have to count on that. And I do freeze, you know, different sizes so I can have them available when the colonies kind of slow down. So, you know, that can be a good thing you can make your own frozen rodents so you can kind of have the best of both worlds there and then if you know something dramatic happens you could have some saved up but the other the other challenge there is you gotta kind of cycle through your older stuff you know or or sell it or you know get rid of uh sell it before you it becomes

an issue or something but um so you know there is that challenge and sometimes you end up throwing stuff out uh that way too so it's not not the perfect system necessarily um i i i think uh what was the oh you mentioned the edstrom valves, and I had that same problem. I switched over to a different type of valve that I got from Triple L, and they have been solid. I haven't had a single leak due to a leaky valve or due to them sticking stuff up in the valve or whatever. So huge. A dream. So huge.

There is nothing worse than smelling that yeah and you know it you know it you know it when you walk in there you're like oh and then you got to pull out a tub that's probably like full of what and yeah and i i actually you know i've i've been thinking up a system of you know having some some kind of uh riveted holes or something where you have a metal surrounding a hole and then um so you can drain it so it's not going to fill up with water and then having like a system of of rain gutters or something on the back side of the tank so it leaks into that and then you know flows into a bucket that has one of those like sensors i just hate it because rats are so good at chewing like if you give them an edge surface to get their teeth on it does not it almost doesn't matter like you'd

have aluminum it doesn't they will chew through that shit eventually yeah that's you know that is another risk of breeding your own rodents is them chewing and getting out and you know i i definitely i'm experiencing the pain of that right now and yeah and uh but i and and during uh covid there was a shortage on on the pans that i use that i get from uh lows or whatever yeah you just use like concrete mixing pans yeah yeah for the rats and so they didn't have any of those for a number of months. And I had thrown, like one got a hole in it and I threw it out. And then I went to buy some more and they're like, oh, we don't have any more. And they didn't for, I checked maybe a few months ago.

But what I did is I bought some sheet metal and some rivets and just a riveter and just rivet in and repair any holes. And that's worked okay. but yeah it's not the the best option yeah rodent's chewing out of bins yeah and that's i mean that's a huge thing in in designing um and thankfully you know people have suffered the ills of poor design prior to us and i think like you can you you know, you can YouTube it or, or modern day, uh, internet search it and, and get, you know, kind of the, the help you need to, but like you said, you know, all this supply chain shortage crap that's going on just makes it very frustrating, you know, especially, especially like, you know, when you, when you're trying to

get feed from your feed store and they can't get their feed and, you know, I mean, it, it just kind of affects across the board and, and, you know, I mean, that's not one of those things where I would like to say like, oh yeah, well, you know, when you can't get your feed, then it's hard to feed your rodents and your thing. But if, if you, if you can't get feed, it's hard to feed your rodents and your thing but if if you if you can't get feed it's hard for the whoever's producing the rodents that you buy you know frozen thought it's hard for them to do it so then their supply shortages go you know then they have supply shortages so it's you know it's a that's a that's an across the board issue it's not you know um it's not and and i and i i think it it affected me much less because I was breeding my own rodents. You can feed rodents a lot of things.

I mean, rodents are really good at surviving on a lot of different food items. And we had a lot of produce and stuff in the garden. And so you can make do even if they're out of your rodent chow for the week or whatever. That's a fair statement. Luckily, it wasn't too bad. But, yeah, I heard a lot of complaining about people ordering live, that it was difficult to get any. Breeding your own rodents, there is some startup costs associated with that,

especially if you're buying a new Freedom Breeder rack or something like that. That can be quite expensive. I've've generally made my those are freaking sweet though i mean they are yeah you know ed bradley had a had a set of those and it was just so clean and so nice and yeah i mean they have done a good job now i, like, you still run into the same issues, but I did see they had some rodent racks that had a metal tube or casing around the water lines. So even if you had a rodent that got out, it wouldn't be able to chew up the water lines, which is a pretty ingenious thing. And I thought, well, and I actually went back and did that to my water line, all of them but um and i probably should go back and and improve finish off yeah exactly yeah because i i encased uh my rodent water lines this kind of the soft flexi tube water with pvc pipe

and so i you know that that worked out well but then I, so I had that on the second to the bottom rack. Cause I, I just took out all the lines after they chewed them up. I just took them all out and put everything up in the, in the row above. And then in case that in PVC and it worked and they weren't chewing it up anymore, but then I put,

put the lines back again. And then they, I thought I had them all captured, but then I had a few more that were still out and so they chewed up those bottom ones so frustrating so yeah i just yeah i went out to mouse soup this this afternoon and kind of lame but so yeah there is some there is some uh vigilance you need to check on them and make sure that things are going well but overall you know i yeah i i think uh having the new uh the new non-edstrom nozzles what i can't i don't i don't remember i should probably look that up but what do they

call it what were they they were ag something were they ag select made the yeah they sold the edstroms i don't even know if they sell those anymore i i was trying to find those on on the ag select website and i i had a really hard time navigating that site anymore like i couldn't find the rodent supplies because i was looking to buy some of the like the shutoff valves and and stuff like that for the end of the line where you can bleed it if you need to and they i couldn't find those anywhere so i ended up getting some different ones from triple l but yeah i haven't ordered anything from ag select for for a long time yeah it just sucks like you get a piece of shaving up and up in those up in those estrum valves and it like it it it it clogged it doesn't clog the diaphragm but it cocks – like the diaphragm cocks open and it just leaks.

It's such a frustrating – Yeah, it's horrible. Yeah. I think some of that is design, like how you design the tub and that area. But yeah, man, that's such a – Freaking – Freaking rodent soup. They're just called rodent drinking valves on Triple L.

And they may be elsewhere. That's the place that I found them. And somebody recommended them. I can't remember who recommended those. Or maybe you heard it on a podcast or something. But they're spring-loaded, so you can't open them and replace parts and stuff like you can with the Edstroms. But, man, they've been solid like i haven't had any issues with them knock on wood uh yeah you know aside from rodent's chewing on the

flexi valve so that's been really nice and uh yeah they're i mean they're they're three bucks a piece or you know 275 if you buy 10 i think i bought 50 so they were 260 each but yeah i i have plenty on hand yeah extras i need to replace them but i haven't had to replace any of them yeah i was i was thinking so you know that does does require a little bit of planning but i i make my own racks and i you know i've i've i've had pretty good luck you know keeping things contained and keep and kind of um filling the space that i need or building enough for the number of rodents I need to produce. And I think I have a pretty good balance, like pretty much anything that needs to be fed gets fed. Yeah.

And back in the day when I was using the Edstroms, like once in a while, if you had a leak, that was another thing that you might think about like and i haven't done this yet but i had planned to do this is have have different rows on different reservoirs so if they do chew through lines it only floods or it only because because just or back with the edstroms like when a rodent would flood its cage all the reservoir would come out into the cage and so then you'd have um you know one one cage flooded but then the rest of the mice were going without water water right and that one flooded cage and that'll shut down that'll completely shut down production too if they go without water for too long that does yeah that shuts down especially mouse production yeah 100

they can only go like 24 hours or they just get messed up for like three weeks you know it takes them a while to come back again so usually i found that when that happens i i just kind of euthanize stuff and and replace the breeders and just kind of start fresh again and um another thing to be aware of is you don't want to bring new rodents into the colony an existing no that's a big no-no so huge if you have established colonies do not find some you know other feeders and say oh i need more mice and introduce those that's the fastest way to colony crash anything oh my god yeah yep nope that's 100 and you know i don't know how you know maybe that's common knowledge but that's something

i wanted to make sure i brought up if you're planning on breeding your own rodents make sure you don't add new animals from different colonies because they usually have and you know we see that in our reptiles too you know you you want to quarantine and stuff like that but i don't know you know if corn i i've never really tried quarantining i just think i just think i just think feeder or like lab runs are so inbred that if you you know mix from another line and you know i don't know if it's i i don't know i don't know what it is you probably probably you know your doctoral degree probably tell me better than than uh than i know but uh man they don't they do not do well and it's a shit show uh if you ever do that it's it if you

run into a problem where your your colonies are crashing and you haven't brought in a new line, it's better to just call everything off and start again with fresh animals. Yes, start over. I mean, yeah, so that's definitely a downside is if you do have an issue that's kind of out of your control, you really will pay the price of the reset. You've got to get everything restarted again and then wait for your breeders to start producing again, which hopefully you can get the numbers in there to kind of get production back up quickly.

Are you frozen? Are you there? Okay, I thought you froze. production back up quickly, but yeah. Are you frozen? You there? Okay. I thought you froze. And that, that does require, you know, also some planning. If you have to restart, you have to have a supply. So you have to know where you're going to get your live rodents from. And, and that can be tricky as well because you don't want to just buy from anybody necessarily.

And, and lab supply companies i mean we we buy a lot of uh rodents for you know the lab in our the university but uh you don't want to uh um you can't get it from them like they're not going to sell to somebody without a you know federal id number or whatever some university or something like that you might find one but i i have heard of uh um some of these rodent supply companies like selling off their euthanized excess rodents and i know i know ben was uh getting some through somebody you know back east and it's hard to get though. You have to kind of be in the know and, and you have to take whatever they give you. That's an inside track kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

You gotta, you gotta kind of be close to the, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good, good luck with, uh, if you say no, then you kind of lose your place and you get booted. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Um, but i don't know i i do like the i i think one other big selling point of breeding your own rodents is that you know what's going into your rodents you know if you're buying them from somebody else they could they could be diseased they could have you know some other issue going on. And, I mean, some rodent colonies have been shown to transmit different human diseases. So if you're thawing out rodents, then you could be exposed to human pathogens potentially as well.

So I did – I was talking to one of my friends who's a veterinarian up on campus, and he keeps falcons. So he was telling me a story that he was, they were breeding, there was this major producer of falcons, right? And he was supplying like the Middle East with falcons and stuff. He was, he was a breeder in the United States. And, and I guess he started just the, his falcons, just their production just crashed. It was just not going well at all.

He went back to the producer of the quail that he was feeding his falcons and found that the quail breeder was also having issues you know producing quail to you know to sell as feeders and so he asked you know he's trying to get to the bottom of it but he uh found out that it was a feed issue that the the feed producer had made a change in their in their feed and uh that it had um affected the breeding of the the bird so what they said was you know what was on the package was not what was going into the feed and so they they found out that they were getting one of the one of the ingredients for the feed um from a some some place that was kind of their quality had lowered and so you know just this chain reaction resulting in, you know, no,

no Falcon production. And so once they got that fixed and the, and the quail producer started buying feed a different feed or, or change their feed, um, then the quail started breeding better and the Falcons therefore started breeding better. So those nutrient, uh, issues can, can, you know, compound. And so, and, you know, to be fair, that can happen can, you know, compound. And so, and, you know, but to be fair, that can happen whether, you know, you know, that could happen to you as a, as a at home. Yeah. I mean, and, and it certainly could happen to a commercial, you know, a commercial breeder as well. So, but if, but if you,

but if it's your colony and you see the decline or you see the less you know healthy rodents or something some issue with the rodents you're going to be less inclined to feed those but if they come to you dead in a bag you're not going to know if they were yeah and diseased or something like that you know as long as it's not external. And you don't know. Yeah, I mean, that is fair. I think, one, if you catch it, you may not necessarily – how long did his Falcon production suffer before he figured out where it was coming from. So I think you're still kind of open to that.

And I do, although it's definitely been shown that certain viruses and bacteria and stuff can still infect an animal even after it's been frozen and re-thawed. barrier, um, a lot of times between stuff that, you know, if you're feeding live could be easily communicated, uh, right from the rodent to the, to the reptile. Um, but I will, I will, I respectfully disagree with that. We, we, uh, working in a virus lab, we freeze down our virus supplies and they are quite happy to sit in you know frozen conditions for years if not decades so sure okay so so maybe not still maybe not all viruses uh but but and certainly and but certainly bacteria don't always respond that way as well. You know, like you're... Well... I would probably say that's kind of one of those reptile myths that's persisted.

You know, we think if you phrase it down, then it's okay, but I would say you still run the risk of exposing your animals to pathogens. The same risk? The same risk? the same risk the same risk uh potentially potentially yeah i mean you could just be delaying it or putting into a kind of a you know waiting stage but yeah it's it's probably i mean that's hard to say. Yeah. But I think lots of pathogens can do just fine in the freezer. Well, I guess at a frozen state, you don't see viruses replicating, right?

You don't see bacteria replicating in a frozen state. So you're right. Potentially, if it's there, you could pass it, but you are talking about a pause in viral load or a pause in bacterial load when it's frozen. It doesn't necessarily eliminate it. But, you know, so, okay, well, all right, point taken, you know. Yeah. You know, it's just one of those other things that I think people think, oh, if I freeze it, then there's no risk. But, you know, there's.

Well, I did not say that. I did not say that. I did not say that. I think it is. That's true. But I do think it. I think there is a good, you know, it does provide a barrier that not freezing it doesn't, you know, like, you know, you know, I mean, can we agree there? Well, I mean, potentially, I mean, if you, if you have a feeder that's sick, as long

as you're not, you know, culling your feeders when they're sick and feeding them to your reptiles, you know, that's probably, um, so I guess if, if you were to take your live rodent and feed it when it was most sick then yeah you'd have a greater risk but if you take your live rodent and cull it and then freeze it when it's most sick you could have a higher pathogen than if you let that rodent recover and or or die and throw it away you know if it recovers, then it's kicking the pathogen out and you're not going to have that huge load of pathogen either. So, you know, it just depends on the timing and your understanding of things, you know. It depends on the pathogen. Like some pathogens, you can look healthy and feel good and you can still be passing

on that virus and have a huge viral load but if you're uh you know and sometimes when you're most symptomatic the virus is actually decreasing in your body so you know it depends on the pathogen it depends on the situation and the timing and a lot of things. So there's no easy answer to that, I guess, which is the case with most things. There's no simple answer, but, um, with, with this, this argument, I think the simple answer is it's, it's better to breed your own rodents. According to you. Of course. Sure.

No problem. Yeah. What the hell? That's the most Dr. Juhlender response to anything I've ever heard. Hey, I got to slip it in there somehow right um yeah i think i'm trying to think i i had another idea but it left my brain so um i need more i think i'm coming down with something are you despite i guess the uh the vaccine is not working well for flu a, I guess this year. So the, the beauty of some years of vaccine.

Yeah. Anything else you want to add? You got any other points? No, I just, I think like my biggest thing, and this is just like, so, you know, as I've kept different reptiles and different, you know, just the myriad of stuff that I've done in this, the thing that I really, that really like, I don't like about, you know, keeping lots of reptiles is it puts you, not and not every reptile i think snakes are a little bit less like this lizards are definitely like this geckos are like this stuff that has to be fed regularly and kept regularly it puts you on the clock it puts you on a schedule it puts you you know and it's like it's a it's a it's a commitment that like whether you're stupid, your stupid co-worker gets you sick or, you know, you pull your freaking hamstring and you can't walk or whatever. That stuff needs to be taken care of.

And you got to go do it and you just suck it up and get your ass in there and go do it. frustrations with rodents was they absolutely are kind of that top echelon of putting you on the clock of like you have to keep up with this or it's bad so that was kind of like one of the reasons like when you know that was what bothered me the most about breeding rodents was just how how tied to taking care of those rodents i were because, you know, yeah, you could let it slack a little, but that has effects down the chain, you know, for your animals. Right. So like, that was my big thing is like, man, you know, it's worth it for me to pay, uh, uh, you know, uh, uh, a rodent producer that I really trust to do it. And that's their full-time job, and they have a business around it and a name.

I don't know. It just was easier for me. And so to me, it's truly a convenience thing. And are you unfreezing me by moving your monitor? It always works. It always works. It is. It's got to lag.

But I hear what you're saying. Yeah. Okay. I did remember what I was going to say. So if you're doing this as a business, you want to lower your production costs. I think breeding rodents is a good way to do that. And to not be beholden to somebody else, to kind of have the freedom of having the feeders you need. And I think you see a lot of big breeders that do that.

You know, you see them having a feeder barn or whatever whatever like jake uh justin kabilka i think he does have a big free uh breeder setup for rodents and it's huge right to keep up with his collection so either he does that or he's associated with somebody that does that that kind of breeds just for him you know so i think that's uh you know something to. But, I mean, that's a big production. And I think it's almost like you have to hire somebody to do that and stuff. So it doesn't make a lot of sense necessarily if you have a small collection or you don't, if you're not a professional breeder, to breed your own animals. So, you know, I think for my collection collection i could probably go either way um oh one of my least favorite things to do is thaw rodents it sucks because you gotta have some you know

depending on how many animals you're feeding you gotta have some giant bucket full of warm water and it takes you know hours and then you got these floppy wet wet, sopping wet rodents, dead rodents, you know, that you got to dry off or whatever and feed to your animals. I hate it. I really, really hate it. So I think breeding rodents just takes away that issue and I don't have to mess with it. So I will give you that wet rodents stick to substrate and like I don't like that aspect of it. I don't like thawing a rodent and you've thawed it in too warm a water for too long. And when you have a snake that is aggressive and it hits that thing and that thing just explodes all over the place and it's gross.

Like I will, I will, I will agree with you on that point. Yeah. But at the same time, I mean, you know, what do you do? Do you, do you just throw them in the bucket? Yeah. So I, I put, I, I bag them, I bag them and then, uh, I'll put them and then I'll put them in the sink. The bags always leak, don't they? The bags do leak a lot of times. I mean, you know. That goes back to the wife thing. Then you're putting it in your sink.

Oh, my daughters. Get this crap out of my house. Yeah. They don't want to go in there and find a bunch of thawing rats in their sink. Well, but my wife also hated me breeding rodents like that was i mean you know that's not a popular that's not a popular thing to the wife and kids as well so um we had one one uh landlord that was really cool and we we moved to this place and and i i said, I have rodents.

He's like, you can keep them indoors. We kept the rodents in the house, which was terrible. It didn't last long. We found a place outside to put them in a shed and eat that and such. During that time, as long as I kept up on the cleaning, it was, it wasn't too bad. And I had to vent it out the window and stuff that, yeah, there were some days where it's like, my wife would not be happy. Heidi would be like, get down there and clean those stinky things. Yeah. And I mean, I, I, I definitely feel like just, you know, buying, buying frozen thawed and keeping them in, you know, its own freezer in the garage.

My wife doesn't have to like, you know, the worst she deals with is a bag of rodents that gets thawed out in the sink and, you know, fed off. And, you know, yeah, you know, she's she's a lot cooler with that than, you know, the smell or dealing with a garage full of live rodents. So, um, yeah. And I will say like, you know, I'd rather be married than have a rodent colony. So if it came down to it, I would probably be okay to buy, you know, word up and word up. So you gotta, you gotta know what's best for you and your own situation. So I'm, I'm very fortunate right now. And it's working out well, I'm not going to say it's working out great right now because yeah so but you know overall over the last 20 years it's it hasn't been bad it's it's worked out pretty well and i've been pretty happy with uh breeding rodents so yeah i think i brought up all my topics any other uh things you can think of in regards i'm spent yeah that's i'm spent it's

a it's a good topic i mean i think i think anybody getting into this needs to kind of consider that you got to know where your feeders are coming from. And, you know, when you mentioned the lizards, having crickets and things, that was a big pain. I hate crickets. Crickets die so easy and they stink. They can stink worse than rodents sometimes, you know. And, like, shipping them here in the winter, it was a nightmare you know so i went from i went from eating the cost of like you know buying like thousand crickets at a time and keeping them in a tub and feeding them off to just go into the to the reptile store and buying what i need and and it's cost me more

but it's like i don't have tons of loose crickets i It's like way better that way. And it's like – You don't have a lot of die-offs. Yeah. So I don't know, man. There's a part of me that's like geckos are cool and reptiles are cool, but snakes are nice and easy. Yeah, they are. Yeah, that does.

That is a good point. But I mean having a roach colony, the dubia colony, and I've actually thrown in some mealworms into the roach colony. And now I've got a double feeder supply. So I can pull mealworms and dubias out of there. Those stupid roaches, you can get sensitive to those. Yeah, that's true. I feel like there's a caveat to all of the feeder. You know what I mean? I do know what you mean, and I agree.

I think there's a downside to just about anything you can do. So as long as the good or some of the downsides or some of the upsides of, you know, both sides. So you can make the best choice for you and your collection. I guess that's the best thing you can do is just think about what you're doing and do the best for you and your family and whatever situation you're in. I do remember when I was a kid, my uncle would, you know, this was back in the 80s. So, you know, I don't think you could get away with this anymore. But my uncle would give me the control mice from the studies. And so he would bring, I would pick up like 30 mice from his house, you know, and I was so happy to get, you know, free mice from this source, you know. And back in the day, I probably should have set up a colony because these were good, you know, labs.

Good labs. Yeah. Hey, man, that's a, yeah. I think the statute of limitations is passed and he's retired anyway, so I don't know what anybody could do to him. Yeah, those studies are shelved retired anyway so i don't know what anybody could do yeah those those those studies are shelved by now i don't think yeah yeah and i did like when i was uh in grad school i was able to get some of the frozen you know the the controls that were euthanized for humanely euthanized and frozen down i could get some of those out of the for especially from

like the behavior lab or something you know those rats were gold man they were like free rodents you know that were prime large rats and for free so so what is it so so if you were to like try to purchase um laboratory strain rodents what does that require? Do you have to have a... Is there a license for that? I mean, is it like you have to represent them? I mean, how do they... Are they like...

I think a big part of it is you have to have protocols in place for ethical treatment of the animals. You have to be legitimate. There needs to be some oversight. You need to be adhering to you know, over there needs to be some oversight. You need to be adhering to government policies and things like that. And I think that's why rodent supply companies just don't supply to to private individuals anymore, because there's just too much of a risk of something, you know, some some bad press or something occurring, you know, what lost their mind and released a bunch of rats and mice into the streets or something, you know,

and release ratatouille. Exactly. Ratatouille. Uh, um, that's what you got loose right now. Fucking ratatouille. Oh my gosh.

Those things are, are yeah they're gonna be the death of me here um i think i i think i've got i'm not i yeah i'm not gonna say it because i probably don't have it under control but well we'll tune in next week to find out exactly yeah we can talk about it on the holiday show. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think that was a good discussion. Yeah, that was good. That was an important discussion. That's a wrap.

Feeders are an important consideration in this hobby, for sure. Definitely. And it eats other animals, so. Definitely. All right, well, you listening to anything good or seeing any, what are you, the holiday show was fantastic. I mean, obviously I caught the holiday show. Yeah, that was good. I got to clear the air, though.

Freaking nipper, man. He's saying I'm listening to Taylor Swift and country music. Yeah, dude. What is he? Was there? I don't know. You know my playlist. There's no country or Taylor Swift anywhere near my playlist.

I do feel like he misrepresented you a little bit i agree with that and then he's bagging on burritos i'm like dude oh my gosh yeah those burritos were fantastic have you been to brit have you eaten british food some of it's horrible he's not gonna he's not gonna tell me that i mean and first of all like he needs to come to san diego and it's it's really tacos that like i think you need to eat tacos burritos there's nothing wrong with a good california burrito i love it but but you know what i don't think nipper gets to comment you know what i mean those no those out of conus yeah those burritos that we ate were fantastic. Yeah. No outer Conus folks need to eat. They can't fuss about it.

He can just have his English breakfast, you know? Outer Conus. He's out of Conus. Yeah. And, you know, he didn't mention what kind of music he listens to or you listen to. It's like this is what even class, it's like techno. Yeah. No, what did he say? Swedish. What 50-year-old man goes to listen to? It's like this is what even class, it's like techno. Yeah. No, what did he say?

What 50-year-old man goes to a techno? What did he say? Swedish death techno or something? Is that what he listens to? I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he muzzes, you know.

What kind of dance is a muzz? I think he might have demonstrated it, but it was like, oh, man, people in glass houses, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely feel like he set himself up with his airing of grievances. And then I have to admit that in the chat he was responding to something, and his grammar was horrible.

How can a man who criticizes English vernacular have a grammar? Yeah, yeah, you've got to tighten up there. Again, back to the throwing stones issue. Yeah, I totally agree. I totally agree. I love Nipper. He's a wonderful guy. Of course.

I think it's part of his persona. You know, he's got to be the grumpy old man or something. But he's a very lovely individual. I really enjoyed hanging out with him. I was kind of, you know, I don't know what it is. It's like, you know, you see these and you and you kind of prejudge a little you're like oh man can i spend a week with this guy if he is he gonna be like this the whole week and you know and and you know nipper did did throw a little shade or whatever you want to say it was

it was entertaining you know it's all it's all talking shite it's all tie it's all for sure it's all talking shite he's a lot of fun he's a he's a very good person i really yeah i i mean i i hope nobody ever yeah i i love to talk the shite uh you know i i uh my my background is nothing but hazing and shit talking so um you know i i know i know exactly where nippers come from oh yeah come on man like you're throwing the shade yeah for sure but yeah that i i think uh nipper is one of my favorite people he's he's great so um and even when he's muzzing even when he's muzzing i could i could watch nipper muzz and that as long as nipper muzzes and he buzzes and he's happy, I'm good. And I mean, I don't know. This whole, you know, you got to pronounce it the right way.

As long as people know what you're talking about. Maybe, I think we had this discussion, right? With Justin, with Schmitty. Yeah. And talked about, you know, how to pronounce things or what to use like scientific names or whatever. And, you know, as long as we can communicate,

you know, I don't have to say breadily for you to know that I'm talking about breadily. I can say breadily. And you know, great. Now we're going to piss hyper off. Exactly. Oh my God.

Here we go. And I think these people that stay up late trying to correct people on how they're pronouncing things. I mean, I get it. You know, if you're saying papayan uh python then maybe you it would be kind of more humane to correct that person and say it's actually papuan or papuan or however you want to say it i mean papayan's a little bit of a stretch or lesser Sudan. Lesser Sudan is awesome. That's awesome. I say you let that go.

I think that's – Oh, I was in the same boat as you. As long as you know, let them roll with lesser Sudan. No, I think that's worth a correction. It is way lesser Sudan. Way lesser Sudan. It's a little bit far afield from Sudan. So I think that one's worthy of a correction. I side with Nipper on that one.

But when I listen to that show, I'm like, lesser Sudan? Come on, guys. What are you doing? I thought that was pretty entertaining. That was good. Kudos there. That was good. And I thought it was really funny when Iper was complaining about something.

And Eric's like, well, who's the one who threw the barbecue with no meat and no fire or whatever? Didn't plan that very well, did you? And he made the comment, I know we're not Dave Kaufman, because I guess Dave saw quite a few monitors and had a nice little barbecue at the Iper's. It's funny. Yeah, those Aussies, man, they go for the big names. The Tom Crutchfields and the Dave Kaufmans. Guys like us, we get no respect.

We don't have a thriving youtube channel or or uh anyway i'm happy being small potatoes yeah but but the holiday show was very entertaining oh yeah man mr personality of the year for lucas selection well i i'm a monroyalty man that's awesome come on you know me i don't think of myself that way. You are blushing. You are blushing. Oh, my God. I'm not blushing right now. That's ridiculous. No, I feel like I beat out Dr. Loafman. You know what I mean? I figured Lucas would be, you know, Dr. Loafman would be his man of the year.

But no. So, I mean, I'm definitely honored. To be fair, you know, Dr. Lofan would be his man of the year. But no, so, I mean, I'm definitely on it. I think, to be fair, he was last year. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's working down the list. But the fact that I'm on the list, that's pretty awesome. And, I mean, you know, I don't think of myself as that, you know, like, whatever. You know, I'm not not i don't see myself you know who does your co-host does ah that's awesome that's awesome you're the man you're

the man and i you know i i agree lucas is right you got the personality you got the fire it's it's a lot of fun podcasting with you man well. Well, I appreciate that. I feel the same way. I think we're peas and carrots, bro. Peas and carrots. Yeah. Yeah. This is a good mix. You're right.

We have some good chemistry. Good mix. Yeah. I agree with that. Yeah. And, hey, can we just take a minute to talk a little shit about being number two in the network we did it we we we fell short last year uh we were number three last year we're we're number two we now sit at the right hand of the pod father that's that's correct yeah we gotta bask in glory. Who knows how long it'll last. But I think we got a little lucky there because Luke and his wife had a baby,

and so he's been busy a little more with that. But, oh, man, I was watching his latest YouTube video. He did some herping and caught a few. He had some fun captures of some sanduanas, so that was a lot of fun to watch. But yeah, check out his YouTube page. He does some cool stuff. I'm blanking on the name. Luke,

his YouTube, what he calls his YouTube. He's Beaches Scalybeast? I guess I can probably look it up. Yeah, Beaches Scalybeast, yep. He does a really good youtube page so yeah check him out agreed enclosures uh yeah he does a good job thanks to luke's baby we're number two so appreciate that baby well done it's a good well done good baby yeah that's a good baby that's right that's right that's right. That's right.

That's right. You focus on that child now. Yeah. Don't let up, man. You're a parent now. You've got things to do. You've got to be responsible. People to raise. Chuck and I, we're almost empty nesters.

That's correct. I'm close to death. I need this. I need this. You know, like this is. That's right. That's right.'s right this is all that i'm hanging on for honestly you know i don't might as well be those two old muppets you know

i might die if i don't get number two again next year that's right yeah we gotta stay on top man we gotta but and we're gonna have to step up our game because eric is stepping up his game so um that that was one of his comments was that he felt like he's been editing too many podcasts that are not of NPR. And I agree with that because, god damn, he's got a lot of podcasts under his belt right now. He does. Yeah. I mean, that was probably a good thing to step in. He went from collecting every carpet he possibly could get his hands on to collecting every podcast he could possibly get his hands on.

And now he's like, I just want to focus a little bit. I want to focus on my podcast. That's awesome. And it's good to hear our buddy Dustin Grahn has taken over on the Gecko podcast. That's a good fit, and I'm looking forward to listening to that. Yeah. Yeah. And I will say, for our holiday show next week, Dustin will be joining us,

as well as our other fellow fellow herper uh on that on that arizona trip we're getting the band back together and steve sharp will be there too so tops man tops it'll be yeah that's uh yeah my favorite peeps so yeah there is i don't know if there's a well i'm sure there's good company out there but that's my faves yeah and i mean dustin's getting his kudos man he's getting getting uh the the uh kudos for what he's done he's he's what the the recognition that's the word i'm struggling here for that he's getting the recognition he deserves man that guy is the man Can we just say how butthurt is somebody that they didn't find Price Eye? Wow.

Yeah. Scott's comment about he should have worked it harder. Yeah, see? We worked it hard. I mean, we were there at the crack of dawn. We were there pretty much all day looking for Price Eye. We about got heat stroke looking. Mate, mate, it was Chuck who found it.

It was Chuck who found it. There you go, man. There you go. You got to take your kudos, too. Not only did Dustin whoop him on the Price Eye, it was the new tosser in the group who found it. Ouch. That's like a double whammy. Oh, no, no.

That was well-deserved, man. That's not an easy— They're not easy to— I mean, you know. Yep. Even if you're standing over top of them. Oh, my gosh. You might miss them. Oh, my gosh. You got to have Chuck're standing over top of them, you might miss them.

Oh, my gosh. You got to have Chuck there with you or else you're going to miss it. They buzz and then you muzz. We were muzzing that day, that's for sure. Word. A double muzz. Yeah, Steve found the second one and we basically passed by it. So I think you need somebody to flush them.

So apparently on that trip, I was the flusher. I would flush them out, and then whoever was behind me could find the cool stuff. That's a fair statement. That's a fair statement. Hey, I'm behind. We were montane muzzing on that trip. That's right. That was the triple knockout, you know, the trio.

That was a good trip. Yeah. So we'll do it again. I mean, the, the, the Willard, the Willard eye was a little bit of a,

yeah, that's, I mean, it was good to see. I mean, it was cool to see, but again, a team effort,

you know, a team effort wasn't necessarily on our direct team, but he wasn't in our group, but he was on our team. Yeah. Yeah. The right time. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Cause group, but he was on our team. The right time. Yeah, that's right.

Because we pointed a claw about to him, so he returned the favor with a will or die. So it worked. Yep. Well, anything else good out there that people need to check out this week? Yeah, I've been super busy. I haven't had too much else. I listen to the holiday show. Same. Yeah, I've been super busy. I haven't had too much else. I listen to the holiday show. Same, yeah.

Yeah, I haven't. I've just been doing too much. Doing too much. Do less. I've been listening to books lately. Yeah, books on tape? I need to get into a few more podcasts. Yeah. Nice. books on tape to get into a few more podcasts but uh yeah yep nice yeah it looks like jordan russell did an interview on project herpetoculture so oh nice i'll listen to that he goes back aways

huh yeah yeah yeah he used to be into the the morelia as well yeah he was a i guess you can check out my episode They released that last week Oh yeah If you want to listen to me Blather on on Animals at Home Network Of course I do Of course I do Yeah

You ready for the holidays? Christmas You're just ready to go skiing I believe I am Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You ready for the holidays? Christmas? Yeah. You're just ready to go skiing. I believe I am. Yeah. No, I'm ready for a little break. That'll be nice.

It's always fun to hang out with the family. We got to pick up Ashley yesterday, so that was really fun and surprise her with a little early christmas present there was this uh poster outside of heidi's office and uh her there was like you know it's like university propaganda posters or whatever like students university propaganda posters oh my god that's hilarious hey i mean there's some of that out there. Anyway, it was this kid. I guess Ashley found him attractive. And he's in the crowd of a crowded basketball game.

And he's doing the double point at the camera and this intense stare. And so Ashley loved that poster. And every time we'd go past it, we'd point at him. It was kind of funny. And so anyway, they took that poster down and replaced it with some redhead kid eating an ice cream cone. So she was really upset about it. Really bummed, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. And so Heidi went to one of herworkers who was kind of in charge of that area or whatever and he found got the file of that picture and so we printed out this like four by four foot by like two and a half foot poster of this kid pointing and and put it in her room so when she got home from costa rica he was there in her bedroom pointing at her so that's she walked in and she it was it was so cute she like she was so surprised that she was just laughing and crying and hugging us it was it was great it was a fun fun reunion it's always nice to have the kids back. Yeah. Yeah. It's weird having grown-up kids.

Isn't it? Doing their own things. Yeah. Yeah, it's fun to see them blossom, though. They're doing really well. Yep. We're ready for a nice holiday together. Kate comes home next week as well, so we'll have Kate back,

and then we'll have the whole crew back in the house for a couple weeks anyway. And then Ashley's shipping out to the Midwest somewhere. I think she's going up to, like, Michigan or Iowa or something like that. One of those crazy states. She's going to go assemble sheds for Sam's Club or something. That should be interesting. Sheds? Oh, like sheds. I had the wrong sheds.

Not like shed skins. Yeah, I'm like, that's weird. And she's getting paid really well. She'll be out for, I guess, maybe a few weeks. And then she's going to go visit a friend out in Alabama. So she's just going all over the place, but good times. I guess that's the joys of being young and having your whole life ahead of you instead of old and near to the grave like me and Chuck are.

That's right. Holding on to number two. That's all I got to live for. Yeah. All right, my friend. I think we've done it. We've recorded another episode, and hopefully you guys, the listener out there, has gotten something out of it. So thanks for listening to us.

We appreciate you guys for supporting us. We appreciate the people who have sent in suggestions and keep them coming we'll get get you on we've got a few cool guests uh lined up for the new year um so i'm i'm excited to have some some new uh new names on the podcast and nice uh some recognizable people on the podcast it's going to be a fun time so thanks again for uh listening to us i guess we'll shout out the npr network the illustrious podfather and the mackinwookie at his side uh just pumping out the shows and just doing the herp community a huge service so uh we really appreciate you guys you're the you're the best So thanks for hosting our fun little podcast.

And check them out on NPR, MoraleaPythons.com. I should really know that better before I start talking about it. I'm sorry, Eric. I'm sure if you're listening to this podcast, you know where to find the guys. Yeah. Yep. So, yeah, we'll catch you next week with our holiday show. And thanks for listening this week.

And we'll catch you soon. Don't get drunk at your Christmas party. All right. Thank you. Outro Music