Hi Gregg, I thank you for the honest post.



ITs very telling. There are lots of things to think about.



First, did I ever and I mean ever, say I wanted to get through to everyone. No sir. I not only never wanted that, I have worked hard to not do that. That sir, is yours and others who want that. Its your wishes that I get to more people. Not mine. Is that true?



About how folks take what I say, or you say, is theirs to do and they will do what they see fit. I do not want to influence that.



You said, you offer direct answers, I will say, if they ask a question because they did not know something. A Direct answer will not be of help. If your dealing with living animals, and we are. Then there is never one answer. I hope to allow them to know why they do what is needed, that way, they can make a good choice, not copy a copy of a copy.



A question, how can you give a direct answer to a question with many answers, with living animals there is no one answer.



If you give them a direct answer, and I allow them to think. Then, WE did a good job. Yes?



I have been at this a very long time and with all manner of reptiles. And While I do not claim much. My approach has worked well in fact much of what you do was developed by me. And other keepers of my time. Recently, the last twenty years or so. I revised the captive approach to varanids and what was crazy stuff 20 years ago, is standard now. And all done the by me and my approach. Varanid husbandry was surely behind the times, as it was indeed very rare to produce a captive baby, now its still not ACROSS the board, but only because monitors require behavior and do not survive the rack approach(take work). And, I did it exactly as I am now.



I also did not publish, I did it by doing and being frank blunt and at times rude.



THe point is, most folks do not want to learn, only a few do. I am interested in the few. Then that few and I can effect others. pyrimid approach if you will and it works.



As I have said, you guys are doing fine, so here, its not about changing, its more about heading in a direction you do not go, or want to go. Behavior



About you allowing choices and observing no difference. I could help you there. You will not see anything different, unless you offer the right different choices. In the varanid world, your situation is common. There was the same type of approach. I have to ask, did you offer different choices, or the same choice many times? That is important. Often, keepers offer the same choice many times, or the same choice differently. All in all, thats not a choice.



I explained my problem, I do not look at what I do for a goal. I see animals in nature and wonder why I cannot do that. Then I keep changing things until I see what I saw in nature.



About your nesting, You said, you saw no difference. The hatchrates are the same. Did I say it always effects hatchrates? no I did not. What it effects is stress on the females. How much it relieves stress is not a yes or no, its about degrees. its about how well you supported nesting. and how different it was from what you were doing.



Good nesting allows the eggs to be deposited as soon as they are fertilzed. right after the shed. With eggs deposited the next day, there is no embryp or blood vessels. With eggs dropped 10 days after the shed, there is a well developed embryo and network of blood vessels. The eggs indicate how long the eggs are held. The longer they are held, the more stress on the female. If your married and had kids, go ask your wife if she wanted to hold those babies in her for LONGER, then duck, cause the answer will not be rational and often result in violence.



The benefit is, the female does not hold the eggs long and suffers very little negative effects from egg laying. Normal reproduction in nature is, well, its a normal event and does not cause stress or ill effects. Normally they drop eggs and back to work they go.



In nature, you cannot even tell they laid. In captivity, the often look like heck. Why? Remember, in captivity, we should not see the bad side of natural, that is our advantage.



I will ask, to what extremes did you go? Did you keep increasing the size and depth of the nest until there was no more improvement? If not, you only took one step. then said, theres not much difference.



As a scientist, I think to test means to test to failure. All good things have limits, if it gets too good, it will fail just like not good enough. What I am saying is, it takes lots of tests, specially when you as a keeper, do not have a target.



As I work from what I see in nature, I have a target.



Back to the top. Your reply is full of I this and I that, your thoughts and wishes, which is great. I get that from that other hog guy too. Which is also great, but all in all, I am also an I. But you do not respect that. Why can't I just be me. You do know that I only attack when attacked. I never attack questions, but questions are rare around here. except for the beginers, I get accused of knowing everything, yet i am always asking questions. But you guys never ask questions, do you already know everything?



You said, FR your right, but but but. If I am right, then how about helping instead of fighting. Hmmmmmmmmmm there I go with all the questions. Again, I do not claim to be right, right is only temporary with everything.



Now I am going to attack you, hahahahahaha not really. I am going to ask you a few questions, and please answer them honestly.



Are most of your cages sparten(minimal cage stuff)? are most the same? do any of your cages reflect hognose adaptions? Do any of your cages have deep substrate, say over a foot deep? Do any of your cages have a temp range from cool,50's to 60's to say 150F. The reason I ask the temp range is, thats what is a common temp choice in nature and its used, the whole range.



So with the above questions in mind, and only loosely, what does anything in your cages have to do with hognose? I am not trying to insult you, I only hope to get you to realize your ability to recieve something different is limited by what you offer as choices.



I do not know your answers nor do I need to know them. As this is for you. If you do not offer choices they would make in nature, then how do you expect them to know what to chose? This is a really good question. You see, they do not read or have the internet, they only know that which is natural to them.



Take substrate, in captivity, its about ease of cleaning and masking smell. In nature, they are so very particular about soil type. So particular that they do not even crawl on the wrong soil(if it can be avoided)



Something to think about, where I live, we have a huge range of soil types. And we have a huge number of nose snakes, longnose, hooknose, leafnose, patchnose, hognose, ridgenose, dang, i am missing some. Dang our vine snakes have the weirdest nose and they are not even a nose snake.



Anyway, whats different about westerns and mexican hognose, the nose perhaps, wonder why? Have a great night.

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