TheCivvie

Mice and rats

2011-09-11T07:19:00.001+01:00

Yesterday, went down to Kilkenny to collect a bulk order of snake food. The journey cost me about €24 in petrol and €50 for the feed.

The saving is that I got 75 pinks which retail at 99c each, 15 rats retailing at €4.99 and a kg of large mice €20, I reckon there is about a saving in total allowing for expenses of €150 plus

And it was a great day out on the bike

Breeding attempt 2011

2011-09-09T00:35:00.001+01:00

Really need to keep this up to date

I bred my male with the older female, the result was 16 eggs. Out of those I ended up with 9 hatchlings. They are feeding mainly but do look well

Will take some pictures and post them

Snake Breeding

2010-04-28T18:57:00.000+01:00

Today, I decided that it was time to take the plunge and put my male and one of the female Corn Snakes together. I have kept Corn Snakes for many years but never got around to breeding

To be honest, I was not sure what to expect but it was a lot more rapid than I expected. I half expected him to either chase her for half a day or just ignore her. But he went straight in for the kill.

Both will be in the vivarium until Friday, when he will get a rest for a week before I put the other female in with him. Hoping for a medium clutch though I am not too worried either way

My Snakes

2010-04-23T14:44:00.000+01:00

I now have 3 Corn Snakes. I do have to admit that I have a fear of snakes, I guess to a degree eveyone does. This makes my decision to get back into snakes a weird one I guess. But there is something about Corn Snakes for me that makes me over come that fear

This is Gooner, the first Corn that I got. She was bought from a lad in Kerry and for a first for me, was bought without seeing. A friend collected her for me. She is totally laid back. 3 years old and about 500g she is ready for a bit of hankie pankie with my male.

This is ButterBall, a male Corn. He is a big boy, I have not weighed him in awhile but he, I think, is over a kilo, and seems to go on for ever when I take it him. A good strike feeder, he has taken the tongs out of my hand with the power of his strike.

And finally, we have Rubix, a shy female who went into a self induced cooling over the winter. She is a lovely snake, very timid and not a great strike feeder. She is due to go into ButterBall for some snake hankie pankie. So watch this space :)

And I do have a Bearded Dragon, who needs a whole entry for herself

Electric

2010-04-17T22:48:00.001+01:00

I do have to admit to being a touch overboard. I have for the last year of so, tracked my electric useage working out rough daily averages.

For 12 months I listed in a small 1 bedroom flat, with electric heating and electric hot water. Everything was on a timer and when the cold snap of the last winter took hold, I turned on the storage heater in the kitchen, mainly for the snakes.

So I was tracking my electric and my last bill was averaging a rate of €1.31 day rate and €1.05 night rate. All my cooking was on the electric cooker and the snakes had small 20 watt heat mats.
I moved to a much larger flat, in fact the kitchen and bedroom of my old flat, may have fitted into the living room/kitchen of the new flat and I have 2 decent bedrooms as well. Same sort of setup, electric everything. Inn fact the new flat has a larger hot water tank with 2 immersions for the bath (I take showers so 1 is now off).

I got my first bill, which is for 36 days so slightly less. But I do also have my Bearded Dragon in with me and she has a 60 watt bulb on all day as she needs the heat. But the avaerages turned out to be €1.17 day rate and €0.93 night rate.

To be honest I was expecting the day rate to be much higher than the old flat. Makes me wonder was I having something else added to my bill that I knew nothing about.

And whilst I was at it, I compared my bill which is with the ESB, to the other two electric providers in Ireland. Bord Gais worked out at €90 even and Airtricity worked out at €87. Now to see if the landlord would be happy for me to change

Why I gave up on my BlackBerry

2010-04-16T12:14:00.001+01:00

I had 2 BlackBerry devices, started 9500 and quickly went to the Bold, which I found to be a good phone. I purchased many apps for the phone and was generally happy with it

So why am I now on an iPhone? Simple really. I hated the builtin mp3 player that comes with the Bold, it was sluggish and if you added 4 or 5 albums, it would drag the phone to a crawl, making it almost useless to use

Almost the memory management was extremely poor, sometimes I had to reboot my BlackBerry twice a day as memory was eaten away and never given back.

I know that the memory loss could have been cured by using less apps but why the hell buy a smart phone if you cannot use apps

Maybe when RIM sort these problems out, I may look again but I am not sure. We will see

New Snakes

2010-04-16T08:24:00.002+01:00

Due to a change in circumstances, I had to sell all my old snakes. This was a hard decision for me and one I have never stopped regretting every day.

About 6 months ago I decided to get back into snakes, when I purchased Gooner, a corn snake. Since then I have purchased another two, both proven breeders. The plan is to breed from them this year.

New Rack

2008-03-20T20:43:00.001Z

Built my new rack. Used contiboard and heat cable. Looks kind of cool. Allowes me to hold 10 + snakes. Slither is still in her own viv

Blogged with the Flock Browser

New Rack

2008-03-20T20:41:00.001Z

Built myself a new rack to hold most of the snakes. Will post some pics but it is cool enough allowing me to hold over 10 snakes. I have still got Slither in her own viv

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Slither and the shed

2007-08-16T22:55:00.001+01:00

Got home from work this evening, got Slither my amel corn out, handled her for a short while, put her back, and went and got her mouse, thawed and warmed it, went to feed her and she had shed. Never noticed her go blue. Live and learn

Slither nd

2007-08-16T22:55:00.000+01:00

My Snakes

2007-08-13T20:16:00.000+01:00

Gotten hit by the reptile bug big style. Started off with an amel corn snake, named by my daughters as Slither (see above). Did nothing really for a year and then added Oddball. Went to meet meet Simon and got Mulder and Scully.

Hoping to add a BCI boa and a Nelson's Milksnake in the next few months. Keep an eye here

Welcome

2007-07-13T19:23:00.000+01:00

Welcome to my blog. Not much here at the moment, but that will change

See Ya