Critter Keeper

04/17/2025

Keep your eyes to the skies!

Face shields recommended!

BIRDS! A massive bird migration happening tonight!

The weather pattern is ideal and the southerly winds are set to bring in a lot of migrating birds tonight. The BirdCast model estimates 159 million! My friend Andy, is a self proclaimed “birder” and sent me this saying, get ready! 

04/17/2025

Pictures are worth a thousand words.

04/13/2025

For being the last day of shows before a six-day break during which I’ll feed the snakes, Friday was a doozy. I’m ready for the break, to be honest.

It was a pretty busy day, for starters. Originally, we had two programs at Immanuel Lutheran preschool, and a late afternoon Spring Fling at Westminster Presbyterian Preschool, but I got invited to a young lady’s celebration at the Shriner’s Children’s Hospital, and we were able to squeeze that in between the scheduled events. I’m so glad I did.

Aspen is a twelve-year-old animal lover, and she has been in a halo for the last six weeks. A halo is a piece of metal that is screwed into the skull, and with the weight of the body, helps to straighten out the spine. It looks terribly uncomfortable, and the patience, bravery, and optimism of children like Aspen are only a few of a hundred different reasons why Shriners kids will always hold a special place in my heart. Aspen’s halo is coming off on Monday, and the Shriner’s staff wanted to help her celebrate by inviting me and the Greenville Zoo, as well as a few of our respective animals, out for Aspen’s celebration.

There were other children and their families helping Aspen celebrate, and I showed off the ten or so animals I brought into the hospital with me, allowing Aspen and the other children to pet and hold as appropriate. Aspen was terrified of the tarantula at first, but with tears in her eyes, she held it, and was absolutely elated after she held it. The child had no idea that I was more thrilled than she was.

In fact, there were smiles all around, with the possible exception of the Infection Control nurse, who watched the animals and I with a wary regard.

The zoo girl had now arrived, and I chatted with her while the table I had been using was sanitized by the hospital staff in preparation for the zoo’s presentation. We got along swimmingly; she had brought along a ball python, a spotted salamander, and a tenrec, which is a hedgehog-like creature from Madagascar. I was surprised to learn that my new friend had never held a tarantula. It was a condition we remedied before I left.

I cautioned her not to wear her sticker while in her zoo uniform. It’s best to avoid any appearances of impropriety and potential conflicts of interest.

Then it was off to the Spring Fling, a short journey that was hampered somewhat by severe thunderstorms with hail.

The large spacious room that I was setting up in already had a number of stations with a variety of games, and across the way, inflatables were being set up. The school had an eight-foot table for me, which I ultimately decided to place a few feet in front of mine - I could put individual animals on that table, keeping a buffer between my table that held many of my animals. Children began arriving early, and everything was going great, right up until the big hand got to the twelve, and it hit start time.

I was already in show mode, and had shown several animals. Mr. Beasley, the bearded dragon, was on the table, and I was offering a large superworm to him in front of a few kids. Sometimes Mr. Beasley acts disinterested, and the beetle larva was crawling all over my hand. I was moving my hand around to keep the worm in sight of the lizard. The superworm was on the tip of my little finger, and that got Mr. Beasley’s attention.

He cocked his head, opened his mouth slightly, and it would be just a second before his tongue would take the worm off my finger.

Except it didn’t.

I can only surmise that since the worm and my pinkie finger appeared to be approximately the same color and shade, Mr. Beasley assumed that he was being offered a very large mealworm. I came to this conclusion rather rapidly, since a full third of my pinkie was now in the lizard’s mouth.

During the countless times I’ve fed Mr. Beasley in the past, one thing I’ve noticed is that the first thing he does when a mealworm winds up in his mouth is begin bringing his jaws together to crush the worm. Regrettably, with the worm initially being on my finger, it was too far back in his mouth for him to chew it. It was now my pinkie that he was concerned with.

I was pretty concerned as well, since it was my pinkie.

Bearded dragons make some awesome pets because of their docility. What’s not talked about is how sharp their teeth are, how powerful their jaws are, and how a wriggling mealworm in the back of their throat incites them to engage in more aggressive chewing.

It was probably no more than 5 or 10 seconds that my finger was in his mouth, but it felt a lot longer. I finally got my finger dislodged, and Mr. Beasley turned his attention back to the mealworm. He may have swallowed the worm whole. Thinking back, one regret I have is not quickly digging out another mealworm, handing it to one of the wide-eyed kids, and saying, “Here. Your turn.”

Pro tip: Should you ever be in the position of having a 16-inch powerfully-jawed lizard macerating one of your distal phalanges, refrain from displaying overt concern and exclamations of pain. That’s how I’m resolving to do it next time.

I put Mr. Beasley back into his bin, cleaned the smeared blood off the table, and retrieved a bandaid from my first aid kit. You know the one. It’s strategically placed on top of my display table. I know some folks think it’s just there for show. Sometimes kids ask me, “Why is there a first aid kit?” I always reply, “Because it’s better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.”

Anyway, the Spring Fling is in full swing, and my job is to show animals for two full hours. It’s noisy, people everywhere, my finger is sore, and I decide it’s time to bring out one of my animals that I don’t use but occasionally.

Violet is a big active sweetheart of a boa constrictor. She’s about seven and a half feet long, fifteen or twenty pounds of muscle.

She’s crawling and climbing all over me, and we’re having a grand time. I eventually handed off the back end to a gentleman that was there. I was holding her loosely about a foot behind her head.

Out of nowhere, a little girl walks up in front of me, and what does she have in her hands? A HAMSTER.

Now everybody relax. It wasn’t real, but it was realistic. So I figured I’d play along.

“Oh, no!” I say. “Please don’t bring that hamster any closer. “Violet here will wolf that thing down in no time-“

It feels initially like an electric shock, although there was definitely some pain, as you would expect to feel when a large snake grabs the inside of your forearm and hangs on with 70 or 80 needle-sharp teeth. She didn’t hang on very long; there was that familiar sound I heard (and felt, if you can feel a sound) that I always liken to two pieces of Velcro being pulled apart as the dozens of teeth release from the tissue.

Well, that’s enough of that. I put her back in her bag, being careful not to drip blood on the bag, while holding my arm out away from my shirt.

Then it was back to the first aid kit after grabbing some nearby napkins. Inside the kit, I found the last antiseptic swab and the last gauze pad. There was a roll of white bandaging tape which I had to wrap around my arm in a couple of places to keep the gauze snug. I was especially careful using my knife to cut the tape. It seemed I was on a little run of bad luck. You know what they say about knives: “Better to have one and not need it, than to need one and not have it.”

Now that I was all bandaged up and the table was cleared off, it was time to get back into show mode. With two bloody incidents within a half hour, I needed to come good.

Except nobody was at my table. The nearest kid was thirty feet away.

Dummy.

It’s because you don’t have any animals out.

The kids and families all came back with me bringing the iguana out. And then the tortoise. I stacked the giant toads, making a “toad-um pole.” I even clowned around a few more times with the knight anole hanging off my finger. Everybody had a wonderful time.

But, it was nice to get home, get the animals put away, and to sleep in this morning until a little after seven.

I fed the snakes earlier today, and had a few errands to run. One of those errands was to buy a new first aid kit.

It seems my old one is somewhat depleted.

04/08/2025

I don’t find many scorpion molts. I believe they sometimes eat the exuvia, or molted exoskeleton, to recycle nutrients. I know that’s what happens when a giant centipede molts. I’ve seen it.

This morning, I actually thought my death stalker had died, and that the tiny crickets I put in a couple days ago had partially eaten the dead scorpion.

But alas, the crickets were gone, and I found a very spry and healthy death stalker under its hide!

04/08/2025

Part of me is excited, to think that science has succeeded in cloning an extinct animal, in this case, the dire wolf.

The other part of me realizes that I’ve seen several movies that start with the cloning of extinct animals, and things tend to end badly.

04/07/2025

***SUMMER READING SCHEDULE***

Here’s the library schedule for Summer 2025. All libraries are in South Carolina unless otherwise annotated. I also included the World of Energy in Seneca on this tally.

Please note that just because there are gaps between dates, it does not necessarily mean that I’d be available for potential new events. Other corporate and private events, as well as vacation and days to catch a breather, are not on this schedule.

6/3 Gaffney; 1030 and 1130
6/3 Blacksburg; 3 pm and 4 pm
6/10 Walhalla; 11
6/11 Ninety-Six; 10
6/11 Greenwood, 1 pm
6/13 Saluda (); 10
6/13 Ridge Spring Civic Center; 3 pm
6/16 Easley; 10
6/16 Clemson/Central; 3 pm
6/16 Easley; 6 pm
6/17 Pickens (Rec Center); 10
6/17 Liberty; 3 pm
6/27 World of Energy, Seneca; 1:30
6/30 Burnsville, NC; 10 am
6/30 Bakersville, NC; 1 pm
7/2 Abbeville; 11 am
7/3 Newberry; 11 am
7/3 Whitmire; 3 pm
7/8 RPL West, Cleveland, NC; 4 pm
7/8 RPL Main, Salisbury, NC; 6:30
7/9 RPL East, Rockwell, NC; 10, 11
7/9 RPL South, China Grove, NC; 2:30, 4 pm
7/10 Conover, NC; 11 am
7/10 Claremont, NC; 2 pm
7/10 Terrell, NC; 5 pm
7/14 Spruce Pine, NC; 10 am
7/14 Newland, NC; 1 pm
7/16 Bennettsville; 10 am
7/17 Calhoun Cty (St Matthews); 1030 am, 1:30 pm
7/24 Laurens; 10 am
7/24 Clinton, 2 pm
8/1 Marion, NC; 3 pm

04/05/2025

Meet Clawed-ia, the Cuban rock iguana. We’re learning each other at a spring fling this morning. She’s not mad in that second pic; she just wants MORE BANANA!

03/30/2025

During my pre-show at eight-year-old Hilton’s party today, I offered a superworm to Jabba the Hop, my giant African bullfrog. He gobbled it right up.

One of Hilton’s friends was very impressed. “That is SO cool!”

Hilton matter-of-factly replied, “Yep. That’s why we hired him.”

03/28/2025

I was doing my weekly diligence of disposing of about 500 live crickets, and as I was putting a few tiny crickets in with the death stalker scorpion, I happened to notice a small cricket on top of the scorpion’s hide.

It was dead. And I don’t mean to sound callous, but it struck me funny that last week, when I put several tiny crickets in with the death stalker, one of those tiny crickets decided to take his destiny into his own hands. Rather than succumb to a quick death from the scorpion, this little fellow in the red circle chose to starve or die of thirst on top of the hide, out of the reach of the scorpion.

It immediately brought to mind another time, several years ago, when Avery was watching me feed animals. As either a death stalker or fat-tailed scorpion grabbed a cricket with its pincers, and as the tail came over the scorpion’s back to inject the venom, and as the cricket went rigid from the paralytic effect of the sting, Avery wryly noted:

“Well, THAT’S the worst day of his little life.”

My sense of humor might not be like yours.

03/23/2025

03/22/2025

To think when I started this grand adventure we all know as Critter Keeper fifteen years ago, I was told it wouldn’t work because half of the population, being girls, would not want a birthday party with a bunch of reptiles and bugs. I remember replying, “I disagree. I think they’ll like it.”

I’ve never figured the exact numbers, but it’s pretty close to being one full third of the parties I do are for girls.

Today, I only had two parties, and both of them were for girls. Not only that, but both of these girls had me for multiple previous parties.

In a situation like that, I’ve got to come good, you know?

First of all, there were several animals I was using that I’ve never used before from a year ago; one of them being the sailfin dragon.

She’s an impressive animal. I made kind of a big deal about it several weeks ago when the dragon that wouldn’t even eat for ten days after getting her, was now eating tangerine wedges out of my hand.

Today, at both parties, while stretched out along my arm, she ate tangerine wedges out of my hand at one party, and a strawberry out of my hand during the second. Katie even suggested a name for her: Ashes. I like it; she’s almost totally black, with tiny gold flecks throughout. It fits, and I might run with that.

That kind of made my day. Thanks, Katie!

Knowing that I had two parties that had seen my program at least several times before, I decided to bring another animal that normally, I use exclusively for the public programs. I just figured Skylar and Katie would appreciate it, you know? I brought my big male knight anole.

This large anole is not hesitant to bite. In my quest to make my program as exciting and as surprising as possible, there’s a point in my schtick with the knight anole when I deliberately allow him to bite me.

I do an exaggerated little dance with this lizard clamped onto my finger, and trust me, anyone who was nodding off is now wide awake.

Does it hurt? Yes, it hurts. Sometimes more than others. It’s when he manages to twist around while you’re talking and get a little flap of skin next to your thumbnail (as accidentally happened at a recent school program) that results in skin being torn, blood dripping out onto the floor, and the necessity of breaking open the first aid kit on my table that some folks seem to think is there for show.

The kindergarteners are probably still talking about that one.

Anyway, at my second party, my schtick with the knight anole was finished. I was putting Clamp, as I’ve affectionately named him, away. A voice from the audience spoke up, and pardon me if it didn’t strike me as a challenge.

It was Cooper. Cooper was one of the older boys at this party; I’m estimating his age to be around 9; 10 tops.

“You were spoofing us again,” Cooper said. “That probably didn’t hurt.”

“No,” I replied, “it definitely hurt.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Folks, I’ve been doing this awhile. Admittedly, much of my program is scripted. Thousands of programs with thousands of interactions with young people AND animals, have helped hone this hour or so with some humorous and introspective banter. Sometimes, something happens and it just goes right into future programs as part of the schtick.

But Cooper didn’t believe me.

“Cooper, come on up here.” As he made his way up, I asked, “How’d you like to take a bite from the knight anole?”

“Sure,” he says, “It’s not going to hurt.”

Meanwhile, in my head, I’m thinking, I may have taken this too far, the bite’s going to hurt, what the heck am I doing…?

Meanwhile, Cooper has his index finger extended, Clamp’s mouth is agape, and I felt it appropriate to remind Cooper that he was at a girl’s party, and all eyes were on him. Tears, screaming, unmanly blubbering, and flinging the lizard across the room would be frowned upon - by both me and the girls.

And then Clamp clamped.

Folks, I was impressed. Cooper was a stalwart oak, somehow giving the impression that it did not hurt (badly). Cooper may not have realized it, but when I allowed the anole to bite him, I was careful to get his finger all the way back into the lizard’s mouth, where less pressure gets exerted. That’s what works for me, anyway.

Cooper’s face was expressionless, and after the anole released him, he looked at me with a deadpan face and said simply, “That didn’t hurt at all.”

“Good job, Cooper,” I said, as he returned to his seat.

Folks, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed. I DID want Cooper to feel a little bit of something. But no, he just sauntered back to his seat. He didn’t know I was watching him.

He didn’t sit down immediately. He paused, intently looking at his finger, probably noting all the tiny indentations left by the anole’s teeth. Then, he waved his hand back and forth a little, as if airing it out, and then sat himself.

I was no longer disappointed. My heart was full. Well done, Cooper.

But that’s how some things get incorporated into my program. You try things, things seem to work, and they show up in future programs.

Which is not saying that we’ll be allowing lizards to bite party attendees in future events. I think that’s going to be a one-time-deal. I can’t bank on everyone having the high pain tolerance of the Critter Keeper.

Or, for that matter, that of Cooper.

03/13/2025

Sometimes, especially for young kindergartners, the scares can be a little intense. A necessary delay may be in order for some quick cleaning, sanitization, and allowing the carpet to dry before the next group comes in.

03/13/2025

I love getting to a church program nice and early when it’s quiet. It gets the head cleared and the mind right. And any company you keep during that time is usually fairly quiet as well.

03/04/2025

My weekend began today on Monday, and it is a day of rest (as much as I could make it, that is). Friday through Sunday was exhausting, exhilarating, exciting, and even a little disappointing. I wound up putting over 1,000 miles on my car in three days, with a total of almost 20 hours behind the wheel.

It began Friday morning with a six hour drive to a hotel in central Tennessee, where I did a little housekeeping on the critters, ironed my outfit, and freshened myself up. I had a few hours before I had to be at a church another hour down the road.

On the way to the church, I took a call from a talent agent in Nashville, who asked me about the possibility of providing some animals for a social media promotion for a couple of “artists.”

I’ve been doing this long enough to be careful about this kind of thing. It’s fairly easy to be lured into an uncomfortable situation where you might find yourself draping a python over a model who is dressed not-so-family-friendly, if you catch my drift. So I asked her to text me the information of where the shoot was going to be, and to please include the names of the “artists.”

I’m not the most pop culture savvy guy on the planet, but I have to admit I got a little excited. The names of the two artists were familiar, and caused my wife and family a great deal of excitement and anticipation. Ethically, I’m opposed to name-dropping, but folks, these are two of the most popular Christian music artists on the planet. The shoot was to be in the Charleston area in just a few days, and while the project was still in the exploratory phase, I decided it was something I’d really like to do.

I took “The Art of the Deal” approach, and put my fee out there. I took a maximal position, which is to say, if I got that price, way cool, but if I had to settle for a lower fee, I was still winning. Of course, this was over the weekend, so responses were delayed. Not everyone works my hours, I guess.

Ultimately, the project pivoted and went in another direction, and will not be happening (with me and the critters, anyway). But I’ve been assured that if other projects come down the pike, I’ll be in consideration.

So long as it doesn’t happen during this coming summer (which looks to be very crowded), I should be okay.

The church service on Friday was amazing. A number of children and families made commitments to Christ, and I drove the hour back to the hotel late that night with my heart full.

With the hour’s time difference, I woke up early on Saturday and though I felt tired, I decided to just get on the road. It was a long drive, seemingly longer than the day before, and I arrived at home in a rather depleted state. On Sunday, it was more windshield time driving down to Columbia for a couple of programs down that way.

For the parties in Columbia, I made an impulse decision to take the new ball python that I rescued several weeks ago, and that no one has claimed. I named her Elsa, because she was in a garbage can, and Frozen Two. She is shown in the picture. She’s a sweet snake; a little head shy initially, but she did very well being handled by kids.

With that, I’m done typing and ready to rest some more. I know you may be curious about who the two artists were, but if you guess in the comments and I respond with a “❤️” you guessed right.

At least it wasn’t me who name-dropped.

03/03/2025

Sometimes, life hands you the tail end of a python, and you just have to deal with it.

02/28/2025

Have you ever heard of the “poor man’s velociraptor?”

Of course you haven’t. It’s a term I just made up.

The video is just for attention. I was mixing up some bee pollen/nectar/fruit for Gladys, the crested gecko. She couldn’t wait to be put back into her cage, so she started licking it off my fingers.

I’m presently thawing out several mice; I want to see if the ball python we rescued out of a garbage can a couple of weeks back will take a meal. No one has contacted me about it, and it seems to be healthy (but a little underweight). I’ll likely post a picture of it next week sometime. I’m making plans to keep it.

It’s going to be a busy weekend. Tomorrow morning we’ll be heading to central Tennessee for an evening church youth program in Columbia. One way, it’s about seven hours, which will be the longest distance I’ve traveled with this crew. Obviously, we’ll be spending the night and driving back on Saturday. I’ve never been one to oppose mixing a little business with pleasure, so while I’m over that way, I plan on linking up with an old Navy buddy and his wife for breakfast on Saturday morning before continuing home.

I enjoy windshield time like that now and again. I’ll be doing a lot of thinking this because I really need to come to a decision on whether or not to adopt yet another animal that was offered to me.

I’m not getting any younger. I’m two-thirds of a century old, something you’d never guess by looking at this youthful appearance. And I’m not sure how many more scars I want to acquire this late in life.

I believe the Nile monitor lizard is the fourth largest lizard on the planet, capable of lengths between seven to eight feet. They are strictly carnivorous, and with those bright eyes, beautiful pattern, pearly whites and large claws, it’s one lizard that will sweep you off your feet.

I mean, literally sweep you off your feet. That long powerful tail has taken many a person to the ground. Now, the Nile monitor that is under consideration is only about three feet long, so it’s probably not going to take me down, but the teeth in the front and the claws in the middle are all business as well. I often say that I don’t have any tattoos, but I’ve got scars, and scars make for better stories.

I have a friend that has monitors, and tattoos, AND scars, and he’s indicated that he might take it when (not if) I come to the conclusion that a “poor man’s velociraptor” might not be a good fit for me. I mean, if one can’t afford a real live velociraptor, I’m pretty sure that a spicy Nile monitor would be the next best thing.

I’m thinking about getting my hands on it though, and maybe do a Facebook Live event demonstrating why Nile monitors are not for everyone. Please give me a “like” or a comment if you think that’s something you’d like to see.

Epilogue: I still have a few things to do before a long weekend, but I think you’ll be pleased to learn that that little ball python just ate two large mice. I didn’t have the patience to wait around to see if it would take a third, but thawed mice don’t usually go to waste around here. The last I saw the mouse, it was heading down the gullet of a blue-tongued skink.

Oh, and I learned today that the sailfin dragon loves blackberries. She took two right from my hand earlier. This has me thinking that this is something we may be able to do at a presentation some day!