Louie

That is the sellers picture. I am going to aim for a delivery for next Thursday hopefully.

I got him from acreptiles fb auction. I am so exited

-Duffy

I don't blame you for being excited . He is good looking.

I know acreptiles because they were first place to carry CB mourning geckos .

They were big years ago .

Their ball pythons are stunning .

shrimp room guard dogs

 

 

sorry one on the right is a little muddy. enjoyed some stomping through a couple streams that day.

Great looking dogs .  They became illegal here years ago  .

Is one of these dogs what they call a ''Merle PB'' ?

I had a male AB and female Cane Corso  in the late 70s  before they became in vogue .

The AB for a breed that in theory is a southern breeds certainly hated the heat .

I love snakes. We get a lot of garter snakes here in the redwoods.  They are so beautiful - green with neon orange stripes.  Shy little buggars. My cat used to love to bring them in the doggie door.  He would have one wrapped around his arms - which I would swiftly take away from him and set free outside.  Luckily, he would never harm one - just wanted to play with them.

I love garters . Have you seen any unusual color morphs  ?

Got this pic yesterday of little guy  .  There are couple adult corns which I sometimes see in gazebo ceiling.

I don't even want to know haha.

So I won!!! This big boy will be my first crested gecko!!!

So cute!

-Duffy

Very nice .

Did you just get him or the seller sent you his pic before shipment  ?

Where did you buy him from  ?

Thanks Louie

The aluminum strip you see above the two tanks is a LED strip that I buy at the local China market for R80 which is around $6, and this works great. It's around 5cm above the tanks

The tiger and RCS tank has 2*24 w T5 around 30 cm above the tank

'' I buy at the local China market for R80 which is around $6''

lol oh wow . Heck you might as well set up more tanks because that is beyond a great price for such lighting .

Almost done! All I need is a couple more plants. Some more dishes and some geckos!

-Duffy

Oh it came out nice . You could add air some Tillandsia air plants which I have found indestructible .

Yea I've noticed this a ton on ebay from Chinese sellers. I've ordered some giant watermelon and giant sunflower seeds from American sellers and so far they look legit. We'll see this summer though if they're really giant.

Watermelon and sunflower are plants from seeds but other seeds they sell aren't seed type plants in the real sense .

I have several elephant ears and they are bulb plants though I often see them as seeds for sale from over-seas vendors .  I guess before the bulb comes the ''seed'' but I don't anyone who grew them from seeds .

I bought fairy shrimp from 3 over-seas vendors which never panned out than I found a place in Arizona and got lots of fairy shrimp.

Looks great .  You hang your lights fairly high over the tank ?

Looks kinda like pennywort?

I have found seeds to be the biggest con on ebay .

Though buyer beware is applicable everywhere. Seeds are the biggest scam.

I'm no expert but I do have lots succulents scattered all over the property and I agree with Soothing .

I myself have never had luck with succulent seeds but every tiny succulent I have bought or given as a tiny plant has grown great but the seeds have been zilch .

In your case I would grow them bit longer and see but they don't look like succulents .

Thanks! I almost had to get one.

You should get one .

I have a White  P. Clarkii and find him full of personality . 

So I am definitely going to get a crested gecko now. Some issue with getting an idea in your head and becoming way too excited to back down haha.

I figured I would journalize my progress and hopefully bounce around ideas!

So this is what I have so far. Got a 24x18x24 Exo terra terrarium tank. My first terrarium tank ever. My god if only aquariums worked with forward facing doors.

Been setting up the tank the past week.

Saw a bunch of videos online on DIY backgrounds and I really wanted to try it. It is definitely fun, I want to try it on an aquarium setup some day. I used spider wood and "grape vine" on the back and other than one more piece of spiderwood to place in the middle, that should be it for wood pieces.

I let the foam sit for a day (anyone trying this use gloves. Dear god USE GLOVES). I should have left it sit longer before I started to mess with it, but everything worked out ok. It was still kinda gooey in the middle of the foam. I carve out some holes for future plants and can't wait to be finished!

I plan to put some black silicone over the foam this weekend and then cover that in organic peat moss to give the background a more natural feel. After that dries I will set up my substrate.

One thing that is interesting is my humidity in the tank is sitting around 60-70 daily. As far as I know Cresties prefer 50-70. Which is fine but I don't even have water in there yet! I was already planning to have the tank fully setup with plants etc and letting it sit for one to two weeks and gauge temps/humidity so it should be interesting.

Will update as I mess with the tank.

-Duffy

The size you got is a great size . 

lol oh I remember when these open front gecko tanks came out . Think from zoo-med and exo-terrarrium .  They were a big hit with the arboreal gecko bunch .

At the time the famous little blue neon geckos which I cant recall the name was a fraction of the cost it is now .

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Just looked it up -  Lygodactylus williamsi

As I understand once they breed if the male gets startled in any way they tend to swallow the eggs. So people like to wrap the tank in black velvet to keep the fish from seeing anything that might startle them. They even leave the female in even though she may pick on the male.

So as I have a walkway behind a wall I figured a tank could be stuffed there and the fish would never get startled.

Do the  macrostoma males always look as nice as on sites or that is just mating color ?

Never heard of these fish ,

was looking at a gallery and very pretty with varied colors .

Could be red or what some call neon red P. Clarkii but your pet store calls them red lobster .  I guess they can be called anything , lol .

They come in several red morphs and some as adults are as stunning and may lean orange more so than red which is still nice and some fade .

Frozen blood worms here too.

I understand it may lead to obesity but fresh from the LFS it should bulk them up for breeding and to recover from being at a fish shop.

I do not trust fish that require live food when it comes to fish shops. Or vegetarian food for that matter, starving otos at the petsmart for an example.

 

 

 

Yeah, I'd think someone would be gouging, looking at demand. Of course once that happens it is only a few months/years before the market crashes like it did way back with dubois and yellow labidiochromis (both went from 25-35$ each to 3$ as people began breeding them for profit.. actually the dubois might have been 50$+).

 

For profit I consider setting up a 40+ macrostoma tank in a closet.

I just looked up macrostoma and very nice . Have never heard of them .

Why in a closet , they breed in darkness ?

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yXis1Jg38sE/UWAWwyb7kwI/AAAAAAAAAx4/5wXXDVJa5ao/s1600/betta_macrostoma_1.jpg

I personally use black gravel in my tank. I find that plants that root seem to attach better to regular ol' gravel as opposed to stuff like fluval stratum, ada, controsoil and such as eventually it will all just turn to mush. Just my 2cents, and personally opinion of course.

I didn't want to say anything because it sounds crazy but every tank I have had with black gravel has been the best and plants thrived like no other .

I have read sites that say black gravel is the best but they didn't say why and scientifically it doesn't make sense .

I now like river gravel as like that pond look but might be doing a black gravel planted neon tank .  Sand I hate .

The LFS got a batch in and there was one female that sold before I got there. I picked up 2 males for the female and will wait for next shipment.

 

The reason that there are only males on the market is that the males are pretty and the females are drab. This is like bettas at the local big box where almost all are male.

Oh I see but would still think some wise dealer would get some females as they seem in demand .

At least you can buy female bettas .

I looked them up and seems some say they only take live food but others have luck with non live .

Louie, I saw them and wondered the same thing.  I especially like the oreo striped patternless fat tail.

Oh those are nice .

Its interesting how leopards have been bred in so many colors but I don't think Oreo like the fat tails  .

The fat tail breeders must enjoy sweets because they also have chocolate morphs and this Caramel morph , lol .

http://www.theurbangecko.com/african-fat-tailed-geckos/caramel-albino

Well Oreo anything is good!

Yes indeed and one has not lived until they have had a Dairy Queen Oreo Blizzard and/or an Oreo Blizzard ice cream cake .

There was a show which is still around in re-runs from the UK called 'Two Fat Ladies' . Youtube has some episodes .

They cooked in butter, fat, etc .   It wasn't a PC cooking show as far as they were not shy about frying things up , lol .  

One show they  made their own large Oreos which they fried in pancake batter and served it hot with real creamy vanilla over it .

Boy those ladies could cook .

You could keep it simple with regular gravel. I like the natural river gravel but black gravel also looks nice just not GLASS gravel .

Fast growing plants and no C02.

I use CFL bulbs because I put the filter on tank side thus led isn't an option but I would use led if not for that .

I only use about an inch of gravel which isn't recommended but I don't like to much gravel , lol .

For types of plants I used it works well .

There are countless ways of doing it .

We have a population of them not to far from me. They can be hunted. We had piebald born on my place and hung around for a few years. Was a buck so Im hoping he passed that gene.

Oh that is interesting . I thought they were extremely rare .

2 of my lovely Hino Shadow Pandas.

An upclose photo of said Hino Shadow Panda

And for the general nature lovers out there - a Piebald!! White Tail Deer that hangs out in my front yard, and drives the dogs absolutely nuts     

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Great shrimp but LOVE that deer .  Not often if ever you see a deer like that .

Here is my Blue Dream Rili Chilling on a Fissidens Manzanita Stump! Like a boss!

BTW- I think Blue Dream Rilis are totally Underrated. They are stellar shrimp in my opinion.

Oh that wood with moss growing on top looks like a tree stump with ferns . Nice

I hatched hundreds maybe even a thousand leo's. I sold my entire stock and most of my equipment last May so I could get into shrimps. I bred geckos for 15 years. If you need any advice on equipment or husbandry just let me know.

 

http://theleopardgeckoforum.com/

http://www.leopardgecko.com/leopard-gecko-care Ron Tremper is thee guy for leopards. His books are like the gecko bible.

I always wondered why fat tails never caught on like leo's .

I never kept either type but read fat tails are easier going ?

I was looking at 'Oreo' fat tails some time ago and pricey .