The Complete Beginners Guide To Keeping Snakes
The beauty of keeping reptiles is that once you've set up their caging requirements and learned a few basic skills, there are many species that can be safely and efficiently kept within the home and should live out a full, healthy life.
Fortunately the vast majority of the suitable snakes one might choose to keep, such as corn snakes, king snakes or milk snakes, require very little special treatment and soon become very low maintenace captives.
Quiet, well-behaved, not requiring regular walks and virtually scent-free whilst being unusual and fascinating, snakes can be an ideal pet for today's ever-busy lifestyle.
At it's simplest, a glass fish tank with a specially-sold reptile hood or one of the specially made reptile cages (such as those available from http://www.petsmart.com) may be used, and these are often available for sale second hand in local papers.
Wooden cages should be avoided unless they are treated so as to avoid any spillage from the water bowl (many snakes like to bathe) and ventilation should be good as moist cages often lead to skin complaints or respiratory problems.
A length of around 30-45 cm is suitable for a hatchling snake whilst an adult will require a length of 60-90 cm so it can stretch out.
The cage should be furnished with one of the reptile-safe substrates such as beech chippings or corn cob granules and should be placed 1/3 - 1/2 over a safe, specially-sold, low-wattage heat mat to gently warm the substrate for the snake.
These cost just pennies to run each day and generate a gentle background warmth for your pet.
In particularly cold situations such as bad weather, during night-time or in a room which doesn't warm up appreciably during the day an additional form of heat is recommended, such as a gauze-encased lightbulb, to warm the warmer end of the cage (the "hot spot") to around 24-26'C.
This temperature should be maintained at one end of the cage throughout the day though this may drop by a few degrees at night without worry of danger to your pet. If using a bulb a thermostat is recommended to enable you to accurately control the temperature and prevent the cage overheating.
A hide should be included as snakes are often quite reclusive and like to hide away for much of the day, showing themselves early in the morning and later in the evening.
This could be a specially-sold reptile hide but I often simply use a box - like an old cereal box - as they're free and easily replaced when they get dirty.
A solid waterbowl - ideally a terracotta dog bowl - large enough for the snake to submerge itself in (bathing is good for the skin) but difficult to tip over should be filled with fresh water and changed daily as in a warm environment plenty of water is likely to evaporate, and in addition many snakes like to deficate in their water bowl.
And apart from some food you're now all set up!
As you can see keeping the smaller, more docile snakes *doesn't* have the break the bank, nor do you these days need to "make do" with substandard products. Companies like ZooMed make high quality, specialist hardware for just this purpose, and make it available for a very reasonable cost.
Now all you need to do is to convince your girlfriend/wife/mother to let you have the snake itself ;-)
Copyright 2006 Richard Adams
Richard Adams is the owner and founder of http://www.aboutsnakes.com. About Snakes is one of the most popular sources of free reptile information online.
Iyengar Yoga Certified Teacher
Central Florida Vacation
Part 1 Walt Disney World
Disney films were a staple when I was growing up, and we went to Disneyland in California dozens of times; my greatest ambition in those days was to live at Snow White's castle! So to say that I am a Disney Fan is a bit of an understatement. When I moved to Florida from the West Coast, I took every opportunity to visit Walt Disney World in Orlando and never tire of the parks. The last four years I lived there, I even had a clerical job for one of the Disney companies, off property and though I wasnt employed in the Park itself, I was thrilled to be small part of the magic.
We moved back to the West Coast and its been nearly a decade since Ive had the chance to go back, so an upcoming anniversary seemed like the perfect excuse to make a trip. I planned, saved, and dreamed of the trip for months anxious for the day we departed surprising my husband who thought we were doing something else. When we arrived at SeaTac, he found out the destination was Orlando, and good naturedly went along for the ride! Since our last few vacations had been fishing trips, this was set to be a very different kind of trip.
After flying all night, we arrived in Orlando around 7:00 a.m. I had been dreaming of pecan waffles for months so we headed straight to The Waffle House, a fixture in the South; thus energized we headed to Walt Disney World to check in our hotel. Since it opened in 1990, I had always been particularly fond of Disneys Yacht & Beach Club resorts, and we finally were able to stay at the Beach Club! The New England beach theme is charming and relaxing. Since it was early December, the Christmas decorations were all in place and added a unique enchantment to the setting, including a gingerbread carousel.
The hotel was able to allow us early check-in, so we changed and walked to the International Gate at EPCOT, which is near the France pavilion. The morning was bright and warm, and it was blissful to just walk around the grounds soaking up the sun. We spent a couple of hours scoping out what was new since wed last been there, and enjoyed a couple rides before heading back to the hotel in mid-afternoon. Since wed been up all night, we slept for a short time, and were refreshed for a simple appetizer dinner at one of the bars amazing Shrimp cocktails.
The next day we spent most of the day at EPCOT again, taking the time to really explore and enjoy another glorious warm and sunny day. Though there are many familiar exhibits and rides, many have been updated and several new rides awaited our discovery, and everything met our expectations. Mission Space and Test Track were thrilling and exciting and the grounds were especially beautiful, as always!
Since it was our anniversary, we had a special celebration dinner at the Yatchsman Steakhouse, and I even had my first taste of Louis the XIII de Remy Martin cognac. Then we walked back to EPCOT for the nightly Illuminations Fireworks display and then spent the rest of the balmy evening relaxing in the hot tub and going for a swim, with a clear starry sky overhead.
On the 2nd day of our trip, we spent the morning wandering around at Downtown Disney, where we enjoyed lunch at Planet Hollywood, explored the new (to us!) Disney Quest then headed to Disney MGM Studios where we spent the afternoon enjoying the exhilarating Aerosmiths Rockin Roller Coaster, the Twilight Zones Tower of Terror, favorites like Star Tours, and others. A Christmas-themed parade capped off the afternoon, and we took the water launch back to our hotel where we walked around the grounds again. On the way out of the hotel early that morning, we happen to notice several turtles resting in the sun in one of the ponds on the property, and spent a long time watching them before we started the busy day.
The next day we spent the morning at Magic Kingdom, enjoying Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, Space Mountain, and Mickeys Philharmagic, a hilarious 3D movie staring Mickey Mouse and the irrepressible Donald Duck! We then headed to Disneys Grand Floridian Resort & Spa where we were booked for a spa treatment. We then enjoyed dinner at Narcoosees, nestled right on the shores of Seven Seas Lagoon with a perfect view of the Magic Kingdoms nightly fireworks displays. The Christmas decorations at the Victorian-themed Grand Floridian are meticulous and charming including a life-sized gingerbread house, and even toasty hot roasted chestnuts!
Though this was to be the last of our 4 days at the Walt Disney World Resort, more adventures awaited, as I had also booked a 3 night Disney Cruise to the Bahamas. We spent most of our time at Walt Disney World peacefully enjoying the familiar and exploring the new, and even though we never made it to some of the newer attractions like Animal Kingdom, the Sports Complex, or any of the water parks, we felt like we had done so much, relaxed, and truly enjoyed each day to the fullest!
Disney Cruise and the Bahamas in Part 2!
Bryn Hiner - for more information about Walt Disney World check out our website http://www.cheapdisney.info
Yoga Flow Video
Replacing an Intermediate Shroud at Sea
Making good time sailing into the advancing twilight of yet another magnificent tropical evening, all is well with the world and she is feeling quite grand, settling in for a good nights progress toward Manihi. Skipping along on a port tack, her cutwater effortlessly slicing through the faintly ruffled but slinky water, she knows she is cutting a fine image, and just faintly irritated she has no gallery of onlookers to acknowledge her finery. Her crew appreciate the show, but some recognition from others would do wonders for her self esteem - she likes to show off just as much as the next ship! Pride always comes before a fall and with no warning whatsoever and certainly with no foreknowledge on her part or the crew a thundering crack shatters the evening calm. Her captain and sibling crew race up the companionway to see Anglo crew staring skyward at a lazily swinging starboard intermediate shroud. It has parted at the upper spreader tang, dropped into a half hoop and now drooping out to starboard.
Aghast, her crew stare at one another. Having heard and read many stories of yachts losing their rigs at sea, thousands of miles from the nearest yard, because of failed rigging, they are speechless for a few moments. The scene before their eyes spells disaster if they cannot effect a solution quickly. She brings her head around through the wind, and into the hove to position. She is most remorseful but hasnt time to worry about that now. Fortunately, the weather is benign and her crew determine that providing they remain on a port tack, the port side rigging will take the very considerable strain. Equatorial darkness is now upon them, so they secure the swinging end to the starboard lifelines and plan to jury rig another shroud in the morning. Immediate crisis over she returns to her heading, gingerly gathering speed again with no apparent problem.
Phew, that was tricky, she thinks. Maybe she will get out of this one relatively lightly?
Head down and serious she now wants to atone for her earlier rush of vanity. Over an obligatory nerve settling cup of coffee, her shaken crew discuss the problem. Firstly, Manihi Atoll being sparsely inhabited and therefore unlikely to be of assistance is struck off the itinerary. Her course is altered to Rangiroa Atoll which has the greatest population in the Tuamotus. Fishing is the mainstay income earner for most of these atolls and that means boats, ropes, cables, wires, will be in abundance sailors are the same the world over! Into their second cup and with their minds more settled with some reasoned thinking, the major implications of the problem appear to recede for the moment. Given that if all things remain equal, most of her sailing will be on the port tack the entire way to Tahiti, where they know all things marine are available. They are carrying a considerable length of spectra rope and this will be fashioned into a replacement shroud tomorrow. This Spectra line has an even lower stretch factor than Kevlar and if it can be drawn down tight enough over the spreaders and onto the deck fittings it may suffice until they make landfall in Papeete.
When Mother Nature is in the frame, nothing is equal. She carries out her vocation at her discretion. Running a printout from the weatherfax shows no alteration in the weather pattern anywhere in the area of the ocean they are sailing just the steady SSE trades the whole way across this sector. Within an hour of their mishap however, cloud covers the night sky, blackening out the stars. The rising wind backs, bringing rain with it, and our little ship is continually buffeted. It is suddenly squall like, with winds up to thirty knots and likely to come from any direction. Thirty minutes into these conditions, the captive hoop of steel wrestles itself free and commences a pattern of wild arcs amidships. Its main target is the mainmast and every few seconds this eleven millimetre diameter steel punch wants to embed itself into the aluminium spar. The tang originally attached to the end has long since disappeared into the sea with a loud hiss, leaving a lethal steel rod hell bent on penetrating anything in its swooping path. Aluminium, wood or a skull would make no difference, in that all would accept the flying projectile to a depth dependant on its own physical resistance.
Her mainsail had been dropped earlier at the beginning of the squall attack, and she is sailing under genoa only, therefore her sails are under no threat of damage. How to quickly secure this flailing missile and survive before it wreaks major havoc? With a now heaving deck her skipper, lifejacketed and clipping onto the jackline, scrambles portside. Crew, shining the weaving spotlight in the general direction through the rain, observe the wet and glistening shroud flashing back and forth through the beam they are thankful to be in the cockpit still. Her captain, crouching low and dodging it at the same time, attempts to catch it as it swoops past.
By the time it reaches the end of its arc to port it is way too high anyway, and out of reach so plan A is not going to succeed. By now, it has whacked the mast many times already, fortunately, not always head on. Crew, seeing the black shape slumped in the port scupper think he has given up or been hit. He rises again, this time with the port side halyard loose in his hand and following several misses manages to catch the tip in the slack halyard, whip the cord around the steel as many times as possible, draw it down taut and fix it to a port side pad eye. Job done, he straightens and scuttles back into the cockpit grinning from ear to ear. No doubt he thinks he is a hero now, not realising that it was a pure stroke of luck the shroud caught in the halyard on its wildly gyrating path. However, the possibility of any further immediate damage being eliminated, she is content, allowing him to bask in his thirty seconds of fame. Tomorrow is another day, when options will be examined, but for now cosy bunks are awaiting. Filled they are, leaving the remaining crew on watch to ponder what might have been.
Gently swinging from her mast head, her captain surveys the scene all around him. A brilliant tropical morning, swept fresh and crystal clean by the overnight rain, leaves a scintillating picture. Three hundred and sixty degrees of perfect and sparkling blue disc encircles her, holding her permanently captive, dead centre. Swivelling his head, he marvels at the outrageous extent of it. Endless, like a womans love, the blue ocean seemingly stretches to infinity. The canopy overhead is without blemish, but for several fluffy and harmless looking thunderheads dotted low on the horizon in the south west quadrant. Probably hovering over some distant speck of land, but being so far off, cannot be seen over the horizon. For the rest, a broad canvas of wide shades of blue, lightly brushed with glittering sparkles as the sun reflects from the wave tips in the wispy breeze. No camera, restricted as they are to a small window, will ever be capable of capturing the overall uplifting feeling of seeing and being part of such a scene. Pumped full with a tranquil joy of being alive, her captain turns his head to the job at hand. Dawn breaking, as it had this morning, into a beautiful unruffled day with only a light breeze on her stern, her captain had decided a trip up the mast was in order to see what could be done about her errant shroud. He would also inspect Miguels swage on her forestay.
Waste of time even looking at that! she says, ever practical, good or bad, what does he imagine he could do about it out here?
Human nature being what it is, there was no way he wasnt going to be hoisted up the extra height to the truk for an inspection. Apart from anything else, that is as high as he can go on her and he will go there! Normally at sea, a trip up the mast would only be contemplated in an emergency. Five degrees of movement on deck translates to a fifteen to twenty degree arc up here. It is imperative that the mast is clamped firmly between the thighs of the climber to avoid swinging out and slamming back into the spar. These youngsters doing a round the world race, go up in all weathers the fearlessness of youth no doubt propelling them. One becomes a little more prudent with age.
Miguels engineering masterpiece is of course flawless and he feels a spurt of affection for that moustachioed man and the product of his craft. Three thousand five hundred nautical miles in their wake, toiling he will be still. Drinking in the view, lingering as long as is practicable without the crew on deck becoming suspicious, distracted (its a twenty metre drop to the deck!) or just leaving him up there, he hails the deck to lower him to the intermediate spreader. Hooked to his belt is the spectra line, and in his pouch a replacement tang. Glancing down the whole length of rope all the way to the deck, he is momentarily fascinated by the convoluted gyration it takes from in close to the mast, to way out over the sea. With its woven diamond blue and white pattern it looks much like a very long and very lazy python, snaking all the way up to his rear end!
Come on, she checks him, get on with the job!
It is relatively easy to double loop the spectra cord through the tang, hook it into the keyhole in the mast and drop the two loose ends down to deck level for attaching to the deck fitting. On the way down he checks the leather spreader end covers for wear. Back on deck with several inner thigh skin burns, the results of which are deposited somewhere up and down the mast, the episode is shared over a cooling beer cannot rush these jobs at sea!
Thoughts of lazy days in those far off, but approaching ever closer, fabled south sea islands, spur them on, and her captain and Anglo crew set about drawing down the jury rig shroud as taut as their combined strength will allow. With no block and tackle system available that would work in this situation, they will have to rely on pure physical strength. This is quite considerable in Anglo crew but her captains contribution will be somewhat puny by comparison. Being on the starboard side, the slack side, they surprise themselves as to the degree of tension they are able to exact upon the brute. Even tension with its twin intermediate shroud on the port side is not so much an issue now, as having in place a rig that will keep the standing rigging upright without breaking or collapsing. In the event, the product of their exertions preserves this premise admirably all the way to Papeete Port. Meanwhile, the arrival of a platter of steaming scones liberally coated with globs of rapidly melting bright yellow butter part way through the operation, undoubtedly inject them with sufficient hairy chested drive to crank down that extra pound or two required.
Men! she thinks, theyre so easy!
The completed assembly, without too close an inspection, looks passably shipshape. Strong enough for fair to moderate weather anyway, and her crew admire their resourceful handiwork from her cockpit. Both she and her captain pray for the Trades to hold until Tahiti.
You can download the complete Voyage of the Little Ship Tere Moana on my website www.sailboat2adventure.com
Vincent Bossley is a publisher and lives on the Northern Beaches of Sydney, Australia. He has is own website http://www.sailboat2adventure.com for cruising sailors, sailors planning their lifetime adventure, armchair sailors, virtual sailors and in fact anyone who has ever dreamed of sailing the oceans of this beautiful planet of ours.
You can find him on http://www.sailboat2adventure.com
Yoga Pilates Wayne Pa
