Animal fever

Hey everyone, just over two weeks ago, spring started which means all the snakes and lizards started to wake up from hibernation. So keep an eye on the road and watch out for the cold blooded animals sun baking. With everyone going to work in the morning and returning home in the afternoon, there will be heaps on lizards getting squashed. If you know or think that you have Blue Tongues in your property, try not to use too much insecticides and herbicides, because snails will get hold of them, then the lizards will eat the snails and will most probably die. Blue Tongue numbers are decreasing in the wild because of these causes, so please be careful this spring and especially summer. Summer is the main time for reptiles to be active, most of the time they are active all day every day.

Snakes will also be really active, which means be on the look out for the deadly Tiger Snake, Taipan, Adders, Vipers, Cobras and other dangerous ones that could kill you. Snakes will most likely to be in shaded areas with water nearby so be careful.

My lizards awaken from their big sleep last week, so now I have to get a few more enclosures ready for the babies and the adults, they are starting to get too big for the ones they have at the moment. I might have to make one just in case I get another bunch of tiny, cute but fierce lot of babies. It might take me a little while, but i should do it with a bit of help. If you have any ideas of what i should put in them, please let me know. 

 Thanks for reading this post, and just remember, keep on guard.

Hi everyone, me again, now if you’r a big fisher person like me, you have to know the difference between the “spurdog shark” and the “gummyshark” so I’m about to tell you.

1. The gummy shark has no teeth.

2. The spurdog shark has biggish spines behind each fin.

3. The gummy is bigger than the spurdog.

4. They both have white spots on their backs but the spurdogs are smaller.

5. The spurdog has a darker back than the gummy, which has a grey back.

6. The gummy sharks usually always bite and run with the hook but the spurdogs usually nibbles then run.

7. The gummys always put up a good fight when you catch them.

There we go, thats most ways to tell a gummy from a spurdog. If you want to know more about fishing or any animals, just ask, but if you don’t have a blog and you want one, just ask and i will tell you how but you have to go on my other blog and ask. Thats because only people with a blog can ask stuff and comment on this on. (cause of the display settings i have). 

Catch ya later

DID YOU KNOW. . . . . . . . .

That most female snakes have a certain amount of babies depending in how long or short she is? If she’s really long, she has heaps of babies. if she’s really small, she doesn’t have many.  

That there are 2,750 different species of termites? That’s heaps! Wouldn’t it be better if they didn’t eat and ruin houses?

That squid live for 16-18 months in the ocean but when i catch them they only live for a few minutes?

That the anaconda is not the largest snake? It is actually the fattest snake, the reticulated python is the largest.

That a female tick expands its size by 200 after two days of sucking blood? That’s heaps, the not so friendly giant bug!

That the flying fish doesn’t actually fly? It actually glides through the air with its big fins with the help of a speedy break under water.

That if the outer casing of a snail gets broken, it cannot repair itself and the snail is doomed to die? Thats not fair, if anything of ours gets broken or hurt, we can replace or fix it or something, poor snail.

That in just under one achre of ground, there could be up to 38 million centipedes found? Thats truck loads! I have just under 5 achres, that means that there could be up to 190 million of those little things in my property!

Hoped you liked this post and learnt something, keep tuned and i’ll catch ya later!    

Hi everyone, from now on, I will be writing posts about stuff like, for example, 10 facts about 10 sea animals, or something like that, i will also be writing about some species of marine life and land mammals that you might not know about. Most of the info will be about Australian animals, so if you want to know more about Australia’s animals, stay tuned and keep checking my blog.  

YES, all my reptile books have arrived and the binders to put them in, i got 22 books and 4 binders. all up it cost over $300 and the books tells me how to look after all different snakes and lizards, and has heaps of websites where you can buy and sell reptiles and what you need to look afer them. they are awesome.

here are some cool websites:

www.reptapets.com.au

www.upmarketpets.com

www.southerenxreptiles.com

www.reptilecenta.com.au

and at this website, you can buy any book you want and the binders, this is where i got mine.

www.reptilesaustralia.com.au

FEEDING:

The Bald eagle is a bird of prey, that means that they use their sharp talons and their keen eyesight to capture their prey. Bald eagles will eat dead or alive animals including snakes, lizards, mice, small birds, carrion and fish but only catches dead or nearly dead fish that is on top or out of water because it does not like diving in the water or getting wet for that matter. These big birds fight with one another when it comes to food, but sometimes they will just go and steel food from other birds. Most of the time in winter, bald eagles will form a big group or heaps of little groups close to where salmon spawn.

BALD EAGLE:

The bald eagle is a big bird with a wing span of up to 2.5 metres. This spectacular bird is the national bird and symbol of the United States of America. Females are about 25% larger than males. An adult bald eagle has a white head, brown body, bright yellow hooked beak, and big, sharp talons. As for the juveniles, they are completely brown with yellow feet. In the wild, bald eagles live for up to 30 years but often longer in captivity, like most animals.

Bald eagles usually live near rivers and lakes so they can easily catch fish when they are hungry.

BREEDING AND BABIES:

The bald eagle makes the biggest nest out of all birds so it can fit all the babies in it easily. When it is breeding time, most of all the eagles return to the original place where they were born. Bald eagles mate for life but if one of the mates disappear, the other mate will find a new mate and will stay with that one. Bald eagle mate by first doing a courtship dance in the air, doing cart wheels, swooping and chasing each other, then they will lock talons and to a free dive, separating just before they hit the ground.

Hi everyone, I’m having trouble thinking about what animal I should write about so can you please help me and if you leave a comment about what animal I should do or you want me to do, I will try and write about it. So can you all please help me decide on what animal I should write about? Thanks.

Feeding:

A scorpion will eat a lot of things, from little meal worms to big centipedes, they have two big pincers that they use to capture pray with and then use their big, long tail to inject venom, that venom will ether kill or paralyze it’s prey. They mainly hunt at night but are active during the day and will hunt then too. A scorpion can survive without food for up to 12 months and water for 3 months. Some scorpions are ambush predators and others are scavengers.

Scorpions:

Just like the spider, the scorpion is an arachnid, which means that they are an animal with six legs. Most scorpions are venomous but the ones in Tasmania are venomous but can’t kill humans, just make us sick or very ill. They all have six eyes, the main two are bind and the other four are close to it so that is why they have specialized hairs under their stomachs that tells the scorpion what it is walking over and they also pick up vibrations so they know where to go to find prey or when predators are coming but not much will eat scorpions. Scorpions have a reputation for looking very nasty and scary. Scorpions are divided into segments, the first segment is its head and has the feet, pedipalps and pincers, the last segment contains the tail and even the tail is in segments, the last segment in the tail contains the poison sac and the stinger. Bigger scorpions are usually darker in colour and the smaller ones are usually lighter or paler. From time to time, scorpions will show up in the most oddest of places. Scorpions love warmth and usually prefer desert like places, such as the Australian outback. Scorpions are attracted to the glow of a camp fire like moths are to an electric light.

breeding and babies:

Scorpions mate like this: The male will grasp the female with his pincers and latch onto hers, then the male will do a little dance like thing , the male will then drop a little sperm sack on the ground then drag the female over it, then she will pick it up and after that, she will eat the male if quick enough. This will give her a highly nutritious meal and will help her to produce some strong offspring. When the babies are born, they will ride on their mother’s back and she will look after them. Sometimes when it is time for the babies to get off, some wont and the mother will eat them, the babies will shed skin seven times before becoming an adult.

FEEDING:

The praying mantis will eat things from the smallest moth to a small snake and will eat them live. They are lightning fast and hard to see with the naked eye and have sharp spines on their front legs and I know because I have got bitten by one and it hurt more that I thought. They are very fussy and will throw the wings and feet away before or during eating, they eat their prey’s head and all the way down to the abdomen and the will eat the insides. As they work there way down the body of their catch, they nibble off the hair, fur and skin.

MANTIDS:

The praying mantis gets its name from their pose that looks like they are praying. The species is really called the praying mantid or mantids for short. They are very, very fast and look like a leaf so can blend in very well, especially in trees or on lawn. If there is a light breeze, the mantis will rock slowly to and fro to look like a leaf in the breeze. There are many species if praying mantis and these are some of them:

-          The Flower Mantis                                   

-          The Sudanese Mantis

-          The common Mantis

And many more that I don’t fully know about. Mantids can turn their heads 180 degrease to scan there surroundings to look for pray and predators with two big compound eyes, with three small but simple eyes in the middle. There relevant size is to a tea cup or 1.2-15cm and lives for up to 12 months in the wild but I’m not sure for how long in captivity. Their eye sight is pretty good for a bug because it can see up to 18 metres. Cockroaches may not be as adorable as mantids but they are both real closely related.

BREEDING AND BABIES:

I have bred mantids but it isn’t a pleasant sight when they mate because during or after mating, the female will quickly spin around and break the males head off or eat him. I am not sure how long it takes to lay the egg sack after mating and I couldn’t find it on the net. The female will lay 20-200 egg sacks so be careful if you breed them. The babies take 4-6 weeks to hatch and there will be hundreds of them. The babies grow rapidly and are hard to feed.

DIET:

Blue tongue lizards eat carrion, fruit, dog food, egg yolk, baby food, insects, some types of flowers and their favorite are snails.

SKINKS:

Skinks have overlapping scales that are usually smooth and contain small plates of bone. There are more than 300 species of skink in Australia. Most skinks have 4 legs and 3-5 toes but the legless lizard have no legs which means that they have no toes.

BLUE TONGUE LIZARDS:

There are 6 species of blue tongues and here are the 3 most common ones.

. Blotched blue-Tongue.

. Eastern blue-tongue.

. Shingleback.

 There are the 3 most common species of blue tongue. The Shingleback and blue tongue have a triangular head, but the male’s head are more triangular than the females, that is one of the ways that you can tell if a blue tongue is a male or female. Another way to tell with the Blotched blue-tongue is that the females have more of a blotchy pattern on the back as for the males, their back is more stripy. Blue tongues are the largest member of the skink family. Blue tongues lizards can live for 20 years in captivity and 5 years longer, that is if they are looked after properly. Blue tongues don’t have as hard scales as Shinglebacks but they are still hard. If you have a Shingleback or blue tongue in your garden and you have dogs or cats, feed them inside and if you see anything that the dogs or cats will eat near where the lizard lives, get it so the lizard and pets won’t be attracted to it and the pets won’t eat the lizard. Try to keep the pets away from the lizard as much as possible. If you are doing something to your garden, try not to do as much around the where the lizard lives. Before going anywhere, check the driveway to see if there is a lizard and If there is, move it and then go so you don’t run it over.    

SHINGLEBACK:      

The Shingleback is also called Boggi, Sleepy lizard and Stumpy-tailed lizard. The Shingleback has 1-4 babies after a few months of mating (I’m not quite sure when). Shinglebacks mainly give birth every 2^nd year. Shinglebacks and blue tongues mate for life. Once the male finds the female, he will eat by her, sleep under the same bush and walk behind her. If another male comes around the female, the male (female’s mate) will fight with the rival male and might leave scars to the body. Shinglebacks have hard scales so it will be harder for predators do bite or grasp them.

BREEDING AND BABIES:

The female Eastern blue-tongue gives birth to round about 10-19 babies 3-5 months after mating. The Blotched Blue Tongue can have 5-20 babies. The babies like it a bit warmer than the adults for about 6 months. The babies love eating mealworms but they can’t have too many otherwise they will get stomach pains and they can die. If you keep blue tongues, don’t keep the babies in with adults otherwise the adults will trample them or eat them if they get too hungry. If the female lizard are carrying too many babies or get too cold, she will release a form of acid in her uterus were her babies are and they dissolve and the female will use the babies as a food source, this is called aborting.