Hello from Sweden

Introductions
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I’m a swede with a life-long interest of all kinds of animals.

As a kid I spent more time with animals than humans. I sat for hours and hours in front of the aquarium at kinder garden, or in every house they had one. I collected insects in stead of playing with Barbie. I raised frogs, hosted salamanders and loved to walk all the neighbours dogs. Two of my best friends were dobermann pinchers.

I studied all animals I could, pet animals and wild. (Including spending lots of time at a mink farm as a little girl, learning a shit load about genetics and then getting traumatized the day I came there and the minks were about to be fur. I had no idea they shouldn’t keep them. I was used to fish breeders.) I read every book in the library about animals, I watched every TV-program.

I’ve always had animals at home. Hamsters, guniea pigs, finches, budgies, aquariums, cats, dogs, rats, snakes, toads, spiders… Not at the same time, but in different stages of my life.

I have a dog now, a 10 year old border collie, and my sphynx cat passed away last year.

I adopted a rainbow boa a while ago, then came a corn snake for my oldest daughter, then came a hognose for my youngest… Then came a hognose for myself and now I am ready to pick up the thread from where I was a kid and let the reptile area begin in grand style. Had tiger pythons and garter snakes in the 80s and 90s and it was a totally different game then to own snakes. I love how the knowledge, the community and the hobby has evolved. Not every part of it (like dog breeding, some things are just… not healthy), but in general. I also love being an aduld, who can decide for myself what I like to do with my time and money. :wink:

Hognoses has stolen my heart. I adore them and would love to breed a clutch in a couple of years.

Besides that I am passionate about nature, music, arts, yoga and I LOVE my work with people with special needs.

Feel free to just say hi or to talk snakes in general or hognoses in particular with me.

Camilla

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You sound like a big animal lover/lover of life in general. I’m a guy from Canada who adores animals and since biology has always been my passion it further fuels my natural curiosity about nature’s beautiful lifeforns of all kinds. I’ve only had dogs as my companions over the course of my life so far but since wolves are my favorite mammal species of all time its worked ok (my current dog is a 13 yr old female husky).

My reptile interest started with tarantulas but since local law forbids anything with venom of any kind (even if harmless to humans) my focus shifted to snakes (specifically corn snakes and colubrids since I’m generally not into boas, pythons (including ball pythons) or geckos pet interest wise (still love em from a biological/ creature of nature point of view)).

So for awhile I wanted a corn snake but right now I think getting rodents for food would be an issue regularly so I shifted my focus again to lizards. I decided I want an uromastyx (U geyri or ornata or both) or 2 as my 1st reptiles. Eventually I want to own uromastyx, maybe a chinese water dragon, jewelled lacertas are cool, green iggys, and snake wise Corns and several other colubrids including hognose, false water cobra, and members of the genus Drymarchon aka cribos/indigo snakes.

But to start I wanna have an Uro or 2 and maybe some dart frogs (D. tinctorius/auratus/leucomelas) in addition to always having a dog (if I ever get a cat I would probably want a Savannah but those are real expensive since breeding them is a challenge sometimes (at least from what I’ve heard)

Hope things where you are in Sweden are ok (its always been a country I’ve wanted to visit and among the european languages I wish to learn).

Welcome to the community!!

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Thank you for the welcome and for your long answer!

Canada! I’d love to go to Canada some day, it seems like “home” in many ways.

Seems to me you are an animal lover as well. I like wolves, and I’ve met with the wolves at Kolmården here in Sweden two times, before they had a caretaker killed and they stopped letting people in with them. Magnificent animals. Never seen a wild one though, only the tracks. Love the huskys, that’s a “real” dog. :slight_smile:

Lizards are adorable! I wish you the best of luck with your future reptile friends. It’s not the same as dogs, of course, but just as fulfilling I would say. You dont’ get the mammal connection with your reptiles, fishes or amphibians, but you do get to know them and their personalities. and many of them are SO beautiful.

Thanks again for the welcome.

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Welcome to the Community!

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Welcome to the community, I hope you enjoy it here.

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Where is this kolmarden place? Is it the place in Sweden that your from/native to like your hometown maybe? Only 3 places in Sweden I know are the capital Stockholm (obviously) Gothenburg I believe its called (thanks to pewdiepie being from there) and I’ve heard of one other place called Up- something. For me the Wolf has always been my favorite mammal species. I just have a huge soft spot of love for Canidae species such as Dogs, Wolves, Coyotes, and Foxes. Where I live in Canada (Toronto in the province of Ontario) we have plenty of cute animals. In my neighborhood we have plenty of bunnies, red foxes, raccoons, skunks, the odd possum and coyotes are said to live in the ravine area. A coyote once attempted to take a shot at me and my husky girl on a walk once which freaked her out as we walked through a field. It tried to grab her back leg and she kicked it in the face and made a startled noise which got my attention. I stomped the ground and started staring at the coyote while trying to be threatening and it backed off but started circling around as we hi-tailed it out of there.

Angel is a calm gentle curious soul who has a strong instinct to hunt (as huskies do–she once brought a bunny in the house, jumped on her bed and tried to eat it). But shes curious about creatures shes never seen before (first time she saw a possum, she came in the house, led me outside to the possum then looked at me as if to say “what the heck is this thing”. I told her what it was and she then looked at me then looked at it then back at me as if to say “cool can I hunt it”.

I think she will be curious about the Uromastyx but once she realizes its part of the family she will be happy to have supervised encounters with her new friend.

Yes, come visit Canada when you can. I would love to visit Sweden but I wanna learn a little Swedish first.

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Welcome to the community Camilla!

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Kolmården is near Stockholm.

You seem to have a very interesting wildlife where you live @beast-blade-wolf_987. :blush:

My dog was not interested in the snakes at all in the beginning, but now she likes to watch when the boa gets fed. I think she likes the thrill of her striking her prey. I live practically in the forest, and she never wears a leash. We have elks, wild boars, deers, foxes, roe deers, rabbits, badgers and lots of other animal here. Sometimes a wolf or even bear from the north comes and visits, but I’ve never seen one, just the tracks. We do have lynx, but they are so shy. Never seen a wild one.

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I’ve had the same interest with all animals since it as three and I bought my first lizard when it about playing in the backyard with my dog, welcome and enjoy it here!

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Yep. Theres a friendly wild red fox that joins our middle of the night strolls around the neighborhood (my dog Angel is 13 now so shes not up for the big mutli hour hikes she loved in her youth. The fox keeps its distance at all times but it never shows aggression or anything. It sits outside the house and calls to the dog and I sometimes. (I wish I could pet it and offer it a dog cookie or 2). I havent seen it in quite awhile…I hope a coyote didnt catch and kill it.

Also I looked up a Google map of Kolmarden to see where it is relative to Stockholm. (Im guessing your a stockholm native who moved near the kolmarden area.) I def need to visit Sweden on my small list of European targets (alongside UK, Ireland, Germany Italy (my moms side is Italian) France Spain and Greece. Since I was born raised and lived my whole life in Toronto Canada Im really itching to travel…but of course because of covid thats kinda hard.

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Welcome aboard…Glad to have you.

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