Musk Turtle is growing

The Musk turtle is getting bigger. Now that this one and the Texas Mud turtle are in their own tank, I think they will do better. The larger turtles in the other tank have a tendency to nip at the smaller turtles.

I found Dusty, the Ball Python!

After four months missing in action, today I found Dusty! We were all overjoyed to see that the baby snake was back! I was shocked to find it, and also very happy. There I was playing ball with my dog Brownie, when the rubber Hi-Bounce ball bounced over a book shelf and then rolled down the back of the shelf and got stuck between the book-shelf and the wall. These Super-Balls are about two inches in diameter, and Brownie loves running after them because they bounce around so much. When the ball bounced behind the book shelf, Brownie kept wagging her tail at the book shelf and whining.

I did not have a spare ball around, so I moved the book shelf to get the ball. When I moved the book shelf a little, the ball rolled all the way down the wall and under the book shelf. So I had to move the book shelf completely away from the wall in order to get the ball. As I pushed the book shelf about a foot away from the wall, I saw the balled up snake rolling on the floor! Apparently it had gone into hibernation, and I had awakened it? What is funny is that my dog Brownie has often sniffed at the bottom of that book shelf. Since I have lost a few of those Hi-Bounce balls when they have bounced behind various furniture (because I am not going to move the furniture to find a little rubber ball), I had always thought that Brownie was sniffing at some lost ball.

On the floor area that where the snake had been was the old waste of the last mouse it had eaten back in December, and a sloughed-off skin. It took a few minutes to clean tht up, as the stuff had all dried into the floor (fortunately it is not a rug!). Apparently Dusty had moulted once at some point. The snake had a tiny bit of skin that seemed to have been rubbed off, possibly when I moved the shelf. You can see the abrasion in this photo (about two inches on the ridge of its spine, near the right-hand corner of the photo) of Dusty that I took when I put it into its home. It stayed in the water dish for a while. It was too late to go to the pet store and buy a mouse. Hopefully Dusty will be hungry!