option
Tom
Seems a lot of forums these days have the ol' compulsory introduction thread. :duck:
So here I am. Hello Everyone! First of all I would like to say thanks to admins and the rest of the community for maintaining such a wonderful tome of shared knowledge. Armed with the knowledge of these forums I have, so far, had a great experience with my new corn snake.
This all began a few weeks ago when I just happened to drive by my local reptile store. Having what my wife calls "empty nest syndrome" since the recent loss of our family pet ferret, I asked my 6 year old daughter in the back seat if she wanted to see some neat animals. We headed in and I was amazed at kings ransom of reptiles available. What really caught my eye was a display of the many baby snakes in stock. A gentleman approached me and asked if I had any questions. I sure did, as I asked lots of questions. Being a pet owner already, I asked the usual questions about food, water, and bedding (turns out reptiles don't have bedding, its called substrate instead hehe). I got what seemed to be great answers, but me not wanting to make a purely impulsive purchase, I decided to leave and let the idea of owning a snake marinate in my head for a bit.
Knowing my wife would not care for the presence of a snake in the house right-of-the-bat, I decided too arm myself with more snake lore and use such knowledge to my benefit. I found several resources around the web until l I settled here and used the nifty search function. I found information the matched what the gentleman had told me at the reptile shop. I finally bounced the idea of keeping a snake as a pet around a bit with my wife, and she was surprisingly open to the idea (especially since I wanted a baby one lol).
A day or so later I stopped by the reptile shop again, this time the whole family with me. Objective 1: I wanted to have a good look around at the animals that were kept there. I wanted to note how well the animals were doing, how clean all the cages were etc. I was still pleased. Objective 2: expose my wife to the baby snakes. She was a little apprehensive and squeamish at first but it subsided quickly.
We asked basically the same questions to a lady that worked there as I had asked previously to the gentleman a few days before. Great I had some consistent information.
Not to long after this last trip to the shop, we decided to go back in the coming days. This time we asked to handle one of the babies, I was instantly hooked. Now for the final say. My wife had to handle a snake. She all nerves but once the had the snake slithering in and out of her fingers, her mild phobia calmed substantially. She was so awe-struck by the snake she wanted to take it home. The gentleman that works there offered to feed the snake for us (which was great, because I wanted to see a feeding before a purchase was made anyhow). While the snake ate, he help us get substrate, the heating pad, and a hiding spot. Again he went over the pros and cons of each choice. Such a great experience, we had. For now our 1.5 month old cornsnake's name is "Fluffy". I have yet to get any objection from my wife, though my daughter insists on "snakey".
Thanks for reading my story. I will follow-up in the photo gallery with some pictures soon.
So here I am. Hello Everyone! First of all I would like to say thanks to admins and the rest of the community for maintaining such a wonderful tome of shared knowledge. Armed with the knowledge of these forums I have, so far, had a great experience with my new corn snake.
This all began a few weeks ago when I just happened to drive by my local reptile store. Having what my wife calls "empty nest syndrome" since the recent loss of our family pet ferret, I asked my 6 year old daughter in the back seat if she wanted to see some neat animals. We headed in and I was amazed at kings ransom of reptiles available. What really caught my eye was a display of the many baby snakes in stock. A gentleman approached me and asked if I had any questions. I sure did, as I asked lots of questions. Being a pet owner already, I asked the usual questions about food, water, and bedding (turns out reptiles don't have bedding, its called substrate instead hehe). I got what seemed to be great answers, but me not wanting to make a purely impulsive purchase, I decided to leave and let the idea of owning a snake marinate in my head for a bit.
Knowing my wife would not care for the presence of a snake in the house right-of-the-bat, I decided too arm myself with more snake lore and use such knowledge to my benefit. I found several resources around the web until l I settled here and used the nifty search function. I found information the matched what the gentleman had told me at the reptile shop. I finally bounced the idea of keeping a snake as a pet around a bit with my wife, and she was surprisingly open to the idea (especially since I wanted a baby one lol).
A day or so later I stopped by the reptile shop again, this time the whole family with me. Objective 1: I wanted to have a good look around at the animals that were kept there. I wanted to note how well the animals were doing, how clean all the cages were etc. I was still pleased. Objective 2: expose my wife to the baby snakes. She was a little apprehensive and squeamish at first but it subsided quickly.
We asked basically the same questions to a lady that worked there as I had asked previously to the gentleman a few days before. Great I had some consistent information.
Not to long after this last trip to the shop, we decided to go back in the coming days. This time we asked to handle one of the babies, I was instantly hooked. Now for the final say. My wife had to handle a snake. She all nerves but once the had the snake slithering in and out of her fingers, her mild phobia calmed substantially. She was so awe-struck by the snake she wanted to take it home. The gentleman that works there offered to feed the snake for us (which was great, because I wanted to see a feeding before a purchase was made anyhow). While the snake ate, he help us get substrate, the heating pad, and a hiding spot. Again he went over the pros and cons of each choice. Such a great experience, we had. For now our 1.5 month old cornsnake's name is "Fluffy". I have yet to get any objection from my wife, though my daughter insists on "snakey".
Thanks for reading my story. I will follow-up in the photo gallery with some pictures soon.
