Meet Rosie!

[INSIDEYOURMIND]

I am sure by now most of you are aware of our unusual pets, so I thought I would introduce you to our newest addition, Rosie!

She is a Chilean Rose Legged Tarantula, about 2.5 inches long, 3 months old and replaces another that I had for almost 9 years!

The current tally is 7 snakes to 17 feet, 3 hermit crabs, a 9 month old Lab puppy, a cat that thinks he owns the place, and a toad that I was sure the snakes would eat but is going on 4 months of surviving.

And if you are looking for a great gift for your PYL, or pyl, take note of my keyboard, it is back lit, and glows blue in the dark!

 

[His_pita]

Hi Rosie, you're really scary looking, but I'm sure you are a nice pet. Just wouldn't want you to be mine.

Now that keyboard is really groovy!

 

[brioche]

She's beautiful.
Scary, but beautiful.

I am considering buying some hermit crabs (either that or one of thise mini lobsters, or maybe those little crabs). Tell me, does the terrarium smell? At all? One of the downsides to living at home and paying rent is that my mum has a very strong sense of smell.

I looked at Petsmart and they seem to eat some sort of food in a dish. What is that? Is that an acceptable diet? And with the little ones, how big do they get? I don't want really big ones, just cute little ones. Thus a little terrarium.

I was going to research this over the web, but I do prefer first hand accounts.

 

[INSIDEYOURMIND]

I will defer to my little girl, she tends to them more than I do, and she has researched their care.

I can tell you that they seem to be odor free.

 

[Chicklet]

The only thing that I miss about my former roommate is his gigantic tarantula - I don't know what kind she was, but she was bigger than my hand, and ate full grown mice. Ahh, Charlotte, how I loved you...

Yours looks pretty nice = )

 

[h_i_s]

She's beautiful.
Scary, but beautiful.

I am considering buying some hermit crabs (either that or one of thise mini lobsters, or maybe those little crabs). Tell me, does the terrarium smell? --Nope. Not at all. They don't produce much waste. The tank has gravel, lots of drift wood for them to hide in and climb over etc. no water other than in their water dish... very simple set up. And whatever they do produce is contained in the shell. They are bathed weekly in warm water in the bathroom sink. It seems to keep them odor free. . At all? One of the downsides to living at home and paying rent is that my mum has a very strong sense of smell. She'd never know you have them unless you tell her or show them to her.

I looked at Petsmart and they seem to eat some sort of food in a dish. What is that? -- no idea (i'll check the food package for an ingredients listing asap), but they seem to like it and are striving... and growing quickly Is that an acceptable diet? They are active, growing and still alive (had them for months) ... so it seems to be a suitable diet for them. They love junk food too, especially peanut butter and popcorn. Careful though there, they can become spoiled and refuse to eat their normal food. And with the little ones, how big do they get? They can get very big. Size is no issue though .... even the tiniest hermits bite, and when they do they do NOT let go (one bit Master and He had to run hot water over him to get him to release the flesh at the tip of His finger. It's all in how you pick them up, approach them from the rear of the shell and they are less likely to bite your fingers. I don't want really big ones, just cute little ones. Hermit crabs can grow very quickly. When their bodies grow, they need access to larger unoccupied shells (ours just moved into the shells that i painted for them. Snails don't usually have the prettiest of shells as they are smaller and tedious to paint but they may be a better choice for you if you are intimidated by the larger hermits. Snails don't grow nearly as quickly, and reqiure almost as little maintenance as the hermit. When my now 12 year old was only 9, she had 12 snails that lived for 2 years (forgot to water them for a few weeks .... dead as doornails, she felt badly ... good lesson learned there though. Thus a little terrarium. We keep our 3 hermits in a ten gallon fish tank.

I was going to research this over the web, but I do prefer first hand accounts.There are entire web sites complete with forums dedicated to nothing but hermit crabs and their care. Some even have members who are seeking adoptive 'parents' to provide homes for their hermits (i'm expected in bed now .... will provide a URL to one of the hermit forums .... asap.)

They make the BEST pets. Easy to care for, inexpensive to care for, no foul odor, & they never bark and piss off the neighbors.

 

[@}-}rebecca----]

http://petimage.bunnyherolabs.com/adopt/petimage/bWM9c3BpZGVyLnN3ZiZjbHI9MHg5MzQzOCZjbj1yb3NpZSZhbj1zaW5uMGNlbnQxIGFuZCBmYW1pbHk=.png


ummmn I think this might be yours ..............steps back very very slowly



(<!-- BEGIN bunnyhero labs pet code -->
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="250"><tr><td>
<script language="**********" ) Think this code enables you to take the critter back home.........yes i admit i have adopted a few since viewing them on sinnOcent1 and graceanne's posts.

 

[marieR19]

Hi Rosie!! *realizes it's a big spider* *sqeels and jumps away*
I have a verrrrry serious phobia of spiders and bugs. But I have to admit that Rosie does look kinda cute..... Now, if I have spider nightmares tonight, I'm sooo blaming you!!
Hey, have you posted pictures of your puppy and cat? If so, where?


Heather

 

[brioche]

They make the BEST pets. Easy to care for, inexpensive to care for, no foul odor, & they never bark and piss off the neighbors.

Thanks, sinn. Lots of info. If they're going to get big, maybe I won't get them. If what I see in the store is a baby and they're going to grow grow grow, then it would be unfair of me to buy then and try to get rid of them later.
My sister had a turtle and it kept growing and growing - it originally had a shell the size of a quarter and was a red eared slider. Somebody told me that they grow to fit their space. I don't know if that's true but she eventually had him in a thirty gallon tank.
He was big. Very big. His shell was bigger than my hand - not just the palm. I know that for some of you you're saying "psh, that's small" but this is a turtle that was originally taken out of the tank weekly to get his shell treated against fungus and monthly to clean his tank. (we had a baby snapping turtle for a while - the idea was to keep him for a year and then release him into the wild, which made for interesting feeding. He died of a fungal infection, and believe me, it's not a pretty way to go) We couldn't take him out anymore and he had developed this rather alarming tendency when one fed him of standing on his rocks and leaning against the side of the tank, stretching up and staring at you intently. We're pretty sure he was trying to get out. If he'd grown any more he'd have succeeded.
He was also a stupid turtle - when my sister put in one of those turtle shaped things to clean up the tank a bit (since we couldn't take him out anymore) he dug it out from behind his rocks and bit off the head and ate it. He also ate chunks from the shell. My sister said he didn't smell for quite a while after that...
She went back to the pet store, who didn't want him, but after badgering them they found a pond in Quebec who happily took him. I'm not sure how he got there, the store took care of that. But the lady who owned the pond said she had several red eared sliders and they were happy there. I believe she also fed them, so that wasn't an issue.
It's like hedgehogs - I love them and would dearly love to keep one, but I read up and found that they mostly only live one or two years in captivity because of nutritional issues, I believe. So I only have statues.
I recently told my mum that I am going to get a guinea pig (well, two) if I get a contract job in Kindergarten. We had four, one female, which gave birth to five babies. She said that I'd have to have a host family in the summers. We'll negotiate.
Our guinea pigs lived a long time. When we brought them into the vet she said they were the best cared for cavies she'd ever seen. The cages were washed out once a week to remove the ammonia to protect their feet, we had vitamin drops and salt licks, fed them guinea pig food (they need vitamin C which rabbit food doesn't have) and alfalfa and bird seed, and cut up carrots or apple every night for them. Unfortunately, that meant they didn't die well. One got infections in her foot. One's teeth were misaligned from birth and his back teeth started cutting his throat. They were euthanized. One lost his teeth and pretty much starved to death, despite feeding him shredded carrot and apple, and one died overnight, probably of pneumonia.
That was the hardest - I moved him into my room so he didn't die alone, and held him in a towel until his back legs gave out about 1 am.
I admire you guys and your menagerie. Snakes actually live longer in captivity than in the wild, according to Rob Ruddle, and you clearly care for all your pets.
I'm not fond of snails. Around here they're regarded as a pest. We had snails in our fish tank.
NEVER HAVE A SCIENTIST FOR A FATHER! Apart from the snapping turtle, which he got from his work, when I wanted fish he went out and get sticklebacks, which he liked - they proceeded to eat any other fish we put in there.
He then went out and got a rainbow trout in a net, and we had that. Unfortunately it grew, and was finally so big it couoldn't turn around in the tank, at which point we released it. Some angler was probably very happy.
Oy vey, I am rambling on! Sorry for hijacking the thread.

 

[h_i_s]

Brioche:

Here are two very informative (in fact, there is way more info there than i have had time to read) hermit crab sites : http://www.crabstreetjournal.com/
&
http://www.hermit-crabs.com/ .

There's a lot of info on those sites about proper hermit crab care. Some of it i agree with, some of it i do not.

1)They discourage the use of untreated water, but i've never treated our crabs' water and they are still alive, healthy and happy.
2)They encourage keeping a very humid atmosphere in the tank. i tried that when we first got them, and two died (both had been replaced immediately .... as hermits enjoy having pals to play with, and one daughter here would have been upset to be the one out of three who no longer had a pet in the tank). i've stopped adding water/moisture to the tank. i now only keep a good sized shallow dish of water in the tank for them to drink and splash about in. So far, none have died since i've kept the tank drier.
3)i don't 'over-care' for them. i stick to the K.I.S.S. (keep it simple stupid) rule of thumb. i offer clean water for drinking, and basic dry hermit crab food as offered at the local Petco. i keep unoccupied larger shells available to them (as their bodies grow, they need the option of switching over to a larger shell or they can die). i bath them in cool-luke warm water once weekly or so. The tank has nothing other than a large gravel fill, and drift wood, with an overhead aquarium light. i've never cleaned it. It doesn't have any odor at all, no evidence of feces, it doesn't smell .... so i don't bother. i believe in the rule of 'If it aint broke, don't fix it"...... haven't had any crabs die since approaching their care in this way.

Perhaps INSIDEYOURMIND can post a pic of the dog and cat, (recent format of my computer and i haven't yet installed the program needed to download pics from our digi camera).

Gotta get some pics of the hermits too .. it's difficult to accurately describe a hermit's size. When a tiny crab moves into a new shell that offers him room to grow, he can seem much larger than he actually is. Ours are really not that big (to me but that's just my opinion ....... they may seem too large for what you would be comfortable with).

What is it about their size that concerns you? Is it because they bite, and you worry more about that issue with the larger crabs? Or, is it a concern involving the size of their cage/tank/home ??

As far as size vs biting, a smaller crab's bite hurts no less than that of a larger crab. And regarding the size of the home, a ten gallon tank can hold three hermit crabs quite comfortably. They have a ton of extra space in a ten gallon tank.

The issue of size regarding their living quarters is not about them being able to fit into the space, it's all about their need to roam, climb, and actually run a sprint from one end to the other. Crabs need exercise, and as they are crabs and don't offer much entertainment to their owners other than being able to observe their movement, put them in a very tiny space and they are suddenly not quite as interesting.

 

[brioche]

Brioche:

Here are two very informative (in fact, there is way more info there than i have had time to read) hermit crab sites : http://www.crabstreetjournal.com/
&
http://www.hermit-crabs.com/ .

There's a lot of info on those sites about proper hermit crab care. Some of it i agree with, some of it i do not.

1)They discourage the use of untreated water, but i've never treated our crabs' water and they are still alive, healthy and happy.
2)They encourage keeping a very humid atmosphere in the tank. i tried that when we first got them, and two died (both had been replaced immediately .... as hermits enjoy having pals to play with, and one daughter here would have been upset to be the one out of three who no longer had a pet in the tank). i've stopped adding water/moisture to the tank. i now only keep a good sized shallow dish of water in the tank for them to drink and splash about in. So far, none have died since i've kept the tank drier.
3)i don't 'over-care' for them. i stick to the K.I.S.S. (keep it simple stupid) rule of thumb. i offer clean water for drinking, and basic dry hermit crab food as offered at the local Petco. i keep unoccupied larger shells available to them (as their bodies grow, they need the option of switching over to a larger shell or they can die). i bath them in cool-luke warm water once weekly or so. The tank has nothing other than a large gravel fill, and drift wood, with an overhead aquarium light. i've never cleaned it. It doesn't have any odor at all, no evidence of feces, it doesn't smell .... so i don't bother. i believe in the rule of 'If it aint broke, don't fix it"...... haven't had any crabs die since approaching their care in this way.

Perhaps INSIDEYOURMIND can post a pic of the dog and cat, (recent format of my computer and i haven't yet installed the program needed to download pics from our digi camera).

Gotta get some pics of the hermits too .. it's difficult to accurately describe a hermit's size. When a tiny crab moves into a new shell that offers him room to grow, he can seem much larger than he actually is. Ours are really not that big (to me but that's just my opinion ....... they may seem too large for what you would be comfortable with).

What is it about their size that concerns you? Is it because they bite, and you worry more about that issue with the larger crabs? Or, is it a concern involving the size of their cage/tank/home ??

As far as size vs biting, a smaller crab's bite hurts no less than that of a larger crab. And regarding the size of the home, a ten gallon tank can hold three hermit crabs quite comfortably. They have a ton of extra space in a ten gallon tank.

The issue of size regarding their living quarters is not about them being able to fit into the space, it's all about their need to roam, climb, and actually run a sprint from one end to the other. Crabs need exercise, and as they are crabs and don't offer much entertainment to their owners other than being able to observe their movement, put them in a very tiny space and they are suddenly not quite as interesting.

I don't really want something that grows to the size of a baseball. I'm looking for a small pet. The hermit crabs at the pet store are very very small. I guess they are juveniles or something.
I can't really explain to you WHY I want a small pet, it's just a personal preference. Even the dog I enetually plan to buy is one of the smaller breeds, but that's partially because I'm not going to live in the kind of area a large dog needs to play and run around in.
It's not a fear of pinching or anything, just a preference.

 

[INSIDEYOURMIND]

OK, Here is my side of the cat story, I had a cool cat, he was a bit stand offish, and hey, if he attacked a rug rat from time to time, what can I say........

Now is is a wuss cat, loves to be carried around, and cries if it doesn't happen, I mean today, he slept on a pink blanket, all day!

I had his balls cut off long ago, but now I think he lost his penis too!

Brioche, there are 2 distinct species of Hermit Crabs sold in pet stores, one is considerably smaller than the other, and stays that way. By the way, in reference to the pain of the bite, THEY FUCKING HURT! It took a great deal to sit there and look like it didn't hurt in front of the kids, when i purposely put my finger in it's claw to show how they wouldn't bite. I won't be demonstrating that again too soon!

Here is a photo of the emasculated cat, and a photo of our Lab puppy Deeoogee, the puppy picture shows him in his Hawaiian shirt, with my grand daughter Alexa, the snake in the background of that photo is Slither, he is about 11 feet, and 70 pounds! The cat pic is just him, he refused to share the spotlight with anyone!

 

[brioche]

OK, Here is my side of the cat story, I had a cool cat, he was a bit stand offish, and hey, if he attacked a rug rat from time to time, what can I say........

Now is is a wuss cat, loves to be carried around, and cries if it doesn't happen, I mean today, he slept on a pink blanket, all day!

I had his balls cut off long ago, but now I think he lost his penis too!

Brioche, there are 2 distinct species of Hermit Crabs sold in pet stores, one is considerably smaller than the other, and stays that way. By the way, in reference to the pain of the bite, THEY FUCKING HURT! It took a great deal to sit there and look like it didn't hurt in front of the kids, when i purposely put my finger in it's claw to show how they wouldn't bite. I won't be demonstrating that again too soon!

Here is a photo of the emasculated cat, and a photo of our Lab puppy Deeoogee, the puppy picture shows him in his Hawaiian shirt, with my grand daughter Alexa, the snake in the background of that photo is Slither, he is about 11 feet, and 70 pounds! The cat pic is just him, he refused to share the spotlight with anyone!

Very nice.
Oh, ok, if they're not going to get too big, then maybe I WILL get some. But I'm still not sure. I tend to be very retentive when making a decision. I'll probably have both tanks set up, complete with shells, before I buy them.
Your kitty looks very pretty. I always like that sooty silvery black/grey colour.
The dog looks nice too. Very content.

 

[h_i_s]

Very nice.
Oh, ok, if they're not going to get too big, then maybe I WILL get some. But I'm still not sure. I tend to be very retentive when making a decision. I'll probably have both tanks set up, complete with shells, before I buy them.
Your kitty looks very pretty. I always like that sooty silvery black/grey colour.
The dog looks nice too. Very content.

Oh, just go for it brioche ... lol.
If worse comes to worse, and you decide it's not a good choice of pets for you ... i will adopt the hermit from you. i don't know where you live in comparison to us, but they can handle being mailed very well.

By the way: Have you concidered what a great classroom pet project a few hermits could be? When my daughter was in the 4th grade, they had snails in the classroom .... hermits are very similar, except that they can pinch. The kids loved having them in class, and learned a great deal from the experience. The teacher chose a different kid to sent them home with over each weekend.... it was very kewl, not one parent objected, and the only downfall was when kids argued over whose turn it was from week to week .... heh.

Oh, and for the record, my Master is the only one who was pinched that one time. It was definitely one of those rare moments when i had to try VERY hard to show only concern for Him, and not laugh my ass off while asking if He was ok. None of the crabs have pinched anyone else so far..... but, then again, none of the rest of us have, purposely or otherwise, stuck our finger right between their big claws. heh .....

 

[brioche]

Oh, just go for it brioche ... lol.
If worse comes to worse, and you decide it's not a good choice of pets for you ... i will adopt the hermit from you. i don't know where you live in comparison to us, but they can handle being mailed very well.

By the way: Have you concidered what a great classroom pet project a few hermits could be? When my daughter was in the 4th grade, they had snails in the classroom .... hermits are very similar, except that they can pinch. The kids loved having them in class, and learned a great deal from the experience. The teacher chose a different kid to sent them home with over each weekend.... it was very kewl, not one parent objected, and the only downfall was when kids argued over whose turn it was from week to week .... heh.

Oh, and for the record, my Master is the only one who was pinched that one time. It was definitely one of those rare moments when i had to try VERY hard to show only concern for Him, and not laugh my ass off while asking if He was ok. None of the crabs have pinched anyone else so far..... but, then again, none of the rest of us have, purposely or otherwise, stuck our finger right between their big claws. heh .....

I don't know...I'd still rather have guinea pigs...maybe I'll bargain for one of the other based on smell and general acceptability. I'm pretty sure I can talk my mum around to one of the two, but she's unpredictable. you never know which she'd agree to.
This requires thought.
Also, the decision needs to be made during a period where I have not had a headache for the past three days.

 

[greenmands]

Lovely

 

[h_i_s]

I don't know...I'd still rather have guinea pigs...maybe I'll bargain for one of the other based on smell and general acceptability. I'm pretty sure I can talk my mum around to one of the two, but she's unpredictable. you never know which she'd agree to.
This requires thought.
Also, the decision needs to be made during a period where I have not had a headache for the past three days.

Been there ... i get some pretty intense migraines that can last for days. i'd definitely hold off on any major decisons until that headache passes. Hope you feel some relief asap .... Plainly put, headaches suck.

 

[Miss Diva]

Can I borrow Rosie

We have field-mouse in the house. I put a trap with cheese on it and the darn mouse ate the cheese and took off.

I do not mind spiders and snakes but four legged furry things that scurry about just plain scare me.

 

[h_i_s]

We have field-mouse in the house. I put a trap with cheese on it and the darn mouse ate the cheese and took off.

I do not mind spiders and snakes but four legged furry things that scurry about just plain scare me.

i had trouble with mice in a house that i lived in at one time & they pulled that same shit.
Stick some of that 'Decon' mouse/rodent poison stuff inside the cheese next time (careful where you leave it (hide it) though... especially if you have pets and/or children ect).

Roise is not quite big enough to eat a mouse ... i don't think. She eats crickets.
Although, any one of our snakes would enjoy your mouse as an appetizer.