You will be envious, oh yes, you will

Ohh-ho-ho! Who was at the opening of the M.O.L.A.??? You bet your ass, I was there! MOLA (museum of living art) is the new reptile exhibit at the Ft. Worth zoo. It was two years and 19 million (I think) dollars in the making. Not only is it one of a kind, but is beautiful as a piece of architecture.
Some of the animals on display were; a 15! foot saltwater crocodile, a Fiji island iguana (very endangered), and one of the very few Chinese giant salamanders in North America, and a giant tortoise. OH! The king cobra is fricking huge! To those not familiar, the king cobra is the largest venomous snake in the world. I will try not to go into too much detail about each species, I tend to go off on a rant and people usually have a hard time following me, like now. The tortoise did not come out, it was a little cool for him/her to want to come outside.
Jayde and I took a day and spent most of it at the zoo and had a great time and took a great many photos. Some of my earliest memories come from the Ft. Worth zoo. I have had the pleasure to observe it become what it is today. If you get a chance, give it a visit, there is an animal for everyone, even penguins for one of our friends, you know who you are.
We have another addition to the house, a Quaker parrot, still yet to be named. She is another rescue and adjusting well. I finally got the 110 gallon tank set up for the water dragon. I doesn't look too bad and there is plenty of room for him.
In a nutshell, that's about it for now. I have to go, I'm in the middle of playing Texas hold'em with some of the beings from my home planet and need to give my report on the going-ons of this planet. Later humans.

Exo Terra review

I have recently been using ExoTerra Sun Glospot lamps to heat and light our reptile terrariums. The results have not been good at all. The spot lamps for daytime and infrared night lamps of the Neodymium sort have an increadibly short life span. I use 3 different brands of light fixtures on 3 different tanks for 3 different species of herptile. All 3 set ups have had the same results. The longest-lived bulb was just under a full 30 days, the shortest, just 3 days!! We have 3 ball pythons, a Mexican Black Kingsnake and THE most beautiful Asian water dragon you have ever seen! Their names are,respectfuylly: Madmartigan, Razell, Sorcha, the Slithering Darkness (slither), and Obad-hai. All 3 kinds have different requirments but one thing in common; they all need a reliable heat source!!!! These bulbs have a nasty habit of burning out in the middle of the night or when we are out. I have tried to communicate to Hagen, the company that makes the lamps, to no avail. So, if you own reptiles, be warned. I have bought over a dozen since August and here it is only November. I am just fortunate to have purchased multiple bulbs each time I ordered. It is not the company I order our supplies from, Reptile Supply.com has been spot-on with the shipping. No broken bulbs on many seperate shipments. We have, however, had no problems with the Exo Terra fluorescent bulbs. They are still working strong on a timed cycle switch that gradually brings the light up to full brightness and slowly dims them each evening.
I have had much better luck with the Fluker bulbs. Hey, all I can recomend is that you try different things to see what works for you and your creepy-crawlys and ALWAYS!!!! buy back up heat sources!!! We live in central Texas and the weather is bi-polar as hell, always changing, so a fall back plan and reserve supplies are a must. We must look after our critters as we agreed to when we decided to raise them, it's our responsibility, so do it well.