the show

[opabinia]

The New England Herpetological Society's Annual Fall Show and Sale was a modest, comfortable affair in a small room at the New England Wildlife Center in South Weymouth. Friendly vendors stood behind fold-up tables stacked with snakes, lizards, geckos, frogs, and tortoises in disposable clear plastic bins. Children of various ages zoomed, bounced, and howled across the room, high on soda, overstimulated by all the brightly-colored animals. There were lots of new-metal fans.

Most of the Real Estate was dedicated to snakes, especially little baby snakes. Second in frequency, I think, were the lizards; and third, the geckos. Lizards and geckos do nothing for me. I like snakes all right, and there were many beautiful, docile specimens to admire, in and out of boxes, draped around people, tongue-sniffing the air; but I had only come for the cryptodires.

There were two tables of interest to me. One had a couple of toddler-aged Chinese box turtles (Cuora flavomarginata), waddling over damp moss and trying their darnedest to escape -- slowly -- over their Tupperware walls. The other had a mated pair of red-footed tortoises (Geochelone carbonaria),



along with three of their children, and four eggs. The parent tortoises were enduring the terrible indignity of wearing modified baby diapers, to prevent soiling their un-furnished holding tub. (The kids had some absorbent bedding to poop on.) I witnessed a diaper change on Momma Tortoise, and although she only protested meekly, withdrawing piteously into her shell (especially when she felt the cold baby-wipe on her delicates), I know the humiliation must have been nearly unbearable.

Comments

[halo.livejournal.com]

so did you adopt anybody?

[lepidosiren.livejournal.com]

Nope. Tempting as the tortoises were, I stuck to fact-finding. e.g.,

1. No spur-thighed tortoises for me. Cute, but destructive.
2. Russian tortoises and Hermann's tortoises are good candidates, also.

[tisana.livejournal.com]

Your empathy for the turtles is adorable.

I know very little about them, only that in my vision of Someday, I have a koi pond with fish and a turtle or two, and there's some vague idea that the combination is bad because the fish will end up being et.
Still.
Sounds like going to one of these shows first would be a good idea.

[mandy-moon.livejournal.com]

I love small tortoises, and big ones too, but I feel their lifespan is too much of a commitment for me. I would have to write them into my will or something.

I loved going to events like this a kid, but this time around I kept thinking "Damn kids all over the place getting in the way of my pictures!" When did I turn into such a grouch?

And no love for lizards? I cry!

[mandy-moon.livejournal.com]

Oh, but I did get a picture of a diapered tortoise. Must upload that later...

[lepidosiren.livejournal.com]

I feel that a tortoise is a more transferable pet than a dog or cat. She wouldn't necessarily care who sponsors her, so long as she's well-treated. If I got sick of a tortoise after ten years, I think I could give her to a friend without causing her psychological trauma. Therefore, despite its enormous lifespan, a reptile would feel like a lesser commitment than a big, brainy, emotional mammal, to me.

Lizards? I dunno. They lack depth, or something. I prefer salamanders, which are endearingly clumsy.

[sephardic.livejournal.com]

My first pet was Tootsie the tortoise. She provided an educational episode for me as a young child. 'Death' is when the lego by your hind foot doesn't move for 3 days.

*Ohhhhh.*

Happily, I have never had to test that theory again.