Happy to be here!!!!

SCReptiles · 06-22-03, 09:38 AM

After going thru and answering others introductions, it occurred to me that I have not posted one when I first signed on. My interest in herpetology has sort of came full circle. I have been interest in the field as far back as I can remember. My mother was a Cherokee Indian from the VA/KY region. As a small child we would often walk the fields and woods seeking out snakes, lizards, turtles, ect. My father was Euro-American and had a great snake phobia. This being the case I was not able to intentionally keep any reptiles. They divorced when I was about 6 years old and after that I began to keep local snakes I would collect. Basically I started field herping and housing only snakes indigenous to my area. By the late 1980’s I was working with rattlesnakes and copperheads. In the early 1990’s I purchased my first exotic snake, it was a ball python. From there I moved on to Burms, retics, and anacondas. I also kept a few African venomous such as gaboons and cobras. In the mid 1990’s I moved to Chattanooga, TN. TN law is not friendly to venomous, so I only housed pythons and a few other reptiles. By the late 1990’s I had moved to GA which allowed the keeping of indigenous venomous and I moved back into venomous herpiculture. Currently I still house 2 pairs of burms that I have had for many years, but other then them I keep only indigenous reptiles. I greatly enjoy field herping and do it every chance I get. I started keeping indigenous reptiles out if necessity, they were all I had access to. Years later, I keep indigenous reptiles because that is where my interest lies. I am a staff herpetologist at a nature center, but that is only part time. For my actually paying job, I am a fleet manager with a transport company. I do some retail in reptiles thru Scenic City Reptiles, www.SCReptiles.com and I teach classes on snakes, mostly identification and envenomation first aid. I have recently developed an interest in breeding and I am building my stock of North American pit vipers and I hope to be in production by next year. One pair of my burms produced this year, so I think I am on the right track. I have too many specimens to list if I included all we have for sell, so I will only list what I consider my personal collection.
1.1 eastern diamondbacks
1.0 canebrake rattlesnake
1.0 timber rattlesnake
1.0 pigmy rattlesnake
1.0 southern copperhead
2.0 eastern cottonmouths
1.0 FL cottonmouth
2.2 Burm
1.1 black racers
1.1 gray rats
0.1 bull snake
0.1 Scarlet king snake
0.1 yellow belly water snake
0.1 African fat tail scorpion
1.1 Deathstalkers
0.0.1 curly tarantula
0.1 black widow
1.1 eastern brown scorpions (TN locale)
1.0 eastern brown scorpions (AL locale)

Matt_K · 06-22-03, 10:06 AM

welcome to the site!! One he!! of a collection you have there!!

SCReptiles · 06-22-03, 11:00 AM

Thanks Matt, I am pretty happy with my current stock, but it’s growing every week. We have 30 burm eggs down right now, not sure how many we’ll actually get. And we are in the field about 3 or 4 days a week trying to strengthen up our breeding stock. I have nice males on what I am wanting to breed, just need to get the females I want in place. =) What do you keep?

feri · 06-22-03, 11:15 AM

welcome,
all the best with your burm eggs, my female should bay laying in about a month
keep well

Tim and Julie B · 06-22-03, 11:43 AM

Wow, the best of luck to your breeding project! Quite the collection. Geat to have you here!

RachelS. · 06-22-03, 12:52 PM

welcome to ssnakess.com!!

doenoe · 06-22-03, 01:27 PM

Wow, very impressive collection indeed.
Welcome to SsnakesS

ngubitz · 06-22-03, 01:57 PM

Chuck.... I'm very impressed with your collection!.... Although.... I still have no clue what you have??.... Sorry, but, I don't speak Spanish (or Latin, for that matter).... lol
Good luck with those Burm eggs of yours!....

....Neil