How did you get started

--Stephanie said in another post that it was interesting about how people get started. So let's hear those stores...

I got started as a kid in Colorado at about 13. The first snake I ever saw was a garter that my Dad chopped up with a hoe. I was hooked, did mostly lizards for a long time, but collected in the US, Germany, PR in the rain Forrest has to be the best.

Had a pet alligator when I was a kid. My mother sent me to Summer camp and when I returned, my gator was gone. I still have never forgiven her for that. Other than WC lizards and frogs, that was my first experience at owning a reptile. He was pretty cool and was growing very well under my care.

My wife brought home a rescued a gecko that was close to death's door. After working with it for a few months, it was doing very well and healthy. We re-homed it to make room for our 25th wedding anniversary present - a Bearded Dragon.

From there, we just kept going.

Same here. I caught a garter and someone cut it's head off because it was "dangerous." I egged the guys car that night and have been hooked since. I think I was 12.

I started breeding a few years ago after getting into Brazilian Rainbow Boas. That lasted a short while until I discovered fauna and fell into ball pythons.

I started in the library around 7 or 8 years old. Didn't wanna read kids books anymore and the fiction stuff didn't have any pictures. So naturally the nature section appealed to me. Started with dinosaurs then went straight to snakes. Didn't actually keep one till high school and it was an eastern king that we had in biology that needed a home for the summer. After that it was turtles because of my mom's fear of snakes. The love for them was always there but, only in the last few years was I actually able to pursue it. Since then it's taken a pretty good hold of me.

I've never been into owning snakes - like handling them and intrigued by the different breeds and whatnot, just never wanted to own one. I bought a 14"snapping turtle from a kid for $2 when I was 10 and kept him ini the window well of our house until my dad found him. I showed my parents he was 'gentle' by feeding him raw hamburger on a stick. When he snapped it in half, he had to go. So I hid him in the garage where 'he' laid eggs under our lawn mower. My grandfather wanted to make turtle soup out of her so I helped her excape to freedom.

My male blue tongue skink was a rescue. I bought my female to make sure he was hitting bench marks since I knew nothing about them and no one had one I could compare him to. Last year was our first successful breeding. We looking to do it again this summer.

We got started around summer of 2010. I think Miles had previously had a BP before and an iguana and was itnerested in them. I was not and wanted nothing to do with them and was mortified because I just went off of what you see/hear on TV.

Miles' grandfather (RIP) had an alligator many many years ago when they were legal to have when he lived in OV I think? And Miles is proud of his g-pa for that. Apparently when they started to become illegal Miles' GPa faught to keep his and then one day they were taken away.

Since we got our first BP together back in 2010 I made the statement I didnt want to "see it, hear it, smell it, touch it, hear it eat, see it eat etc" That was "Strikey" our Albino Male we got from Rich Baker (Chesapeake Bay Ball Pythons)... then he got our Bee female from Colin Weaver and that was it. I fell in looooooooooooove with "Ms Bee Bee The Bestest BeeBee Everrrrr" from there we now have 19, possibly soon to be 20 and I love it.

I educated myself on them after we got "Strikey" and came around to being in the same room when he was brought out but that was about the extent of it.

I've always liked every animal known to man and of course wanted everything, so I would go collecting and scare the crap out of my mom and grandma with what I brought home and then they made me take all back outside. I was only allowed to have cats growing up with my mom, and then my grandma took me and I couldn't have anything! It killed me, so when I met my husband I told him I loved amphibians and reptiles, among other things, and since he knew I couldn't have one while I lived with my grandma he bought Xavier (who will be 13 this yr )and kept him at his house. The sentiment was extreme because he hated snakes and other animals (except for cats, go figure) and he still got it. Now he just says ok (most of the time) when I want something

Of course I don't remember it, but as the story goes my older cousin would put snakes in my diapers just to hear my mom freak-out. Apparently, this was great red-neck entertainment and happened often.

Some of my first memories are of collecting rattlesnakes with the same older cousin. I've been "hooked" ever since.

As a kid, I loved to catch everything from lizards to crabs at the beach in Italy. I used to catch wall lizards of the genus Podacris as well as various geckos in Italy and bring them home much to my mother's complaints. I was just obsessed with biology which what led me to start my graduate studies in physiological ecology looking at water snakes as a model for circadian rhythms (which I never completed but turned to Malaria research instead). However, I had gathered so much data and worked with a great Herpetologist and learned lots from him (Dr. Charles Blem). The rest..as they say...is history. Here is a picture of a Podacris lizard: Some of you guys would love to breed these guys, the natural color morphs are very interesting and varied....

jw wrote:

Of course I don't remember it, but as the story goes my older cousin would put snakes in my diapers just to hear my mom freak-out.

Now, I see how you got confused in the snakes in the toilet thread.

Don wrote:

jw wrote:

Of course I don't remember it, but as the story goes my older cousin would put snakes in my diapers just to hear my mom freak-out.

Now, I see how you got confused in the snakes in the toilet thread.

Nice Don.