Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am finally going to try and post my herps in a list like everyone does. Here is what I keep.
I consider these mine as they are not going to be sold.
I am sold out of everything else I had for sale but I still have eggs left so it is too hard to keep track of those but this is my main group that stays with me
Nosey Be Panthers 1.1
Ambanja Panthers 1.1
Veilds 2.1
Bearded Dragons 1.2
Blue Tongue Skink 0.0.1
Crested Geckos 1.3.5
Madagascar Giant Day Geckos 1.3.2
Leopard Geckos 3.8
Red Eyed Tree Frogs 2.0
Whites Tree Frogs 3.0
Tiger Legged Monkey Frog 1.0
Clown Tree Frog 0.0.1
Cuban Tree Frog 1.0
African Reed Frog 0.1
Grey Tree Frog 0.0.1
Non Herps (I guess if you count these I have an even 50)
African Grey 1.0 (Marley is the King of all he sees)
Cats 1.1
I have fish too but who is counting.
It's funny even though you would think I don't have time for all I have managed to get a good routine feeding and cleaning and I check on and handle each one daily.
I even know each ones favorite food and can tell if one is not acting right.
When I lose one it hurts just as much too.
I still miss Lelo and Gala and think of them daily.

This is Cheddar one of my Leos

...oh, yes - and you, too LOL!!!

lele
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0.1 veiled - Luna
0.2 green anoles (Jaida, no name)
0.1 brown anole - Jamaica
0.2 house geckos - (still no names)

I brought some plants home and even washed them with soap and water. Well while they dried a brown anole.
I guess that's what it is (dk brown with white spots all over and a red dewlap)
Hitched a ride on it into my herp room.
He has decided he likes my female Veiled's cage!
He is on it or in it every day for a month now.
He likes her active UV bulb and basks under it every day.
He fits through the holes on her cage and goes in and out as he pleases.
I am kind of worried he will get eaten or give her some disease but he is super quick and I can't catch him.
She seems to leave him alone even though he steals some of her crickets.
Actually he catches the runaway crickets so I stopped trying to catch him and the cats don't go in that room so I have left him alone and let him come and go as he pleases.
I guess he did not like being homeless. LOL

But I've always wondered how much people who have, say 47, lizards.....pay for elctricity a month. We noticed when we first got Roan, with having his basking lamp, his uv buld and a fountain going 12 hours it day, it put our electric bill up about $8-10/ month. We've since gotten rid of the bacteria trap...i mean fountain, but we have also gotten another chameleon. We can't tell the difference now because our rates and service fees have gone up. But we pay about $30 more a month, then we did a year ago. (before roan and jade)

So, how much more do you have to pay with 47 lizards?

again, I'm not meaning to pry....just real curious about what my future is going to be like!!! Reptiles are addicting!

Tara

1.1 veiled

I've got alittle over 100 herps right now and our electric bill is about 500-600 a month, alot of that is our ac and our 150 gallon reef tank though.

My house is not very big though.

But I am in Florida and they are in their own room which stays pretty warm so I don't need very hot bulbs to heat the leos up.
Cresteds overheat easily and need no heat or UV
The chams are the majority of the heat and I have the heat bulbs on a thermostat. They all go off and on when the temp dips or spikes.
I have a couple of humidifiers in the room so they tend to share that. Plus I mist twice a day and as that evaporates I get more moisture.
My leos even like it because their dens tend to be more humid than the ouside environment so they have shown no ill effects being in the room.
As for UVB bulbs I have 4 ft long fixtures that go over two cages at a time so they tend to share that too.

My power bill has gone from $50 monthly to over $300. I help out on the cost of taking care of my reptiles by breeding my own rodents and a lot of my crickets.
Cricket

Try using some thermostats maybe it will help save lots of electricity for you. It may be well worth the price of the thermostats. My bill may be $100 more but thats it.
I think your climates may have lots to do with it.
Our high temp today was 87 F and our low is in the upper 60's
I can see if you are heating several cages in low temps it would be a problem.
I may go the whole winter without needing night time heat for my animals.

With all my critters and aquariums (150g saltwater and 90g reef), my electric bill averages 300/mo in PA. I also have been using the heater recently as I am accustomed to California temps and it's quite colder in PA.
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Raf

1.2 Jacksons Adults (Frank, Patty, Lucille)
0.0.1 Jackson's baby (George, the only survivor)
0.1 Adult Sulcatta (POOPIE,I bought it from Victor at Kobey's in SD)
0.0.2 Baby Sulcattas (frick and frack)
1.0 Home's Hingeback Tortoise (SPEEDY, From Victor as well)
1.2 Red ear slider babies (Hingis, Dingis and Dorkus)
1.0 Red Siberian Husky (Harley)
0.1 Black Lab (Krissy)
0.1 English Bulldog (Alice)
0.1 Blue Merle Great Dane (Wednesday)
Saltwater Fish and Inverts too

hmm, my list might take awhile.
1.1 veileds
4.6 ambanjas
2.4 sambavas
1.1 red bar ambilobes
0.1 sailfin chameleon (montium)
1.0 fischers chameleon
2.1 deremensis chameleons
3.3 helmetted geckos
3.7 leopard geckos
5 knobtail geckos
3.2 underwoodisaurus geckos
2.3.2 crested geckos
2.2 leachianus geckos
1.4 salmon bearded dragons
2.3 blood bearded dragons
1.1 ornate uromastyx
5 red eye tree frogs
3 african spur thigh tortoises (family pets but I'll include them anyway)
1.4 red tegus
1.1 black and white tegus
1 blue tongue skink
1 savannah monitor
and some albino kingsnakes that are my bfs and I dont really feel like digging through the rack and counting, thinking there are about 6

eggs incubating: crested geckos, helmetted geckos, and ambanja panthers

gravid females: helmetted geckos, crested geckos, 2 ambanjas, and 2 sambavas

I am not the only nutcase on the forum.
Hmmmmmm Leachies maybe next year we can work some kind of trade.

n/p

I gave up naming them a long time ago. Most of the chameleons have names but thats about it

Sounds like we ladies need to do some "good ole fashioned herp tradin'...!!!!!!!!

We'd love to add a couple of nice leos to our pets... and we got a couple of breeder pairs of cresteds (Dragon Den stock) that we could part with.

We have so many chams - don't know if I can list them all - but I will start the counting. And... for those inquiring minds - yes, the adults all have names! hahahahaa

We don't bother giving the little guys names until they are adopted into the breeding colony. But just for kicks & giggles - we currently have (under 5 months of age): 27 flapneck; 83 veiled; 25 panthers; 23 jackson. There are more panther eggs getting close - so the count changes weekly.

I need a abacus.... *sigh*

Just recently, we found homes for the 2 rescued male BTS that we had for over a year... and hubby got a pair of uromastyx. They have their own "hot room". One end of the house is the Sahara and the other end is montane species! The babies are in the middle. Too much fun!
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Let's see now. I havenot counting offspring or eggs)
1.1 Green Iguanas-both over 5ft. long
1.3 Leopard Geckos 3 Anoles
1.1 Frilled Dragons 1.6 Bearded Dragons
11.15 Veiled Chameleons 0.2 Senegal Chameleons
2.1 Egyptian Uromastyx 1.2 Nigerian Uromastyx
1.0 E. Desert Collared Liz 1.0 Blizzard Leopard Gecko
0.1 Miami Corn Snake 1.1 Ball Pythons
1.1 Desert Horned Vipers 1.1 Russian Sand Boas
1.1 Brazilian Rainbow Boas
1.1 Tangerine Honduran Milk Snakes
1.1 Marathon Keys Rosy Rat Snakes
1.1 Banana Phase California King Snakes
0.1 Rosehair Tarantula(not a herp,yeah I know)
and my 13 year old son has 4 lizards in his room.
0.1 Bearded Dragon 1.0 Mali Uromastyx
1.0 E. Desert Collared Liz 0.1 Leopard Gecko
Part of these I breed and part are these are pets.
There you have it. Hope I didn't forget someone.
Cricket

I don't really have a lot of pets yet. I have two cats, two budgies, a dwarf hamster, a fish, and my female ambanja panther cham.
I live in a two bedroom apartment with my dad - yes, STILL with my dad, I'm just little (19) and I'm a daddy's girl
I'm PLANNING on having a ton of herps.. and other animals too. I want to get into keeping/breeding different types of chams and exotic birds. You could add a macaw to your collecttion! or a grey congo... Then I'd be COMPLETELY jelous of you and your herps and your bird, and I'd have to move in like the anole! lol

He is a congo African Grey
He is the king of the house and his favorite thing to say besides "Want some"
is "It's a frog"
He speaks with understanding (not so rare in grey's) and can actually answer simple questions.

A photo of Marley, 4 years old now.

That's not fair! WHat do you do for a living? I'm a student... once I'm "set" in a job and have a steady income I will be expanding, but having all those animals must be expensive!! Are there any budget tricks you can share with me?

Most people think that means I have lots of $$ but it is far from true especially in this economy. Our store has been open 10 years and so it is pretty established but even so it is just us two working here. We do lots of work especially framing for 2 people to handle and we put in lots of hours but at least it is something we like doing and some of the animals come to my job with me. A couple of them live here.
One thing that helps about having a business is that I run my animals like a business. I buy bulk supplies to save $$$.
I research everything to find good prices and ideas.
I have bought most of my animals slowly by breeding mine and selling offspring or trading for others I want.
I have lots of friends that are zoo keepers and ask them for advice.
I know how to build all of my own caging (the biggest plus) and use some of my work tools for that. It has saved me tons of money and I get the exact cages I want and how I want them to be.
I have built cages for others, to help pay for my animals.
I am an artist and I paint pictures or sell photos or make jewelry to help pay for my animals.
I also do not spend much money on other things besides my animals and art or photography supplies.
Probably one of the biggest things helping me out is the Florida climate lends itself to raising herps so I don't have monster heating bills.
Graduating from college didn't hurt either even though I never really used my teaching degree for teaching.
Good luck with your herps. I am sure when you get as old as I am you will put my collection to shame.

Thanks for the tips! VERY helpful!
I built Orion's cage she's in now.. but I spent way more on it than I needed too. It was an experiment. It looks ok, but not great, lol. I'm going to be building her a new one soon, then using her old one for supplies for my next one (hopefully I'll get a male soon...). This one won't be as elaborate (or, at least not in a costly way )
~Lindsay

Well... currently I own...

1.1 corns
1.1 veiled chams
1.1 jax chams
2.3 sulcatas

non herps:
1.1 ducks
1.1 golden retrievers
0.1 mutt
3.1 cats
1.0 conure
3.4 show rabbits
5.8 dumbo rats(pets)
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1.1 Veiled chams.
1.1 jax chams
2.1 corns
2.1.2 Sulcata torts.
1.1 Golden retrievers
2.1 Fuzzy lops
1.1 Holland lops
1.1 dumbo rats
0.1 conure
3.2 cats
1.1 ducks

Well, my collection has somewhat recently been downside, mostly thanks to the wonderful pleasures of hungry, hungry ants, but here it goes:

Honey, my LOST, female Veiled chameleon
2.3 American Green treefrogs
2.1 Squirrel treefrogs
2.1 Cuban treefrogs
0.1.1 Red-Eyed treefrogs
0.0.4 Greenhouse frogs
0.0.5 American Green treefrog tadpoles, near morph
0.0.2 Leopard geckos
0.0.3 African Dwarf frogs
0.0.1 Albino California Kingsnake, shared between my boyfriend and I

I also have Boxer, my 7-year-old dalmatian and the best dog ever!
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Got hips like Cinderella / Must be having a good shame / Talking sweet about nothing / Cookie I think you're Tame

how do you manage to have so many?