Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Let me just say thank you. You guys have provided me with much entertainment. I don't have a lot of time to read all of your posts but somedays I have a lot of waiting and while I could be doing better things, I read your posts. lol!! Sometimes you are hilarious; better than tv. I have never posted here in the monitor forum before, I usually just read, but today I felt especially motivated to say something. I also feel the need to backup my profession. I think that science is the coolest job ever. I am always asking questions and trying to find a way to get answers. But some of you guys are wound up so tight, just relax. Or don’t because I’ll loose my afternoon entertainment. HAhAhA And FR I totally respect you. Your methods have revolutionized husbandry for monitors and kingsnakes, and you have been doing it for longer than anyone I know of. You can be quite abrasive though. But if I ever have any husbandry questions I will not hesitate to consult you, but that does not mean you are God or something. Likewise I often consult others that have more experience than I do regardless of the subject. It just makes sense to do so, I make less mistakes that way (I make a lot of mistakes, but I learn the most from them too). But please don’t downplay the work that scientists are doing. There are a lot of young minds out there that I am sure also respect you, and some of the things you say may discourage them to want to be a scientist. I just think that is unfair to my profession. I just want to say that you don’t have to be some uptight person to be a scientist. I am a herpetologist and I work as a biochemist five days a week cloning proteins. I look forward to going to work. How many people can say that? Also I am really good at keeping reptiles. I’ve been doing it for 15 years and see all of life’s events. So it is possible to do both, please remember that. Thank you again for everything you have offered this community.
Cheers,

“Relax, don’t worry, Have a Homebrew!” Charlie Papazian
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Jason L. Dobry
Research Associate
College of Veterinary Medicine
Department of Veterinary Comparative Anatomy, Pharmacology and Physiology
Washington State University

...took the words right out of my mouth lol

but one thing really bothers me with your comments. Your god comment is totally out of line and very disheartening.

I have to ask, how on earth would having reptile experience, and being good at something like breeding reptiles be equated to being a GOD? Sir, that comment reflects your insecurity.

I would think mainly young kids would erroneously place a person on a pedestal for being good at something. Sir, you saying that is a respect loser for you.

You mentioned kingsnakes, if you know my history with that type of reptile, then you must know that I have and had, lots of friends and peers that were excellent keepers. Some of those keepers, much like myself, would successfully keep anything we set our minds and energys on. Some of those folks are in the NW. The main reason I ventured into varanids and they did not is, hmmmmmmmm I had space. Wow, that surely makes me a god!

What is surprising to me is, how does a decent keeper with other reptiles(myself) come over to varanids, and be instantly super successful? In my first six months of varanid keeping, I ended up with over a hundred eggs in the incubator. Sir, that means, I did not learn this trade with the monitors, I learned it with other reptiles. I simply adjusted my experience to fit monitors. That does not take a GOD.

As I have said, time and time again, I am not a varanphile or whatever. And I do not want to be one, as in my opinion, this is one weird bunch. I perfer the company of my peers, that are all success with reptiles, I am just one of the guys. Ask them. Its only in this backward varanid world, that I am seperated from the pack. That does not speak of me being special, but of others not doing their job.

Sir, once I was asked to critique a reptile department(yes, they supplied an editor)hahahahahahahahaha. One paragraph said this. "success, spawns success? it creates interest and keeps the people in the department, on the same page and working as a team. It keeps them moving in a positive direction". I also said, failure in the same way, creates more failure. After a while, instead of looking for ways to succeed, the keepers look for ways to protect themselves and not accept blame.

I believe in a nutshell, this is what happened to the monitor world. Failure caused varaphiles to seek excuses for their failures, instead of looking for ways to succeed. So as you see with these fine gentlemen, instead of offering methods to succeed, they only offer methods to fail.

A great keeper from the NW once expressed a very useful way to look at keeping reptiles. Failure is not a snake or any reptile dying or laying bad eggs or eating eachother. Failure is you giving up. So, is he the GOD????????? Ernie(pooh)Wagner, the reptile God. In a way yes he is. As he is the one who spawned the other great NW reptile keepers. Ok, hes only a regional god.

Then a Fla. reptile breeder of condros and other pythons, came up to me at a show and said, Hey Frank, do you know why we are so good at this???? I gave him a puzzled look and said, no why? He said, because we are both to dumb to know when to give up. hahahahahahahahahahaha I laughted and thought to myself, how right he is. Is he a god too?

One of my BIG detractors on monitors, started this war because I was asked to give a talk a varanid sym. Then after the talks I went off with my longtime snake friends instead of with them and their group of varaphiles. How petty is that? I have my own friends and I was staying at their house. I did not know any of these varanid fellas, not a single one.

My friends like all reptiles, not just one kind. How silly is liking one kind of reptile, no wonder they are so backward. Cheers

you have a nak for picking out one harmless phrase and twisting it into something it's not. and now he lost his respect for it. this is what i was talking about in my previous thread. he just got done saying that he respects you and your success with reptiles.

How does that differ with what you guys do, as you just did the same thing.

You picked a tiny useless bit from a whole bunch of meaningful bits. How funny are we? stop here, the rest is useless stuff

So Mister Johnson, I ask you? he accused me of thinking I am a god(a totally useless statement by that poster) and then get upset when I act just like the rest of you. You see I am just like the rest of you, I have all sort of human maladies. Why would you expect different? That I happen to have lots of experience with reptiles does not exclude me from other normal or abnormal faults. In fact, liking reptiles has always been considered a maladie(sickness) in its own right.

So you leave me wondering, what the heck do you expect from me. You don't want me to be superior, as that would ruin you fellas, and you don't want me to have faults. So yes, I wonder about you?

I do know about me, I do not have to wonder, I will go on being me. You know, who I was long before I ever kept a monitor. I still happen to think keeping monitors is fun and rewarding, so I guess that means I do not have to dwell on you guys. I have better things to think about. So go on with your bad self. Cheers

"How does that differ with what you guys do" i'm not part of team blue. i'm not a scientist. however i do like to read, listen and learn from their field observations. i would imagine when you sit and watch these guys for 6mo to 12mo at a time you can learn a lot about natural behavior. i know you disagree (at least with some people), you don't even have to say it.
i'm trying to be a good captive keeper. so, on the other hand, you're one the most successful captive breeders and i would love to listen and learn from your experiences as well.
i'm not gonna choose sides like many here have. i'll accept good ideas and info from who ever has it. and i'll share mine as well.

cheers
shay

Sides, you keep saying picking sides. What their oddball arguements are designed to do is cause you to think the sides are me against them. Or me, against science. Both of those are very wrong.

The sides are, all keepers vs. keeping monitors successfully.

So, no, its not about sides, ITS about you picking information that WORKS with your captives. Cheers

roger that FR. lets talk about our opponents

i'm focusing on a panoptes breeding project. starting fresh infact i just brought home a group of 4 CBB a few days ago. i have an adult male. had an adult female, she past away the same way your female cumigi did. i think i've told you that story before - other forum.

how are yours doing/breeding? yours are v.p.horni right? you have such a vast and exotic collection, i thought i'd ask to make sure. have you ever kept v.p.p. or v.p.rubidus?
where is your "for sale" list?

cheers

Arrgggggggg but I don't know how to talk about monitors. hahahahahahaha.

At this time I do not keep pure V.p.horni. And I seen and handled both V.p.p. and V.p.r. And actually wild betweeners of those two. Also, there are far more "types" "regional morphs" "subspecies" whatever you would like to call them out there. Seen a lot of those as well.

I am keeping pure V.flavirufus and Pure, V.gouldi. And a ton of crosses. Actually not a ton anymore. Just three or four small groups. Which includes my banded crosses, a captive produced consistant form. What is so very funny, of all the monitors I have, the banded crosses are the only ones that throw babies that are consistant to the adults. Nearly all other types and species I have throw a wide varity of pattern types and colors.

I have had no problem keeping a breeding V.p.horni. With the only exception being, they are bit much. They get too big for me, and they act to big as well.

At one time, I raised a horni that became like an arcade game. It was such an aggressive feeder, it would charge the front of the cage and did so very quickly. Well, my friends would often ask it they could stick their finger in the cage. You know, to see if they could get it out before the panoptes got it. Well, a long bloody story short, my friends do not seem to be that quick, not in reaction time and not in brain power. So got tagged many times. hahahahahahahahahaha.

Anyway I learned lots and lots from Panoptes, I did lots of tests on them. They are a great teaching monitor.

I do not post or have a, for sale list. If I cannot sell a monitor or clutches of monitors, I post them on KS. Mostly they are sold or excessed(traded) long before I have to advertise. Cheers

In lew of your post, how come after I post all sorts of really nice pics(some out of focus) of monitors doing STUff, I add some commentary, very little but some, And you guys have nothing to say on the subject of my post? You only talk about me, or them, or some other unrelated stuff. Why is that sir?

I know, when I look at my own pictures, I have literally thousands of questions. I also see lots of things I understand and lots of things I do not understand.

I would think you too could see some of this and actually ask about them.

I do get a few questions, like, what kind of dirt is that? the answer is, I don't know what kind it is. It did not come with a label and I very little about names of different soils. Or, are they for sale. Or in a recent case, what other snakes do you have. None of which is about the actual subject. Which in this case is varanid nesting. So, what were you saying about me???? I forgot. Cheers

Forgive me for the accusation. But all I am saying is that you should also be willing to listen to others. Please only take what I said as constructive critisism. Everyone can use that.
Cheers,
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Jason L. Dobry
Research Associate
College of Veterinary Medicine
Department of Veterinary Comparative Anatomy, Pharmacology and Physiology
Washington State University

The problem is, I have listened to them. This battle has been going on for several years.

Jason, I have a feeling you have fallen for their propaganda, I do not dislike science, or academia. Its only these few people that do not practice science, but use the name of science, that bother me.

Simply put, When is the lack of data, become data????? The lack of data is always a lack of data. The lack of data does not lead to real events, it leads to assumptions. Which they are full of.

What bothers me is, they come here, were there are people doing pretty well. And stay all this and that, taken from their lack of data. Sir, taken from assumptions. They do not know what monitors are doing, they assume what monitors are doing. The point is, they have shown a distint lack of husbandry experience. And a distint lack of taking any information from their field work and applying it to captives. In fact, they not done much to nothing with captives. Yet, they come and say we are all wrong. Dude, thats not about science. Thats about human behavior(not the good ones either)

Again, they are welcome to believe anything they want about wild monitors, no skin off my elbow. But why do they say I'am wrong about this and that and everything varanid. Yet do not offer one tiny bit of advice or any successful options to consider. All I hear is, your wrong. Telling me I am wrong is absolutely of no benefit. Showing me or others a better way would be of great benefit. Or even a way thats equal in results but is easier to do. Something of benetif.

Sir, what they offer has been written in old petshop books twenty years ago. Most is useless, some is harmful, but none is up to date. That is, up to date with monitors actually doing something.

Whats funny is, most of us used those old recomendations, and moved on to something better.

Jason, can't you see, they have offered nothing. In the last few days, I posted more varanid success then they have had in their collective lifes. Thats not bragging, thats a reflection on them. And truely its OK for them to not be good in this field, the actual keeping and breeding of monitors. But why do they feel the need to attack me, and I am successful. Sir, that is the question of the day?

So sir, take your question about me, and ask them. Ask why do they attack the methods of someone far far more successful then them?? Jason, it is a good question.

And I forgive you, but please keep this about monitors. I do not think breeding reptiles makes me special. I have grandkids, they make me special. As least in their little eyes. Sir, that is something far more important then this crapola. Cheers

Sorry!

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Michele