Like most of you I’ve been fascinated with reptiles my entire life. Some of my earliest memories are of chasing lizards and frogs in our yard when I was 3 or 4 years old. Growing up in Houston, Tx I had my first pets early on keeping as many skinks, anoles, toads, green tree frogs, wolf spiders, and box turtles, etc. as I could find cages for in my room. I spent most of my free time at home looking for them and watching them, and most of my free time at school reading about them or talking about them to anyone who would listen. Not a lot has changed in that respect. I’ve probably kept in excess of 200 species over the years and successfully bred around 15 of those species.
My favorite thing to do these days is the educational presentations I give at the Las Vegas Natural History Museum and Las Vegas Science and Technology Expo every summer for the past 5-6 years. I’m currently working on some colubrid hybrid projects and a small collection of boas. While I understand the issues that many hobbyist have against hybrids I find them extremely rewarding to work with and I love the world of possibilities they open up. My most recent clutch was a small clutch of Sonoran Gopher snake x Corn snakes out of which I got 2 normals and 3 albinos! The gopher snake is a long-term captive that was originally captured in the Phoenix, Arizona area and this being her first year to breed we had no idea she was carrying the gene for albinism or that it would be compatible with the albino gene in the corn snake.
All of that being said, I definitely also appreciate keeping lines pure and will always do everything I can to keep from unintentionally muddying up pure lines. Hybridization should be approached with intent and tracked meticulously.
I’m always open for an intelligent discussion on these and many other topics which is why I’m here.
I recently got my website up and running and decided to add a blog to it. I’m going to try my best to keep up with it posting on new topics and such. Sharing here is not meant to take away from this community at all as I would very much appreciate some interaction on the site as well as feedback from you fine folks. You can also see my entire collection in one place. The only thing I havent added pictures of are the spiders and a couple of natives. My first blog post is about “The Good, The Bad, and The Gross” of keeping reptiles. Let me know what you think.
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Welcome my new friend.
Great introduction and amazing logo, I look forward to seeing posts by you and some updates on them corns.
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Welcome to the community and I also love your logo; super badass.
I am intrigued by the hybrids that I’ve recently come across on the forums, and look forward to seeing what you post about (if you do post more about your hybrids) and the discussions it brings. I look forward to also seeing pictures of your hybrid projects (that you’re willing to share)! 
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I will definitely be sharing more on them as the projects progress. The plan is to eventually have several different genus in one animal.
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Hey guys I recently got my website up and running and decided to add a blog to it. I’m going to try my best to keep up with it posting on new topics and such. Sharing here is not meant to take away from this community at all as I would very much appreciate some interaction on the site as well as feedback from you fine folks. You can also see my entire collection in one place. The only thing I havent added pictures of are the spiders and a couple of natives. My first blog post is about “The Good, The Bad, and The Gross” of keeping reptiles. Let me know what you think.
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Absolutely brilliant mate. A perfect introduction to reptiles and what to expect.
You did a great job of explaining the bad and ugly without discouragement. 
I notice at the bottom you have a RSS feed button, would it be possible to add that to here and it automatically updates this topic when you add new articles to the website?
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Im gonna look up your website @thebeardedherper. Its just called "the bearded herper .com or something right?
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@eaglereptiles Thanks man. Ill give it a look. I hope you and @thebeardedherper stay safe amongst all this coronavirus bs the world is being wrecked by atm btw.
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@thebeardedherper I just read your blog post. I gotta agree with @eaglereptiles well done man 
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@eaglereptiles thanks so much. I’ll be honest I didn’t even know what an RSS button was. I’ll look at that today.
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@beast-blade-wolf_987 thanks. Yeah its www.thebeardedherper.weebly.com
I own the .com too just not able to swap it over just yet. I’m unable to work at the moment and need about $75 to swap it over. I have $ to live on just trying not to spend unnecessarily.
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Btw @thebeardedherper @eaglereptiles I wanted to ask where you guys are originally from if its ok to ask.
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I’m from Manchester, England… Been here my entire life.
I started a Finding Community Users Near You topic a while back I your after finding people local. Also if you click on a user’s icon it might tell you where they are from if they have allowed it in their settings.
Like so
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Originally from Houston, Tx. Live in Las Vegas these days.
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Whats the herping like there in Vegas compared to Texas?
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@eaglereptiles the herping in Texas is a lot more diverse. Theres pretty much more of everything there, especially in the Houston area where it’s located off the gulf of mexico. Used to catch all kinds of frogs, toads, turtles, snakes, lizards, insects, centipedes and millipedes, and arachnids. Here in Vegas it’s too dry to have as much diversity. Not that there aren’t herps to find as there certainly are, but it’s a lot more work. There are a few that you can find by the dozen, but most, and definitely the coolest, are spread out and hiding much of the day. Texas is the only state in the U.S. with all four major families of venomous snakes as well, or at least that’s what I was taught many years ago lol. Hots are not my specialty. Bottom line is being close to the water makes for better herping.
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I can tell I’m going to love it just from the title alone! And of course since it stars you in it!
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I really enjoyed this Johnothan
I’ve said it before but you really are a hidden jem in this hobby. I would love to see you on more podcasts like this.
Thank you for sharing it.
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