One Month!

Trinity has been with us for one month now. She is doing so well. I was so excited to hear her say her first word today: "hello". It was clear as day, my sister, who was sitting next to me heard it too! of course she never repeated it. Hopefully she will. You can definitely tell from the numerous sounds she's been making that she is definitely practicing speech! She already has the tongue clicking sound down pretty well.
I've witnessed her pterodactyl screech a few weeks ago when I was cleaning FlapJack's cage. It scared me! I thought she had hurt herself! Nope! when i turned around to see what happened, she was sitting on top of her cage as if nothing happened. I looked at her closer and she put her head down for a scritch. CLEVER GIRL. looks like someone gets jealous if i pay FlapJack a little too much attention, even if I'm just cleaning his cage. She repeated the same behavior again a week later when i was cleaning FlapJack's cage. She still is reluctant to step up for anyone. Oh but she will if i have a sunflower seed in my hand!!!! we'll work on it a little bit each day. I found she enjoys water. Ive caught her several times taking a little dip in her waterbowl. Sometimes i'll take her in the shower with me and have her perch on the curtain rod. She will tolerate a little splash here and there. :)
She LOVES SHREDDING PAPER. I used to have a small poster on the wall next to her cage, torn to shreds now. Thats ok, it was getting old to look at anyways.
The ither day, i was on the ground with my laptop a little ways away from her cage watching einstein the african grey on youtube. I purposely turned it up to see what she would do bshe flew down in front of my laptop, took a look at the screen for awhile then walked back to her cage and climbed up. lol. She is pretty silly.

Reptile Educational "Show and Tell"

A couple of days ago I packed up my reptiles and headed to an Elementary School where I would be talking to 6 different 1st grade classes all about snakes, lizards and tarantulas. Unfortunately I no longer have a tortoise =(
There were 9 creatures altogether and the children LOVED every one of them! They were so fascinated by them and had a billion questions. I explained to them what type of species they were, where they were located, what they ate, and about their sense of smell, sight and hearing. The kids were full of questions, so I let them ask away. Some of the most frequently asked questions were "does it bite?" and "what does it eat?".
"Does it bite?" is a very popular question with anyone I show the animals off too and I must say it is a HUGE pet peeve of mine.
"Does it bite?" OF COURSE it CAN bite just like you or me.
Does your dog bite? no? but it CAN right? Same goes for reptiles or any other species for that matter.
My reptiles generally don't bite out of aggression, they're actually very docile, but that doesn't mean they won't have an "off" day. Reptiles aren't domesticated like dogs and cats and can be kind of hard to read. With any reptile or wild animal, even the most tame, you must be on your guard at all times.
Sorry just really had to put that out there. Food for thought.
Anyways, back to the "show and tell".
My boyfriend and I brought:
 4 bearded dragons- 2 male, 2 female
1 Argentine Tegu- my Spartacus
1 Albino Burmese Python- my Loki
1 baby Columbian Red Tail Boa
1 4.5 ft Columbian Red Tail Boa
and of course Lucretia the Chilean Rose Tarantula

The kids got to come up (if they wanted to) to pet the bearded dragons.
Some kids got to pet Spartacus but because I woke Spartacus up from his slumber that morning he was being a bit cranky and uncooperative. So I had him on his harness and leash and let him walk around on the floor. The kids got to watch him from a distance.

They kids also got to witness the bearded dragons eat some super worms. They REALLY enjoyed that.

Unfortunately they didn't have parent permission to touch the snakes. =(

The event went really well! I was really tired out when I got home! The reptiles were too.

I'm bummed that I didn't think to get pictures of the kids with the animals. Maybe next time!

Here are the reptiles that showed themselves off for the kids:

Rocko: Bearded Dragon

Dharma: Bearded Dragon

Maggie: Bearded Dragon

Dexter: Bearded Dragon

Kaa: Columbian Red Tail Boa

{Instert picture of Stark}

Loki: Albino Burmese Python

Spartacus: Argentine Tegu

Lucretia: Chilean Rose Tarantula

Lucretia is doing well

So Lucretia went to her first classroom the other day. She was featured in my educational "show and tell" for first graders. The kids loved her. She did really well. I didn't take her out onto my hand, partly because I don't have too much experience handling her, and partly because I wouldn't want her to jump away and become loose in a classroom with potential allergic kids. That would be bad. My sister took some much better pictures of her! She still hasn't eaten, so far I've only offered super worms, I'm guessing she just isn't interested and would rather have a cricket or a roach. I'll pick some up this weekend. Hopefully she eats. Overall she's very very calm. Love her!

PICTURES!

Finally had my sister take pictures of Trinity with the better camera =)

Meet Lucretia

Brian and I went to a reptile show in Pomona, we had no intentions of bringing home any new animals, we just went to get out and to pick up some feeder bugs for the beardies. I saw a booth full of tarantulas and marveled at the sight of someone holding one. I have never held a tarantula before but really wanted to. I ended up holding a Chilean Rose. AWESOME experience! I fell in love with her of course and just HAD to bring her home! So I did....
She is said to be 8 years old.

The car ride home. Isn't she beautiful?

Fearless

I'm so proud of Trinity. I introduced the vacuum a couple days ago and was really worried how she would handle it. (but the carpet really needed a good vacuuming!) FlapJack is completely fearless and has never been afraid of the vacuum, or anything for that matter. I brought the vacuum out and I guess the sudden sight of a big red thing coming in from the other room startled her, she took off in flight. (WOW! she really can glide pretty far even with her feathers clipped, which I'm happy about). Brian rescued and cuddled with her, and once she was alright I warned her of a "BIG NOISE! BIIIIIG NOISE!" and turned the vacuum on. Brian had her so she was busy cuddling. She did fine =)
Later that same day she managed to throw her pellet dish and pellets went flying everywhere. She was on her play gym at the time. I took the vacuum out once again and she didn't get scared like she did earlier. yaaay. I totally forgot to warn her about the "BIG NOISE" and turned it on......it didn't even phase her! (of course I turned it off after realizing I forgot to warn her, said "BIIIIG NOISE" and turned it back on) She just sat contently watching me. She didn't seem frightened of it at all! =) YAY. =)

She really loves attention and sounds like a little puppy when she begs us to come out of her cage. I take it she enjoys our company so I thought maybe she is ready for some simple clicker training...the "step up" command. I didn't want to push her at all if she wasn't interested. SHE CAUGHT ON FAST!!! She learned that putting one foot on my hand would get her a sunflower seed. I decided to show her how FlapJack steps up. I went over to FlapJack's cage and had him "step up" onto my hand for a seed (FlapJack is a pro at it). Trinity watched and must have understood because when it was her turn she stepped onto my hand with both feet! AMAZING =) She's so smart and such a fast learner! (FlapJack too) Both FlapJack and her took turns "stepping up" onto my hand and "going to cage" for seeds. FlapJack is a good teacher =) I've been doing the "step up" command a couple times a "session"..don't want to bore her or frustrate her =) Now she is stepping up for Brian as well =) I think she really enjoys the attention! 

It's Been One Week!

It has been a week since Trinity came home and she is doing well =)
Yesterday I introduced her to FlapJack's Play gym, She was a little iffy at first but calmed down fast. I fed her some of her bean mix on it, she ate like a little piggy! She's definitely starting to eat more now. Hopefully now she starts gaining her weight back.
She's very playful and loves playing with her toys =)
She makes very cool whistles when she's in her cage and she wants out.

She wags her tail A LOT like a little duck! It's so cute! I recently bought a book on parrot behavior and was reading that the tail wag means "I'm glad to see you", "that was interesting" or "My tail feathers are out of place" (Mattie Sue Athan)

Her favorite treats are dried noodles and (of course) sunflower seeds.
She doesn't know the step up command yet, but I was playing with her a little bit last night. I have a clicker and did a few "training" sessions, nothing really serious, I just wanted to see how she would react. She understood last night that if she puts one foot on my hand she gets a treat! =) The session didn't last long, I just wanted to introduce her to the clicker.

She's very sweet! I hope this isn't just a "honeymoon" period.
She loves being rubbed around her head and LOVES cuddling underneath chins!
I bought a couple of cheap towels to drape around me when cuddling with my birdies, I'm getting tired of being pooped on. haha.

Here She is on a branch of the play gym. I think she liked it =)