MEADVILLE TRIBUNE (Pennsylvania) 01 January 08 Area man takes menagerie of reptiles on the road (Ryan Smith)
Chicago: There’s nothing like the love between a boy and his pet — alligators.
And venomous snakes, crocodiles and other potentially-lethal reptiles.
At least, that’s the case for Jonathan Custead, the now-21-year-old who’s taken his Dangerous Reptiles of the World show to a multinational level after years of shocking, amazing and educating crowds around the region.
Most recently, the lifelong Cochranton resident and his reptiles took their show on the road to the NBC Travel Expo in Chicago. Part of a string of annual expos in major cities nationwide, the event brought out major newscasters and travel industry types from around the globe, according to Custead.
Custead was invited by NBC to do around six shows for the Expo’s crowds at Chicago’s Navy Pier over a two-day period in November. “It was huge,” he said in a recent interview. “It was a great success. There were tons of people at every show.”
To hit the big-time has been Custead’s goal since he began showing the reptiles — all of which live comfortably at the Custead residence near Cochranton — around age 12. Splitting his time between performing the show and working for his father at Custead Saw Mill, he’s become increasingly serious about making what was a hobby into a career.
Between now and March, Custead said he has shows booked in spots including Reading, New Jersey, Massachusetts and New York. And come August, he and the reptiles will again be performing at the Crawford County Fair.
It’s not the same old routine he’s putting on, either.
“Within the last year, I’ve completely changed my show all around,” he said. It was getting to the point where “it wasn’t really exciting for me and all the animals I have.”
What he’s doing now, he said, is showing “everything people don’t normally get to see.” Reptiles “are awesome animals. To me, the more dangerous the animals, the ones that are more aggressive, (the more) I love them.”
And sure, Custead admits he gets a kick out of scaring crowds both young and old with, say, a black Mamba — widely considered to be the world’s deadliest snake.
But what it’s really about, he said, is to get rid of what he said are often irrational fears associated with those sorts of scaly, slithery, fanged creatures.
“Those are the animals that most people are afraid of,” and “I believe phobias are passed down by parents,” he said. “I’m not really trying to get people to love” the reptiles, “as long as they earn their respect. ...That’s what really keeps me going.”
That sense of respect should be readily observed for all dangerous animals, he said. The recent incident where a 350-pound Siberian tiger at the San Francisco Zoo escaped from its enclosure and fatally mauled a 17-year-old is one example of how complacency with such animals may lead to deadly results, he said.
“They’re wild animals” after all, he said. And “to educate the people (of that fact) is huge.”
Custead’s local sponsors for his shows include Sunset Memorial, Klasen Oil Co., Walter L. Dunn Construction, the Carousel shop, Cochranton Veterinary Clinic, Patterson’s Auto Wrecking, Cochranton Co-op and Girardat Transportation, all based in Cochranton, and, in Meadville, Pennco Tool and Die Inc. and Griffin Motor Co.
Area man takes menagerie of reptiles on the road