Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This semester I am teaching a class called Laboratory Animal Clinical Management in the vet-tech program at the local college. We're handling lots of rodents & lagomorphs but the last chapter of the textbook covers nontraditional laboratory animals and it includes turtles. Back when I was hired the DVM who is the director of the program asked me to include these nontraditional species when I can so I am doing that.
Then as you know 2 weeks ago 2 of the students handed the injured Chip to me so I've included him in the 3 hour lab class for the last 2 weeks.
Every June since 1999 I've been teaching a class called Reptiles and Rodents for 1st-6th graders. It's part of a program called Kid's College which is produced by the same local college. They offer 100-150 different classes or so for the little kids.
Each year the little kids are thrilled to pieces to see the many different turtles and tortoises we bring in and all they want is to see them eat food.
Yesterday when I took Chip to lab class with me, I also took 2 females because the students wanted to see for themselves how you sex box turtles.
What cracked me up is that all these young ladies who are all over 21 acted just like the 1st-6th graders! LOL
They tried & tried to get the turtles to eat just like the little kids do. The turtles were too nervous & wouldn't eat. Darn it! They sat there & played with the turtles for I don't know 20 minutes or so. They're all adults, I got a huge kick out of watching them.
Then I concluded that apparently everyone enjoys watching a turtle or tortoise eat food. I wonder why that is?
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PHRatz

The same reason everyone likes VW bugs.

LOL, its because the turtles so obviously enjoy eating them selves I love watching mikey eat because he likes it

VW Beetles lol I remember when they came out with the new ones in the '90s after not seeing any new Beetles for years. We were at a busy interection at a red light in the DFW area once when a brand new Corvette pulled up next to us & out of the corner of my eye I could tell that the middle-aged-crazy man driving it wanted people to look but none of us did look.
Then a brand new Beetle turned the corner from the other direction & passed us, everybody in the car craned their necks to look at the Beetle... who cares about the guy in the 'vette? ROFL!!

Mel I know what you mean I love to watch Her Majesty Miss Destiny the sulcata eat, that's why she's gotten the idea that every time she sees me I MUST have food with me. I'm a food machine as far as she's concerned. LOL

This fall the skittish Charity box turtle has become so bold that yesterday while I was sitting on the floor with the dog (the dog will not eat his food if someone isn't sitting with him) I was looking through pet supply catalogs for a minute. I was not paying attention when I looked up at the dog who was eating & on the other side of his plate was Charity eating his food WITH him. She's turning into a first class brat lol.
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PHRatz