Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am starting to revamp my web site and I was hoping for feedback. What do all of you want to see in a website? do you want lots of different pics? links? variety of animals? large text? what is important to you? I am trying to build a site that will inform and entertain the herp community.

Please answer here or email me off list with comments. Thanks
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Bennett

Home Of The Florida Orange
www.beardiedragon.com

i like to see a website with a place to learn how to build a cage for ur bds or monitors also tips like to help ur bd get threw mating season do this or w/e hope this helps ps thanks for the help wit my breeding thing

I dunno Bennett LOL

I am kind of partial to my new site I made yesterday! LOL

I will say one thing... I like crisp and clean. Cluttered sites and windows get closed and ignored by me. So, I would say, crisp, clean and straight lines. Easy to navigate and some pictures of adult breeders are always a hit!
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Lisa
Cricket free babies!
LIVE hatchling web cam 8 - 8 EST
www.beginnersbasics.com

Your old site was nice too but this one is definately slick. Very crisp and clean. I love it. You are a techno queen!
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Bennett

Home Of The Florida Orange
www.beardiedragon.com

>>Your old site was nice too but this one is definately slick. Very crisp and clean. I love it. You are a techno queen!
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>>Bennett
>>

LMAO! Not hardly...
It is something I play around with from time to time. I like to create sites, etc. Everything I know about PC's is self taught, never picked a computer book up in my life and don't plan to start now LOL

My husband says I change my web site like most people change clothes!! lol
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Lisa
Cricket free babies!
LIVE hatchling web cam 8 - 8 EST
www.beginnersbasics.com

I think both of your sites are great tools for information. i mainly lurk here ever day and read as much as i can from other sites i'll have to look alittle closer and see if i can give any constructive critisism. if you can get past my horrible spelling.haha

but this is what i came across yesterday. i found this EXTREMELY intresting. it's just a couple simple pages and pictures but when i seen their breeding set up it really put in perspective how much work they put into this. and gave an idea of how they set up for breeding and stuff like that.

maybe you can add something like this. example i read how to set up a egg laying box... but seing a picture gave 100% more help than trying to understand from a post here just a few day's ago.

http://www.dachiu.com/care/breeding.html

so in my rambling here, maybe alittle more pictures with short descriptions of the entire set up.

other than that, great job to the both of you!

This is just my personal opinion. I have done a little side work on designing sites. I think the links that flash from pics to titles are a little distracting. I would prefer to just see a word link. I also like the way Lisa has layed out her available page with each baby pictured and a description next to it. Maybe have the parents pictued with a link that takes you to their babies. It's easier to just be able to scroll down a page looking at each one one at a time. I will hand it to you on your pics. I don't know how you get your males to display their beards so easily for pics. Mine will sometimes darken up but yours always seem to puff up on cue. Just some ideas.

Mike
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If you can read this, thank a teacher. If you are reading it in English, thank a soldier.

Neat site, but the flashing pic's in the header are a distraction for me. I prfered your old site but that is probably just me. Alot of this site is actually better it is just the flashing gets to me.

I like it when you can have the main menu always available. Like a browser within your main page. That way it is not necessary to click back to home to explore your entire site.

I think a links page is a good idea. If you want to educate the public I'd have a page dedicated to that with links to resources.

Personally I think it would be a good idea to educate anyone going to your site about what to look for when reading a forum. Tips that may include reading a forum for a decent amount of time to form a good opinion about who's advice to take and who's not to take, forum etiquette (searching), etc.

I'd also make it a point to explain there are individuals that seem to be experts on the forums sometimes and to be very, very careful if their advice is way off of the proven successful advice that the majority of other experienced keepers have given. That's not to say completely ignore it but if someone is a newbie (isn't that what most of the traffic will probably be?) they should know it would probably be in their best interest to follow proven techniques to start out and some people giving off the beaten path advice fail to point that out. If someone can't backup their advice be very careful (that type of thing). If I recall there is no mention of these things on any caresheet I've read to date and with the forums being so popular and in my opinion important, some ideas about the nature of the beast would be very helpful to a newbie (sure as hell wish I'd had some advice about these forums when I started out!).
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Rob Talkington

Thank you all for your input. Some really good points that I hope I can accomplish in my redesign.
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Bennett

Home Of The Florida Orange
www.beardiedragon.com

This is taken straight from my care page...

"Here you will find some basic care, health and feeding information.

It is given as general information and should not be used as a sole source. Further research is always recommended. Certain husbandry techniques may work well for some dragons but not for others"
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Lisa
Cricket free babies!
LIVE hatchling web cam 8 - 8 EST
www.beginnersbasics.com

I'm looking for an elaboration of your statement. One that gives advice as to which advice to take and which not to take. Not just one that indicates not everything works for every dragon.

Cricket free babies? Seems to me this is okay to try and also okay to practice. Why? Because there are enough who have tried it and been successful and you have the history so far to back it up. Also, the arguments I have seen have been fairly trivial against it.

Dirt as a substrate? May not be good, especially if you're a newbie. Why? There have only been a few that say it is okay to use and don't have any other evidence to back it up other than their own opinions. Also, the arguments against dirt have been numerous and studies done by doctors indicate it may cause problems. Even if it were suggested this not be used for a newbie when advised on a forum it would be better but unfortunately that sometimes does not happen.

I just think it would be good to be somewhat prepared as to what one will run into when just starting out. Also, some guidence would be helpful as well.

I'd also like to see more emphasis put on reading the forums. Caresheets are fine but I think where you get really good, solid info is from the forums. I had read at least 10 caresheets and didn't realize this when I first started.

This is just from what I've experienced in the last 9-10 months.
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Rob Talkington