JelloDrake
New member
This is so exciting. It's been a long time since I was a member of an active forum, I forgot how much I loved them!
But enough gushing!
When I was a kid my mom liked to have out of the ordinary pets. We had a few rats and she happily indulged my interest in having lizards and amphibians; but those were the 90s. We didn't have internet and very few people knew any more about caring for them than the average petco employee. When I grew up and started researching rat care I immediately felt bad even though the ones we had were part of the family and only really slept in their enclosures. Never mind the lizards/salamander/frogs.
The frogs and firebelly newt(had them at separate times) were escape artists. We had a secure lid but they figured out how to get out anyway. We gave up on the frogs within a week and traded for the newt instead. Then the newt was so good at escaping that it even got out of our house and our neighbors found him months later living by their AC unit. I was 10 and that was the end of amphibians for me because we had no idea how to keep them inside their enclosures.
Fast-forward to about 9 years ago. I do a crazy amount of research into taking care of rats and my mom offers money to help get one for me, my husband, and our two boys for Christmas so that they can have a pet because we weren't able to have dogs or cats. We get 1 baby rat with that money and 2 more of his male littermates. I spend an absolutely delightful 5 years decking out their giant living space to keep them happy and engaged. My husband builds them giant cardboard mazes to play in. My boys loved hanging out and playing with them. But then, as rats typically do, 2 died of pituitary tumors pretty close together (despite our attempts to treat it) and then the 3rd died of grief the same night we had the second put to sleep. My husband, who had at first been grossed out by them, was absolutely devastated.
He more or less barred off any future ownership of rats because the idea of falling in love with something that averages a 3 year life span and behaves like a dog or a cat was too much emotionally. It's been 4 years since they passed and when I told him that axolotls can live 15 years or longer he was immediately on board even though they wouldn't be the kind of pet we could play with nearly as much. I love gardening so taking on an aquascape sounds like a really fun endeavor and I already have a few houseplants that are safe for them. I've been building a native plant bird & butterfly garden in my backyard because I like to watch the wildlife. Having something indoors sounds wonderful.
As I've been researching I've come across responses to others from people that seem to get really upset at the idea of a vivarium that just happens to have an animal in it. Just want to be clear that, even though the gardening part is exciting to me personally, that's not what this is going to be. It will focus first on what's good for the axo, beauty is secondary.
We haven't started the journey past researching yet, but are planning to start shopping for the tank, supplies, and etc soon so that I can start getting the tank cycling.
I ended up here as a result of accidentally stumbling on a link to caudata.org in a different information source yesterday. I've been digging around, learning, and taking notes ever since. Then I learned you had a section for sellers; which got me excited because covid pretty much destroyed our local breeder market and I've been struggling to locate very many, if any, that are still active.
Outside of this introduction post, I have no idea how active I'll be. I may just spend most of my time lurking and learning. We'll see!
It's nice to me you all!!
But enough gushing!
When I was a kid my mom liked to have out of the ordinary pets. We had a few rats and she happily indulged my interest in having lizards and amphibians; but those were the 90s. We didn't have internet and very few people knew any more about caring for them than the average petco employee. When I grew up and started researching rat care I immediately felt bad even though the ones we had were part of the family and only really slept in their enclosures. Never mind the lizards/salamander/frogs.
The frogs and firebelly newt(had them at separate times) were escape artists. We had a secure lid but they figured out how to get out anyway. We gave up on the frogs within a week and traded for the newt instead. Then the newt was so good at escaping that it even got out of our house and our neighbors found him months later living by their AC unit. I was 10 and that was the end of amphibians for me because we had no idea how to keep them inside their enclosures.
Fast-forward to about 9 years ago. I do a crazy amount of research into taking care of rats and my mom offers money to help get one for me, my husband, and our two boys for Christmas so that they can have a pet because we weren't able to have dogs or cats. We get 1 baby rat with that money and 2 more of his male littermates. I spend an absolutely delightful 5 years decking out their giant living space to keep them happy and engaged. My husband builds them giant cardboard mazes to play in. My boys loved hanging out and playing with them. But then, as rats typically do, 2 died of pituitary tumors pretty close together (despite our attempts to treat it) and then the 3rd died of grief the same night we had the second put to sleep. My husband, who had at first been grossed out by them, was absolutely devastated.
He more or less barred off any future ownership of rats because the idea of falling in love with something that averages a 3 year life span and behaves like a dog or a cat was too much emotionally. It's been 4 years since they passed and when I told him that axolotls can live 15 years or longer he was immediately on board even though they wouldn't be the kind of pet we could play with nearly as much. I love gardening so taking on an aquascape sounds like a really fun endeavor and I already have a few houseplants that are safe for them. I've been building a native plant bird & butterfly garden in my backyard because I like to watch the wildlife. Having something indoors sounds wonderful.
As I've been researching I've come across responses to others from people that seem to get really upset at the idea of a vivarium that just happens to have an animal in it. Just want to be clear that, even though the gardening part is exciting to me personally, that's not what this is going to be. It will focus first on what's good for the axo, beauty is secondary.
We haven't started the journey past researching yet, but are planning to start shopping for the tank, supplies, and etc soon so that I can start getting the tank cycling.
I ended up here as a result of accidentally stumbling on a link to caudata.org in a different information source yesterday. I've been digging around, learning, and taking notes ever since. Then I learned you had a section for sellers; which got me excited because covid pretty much destroyed our local breeder market and I've been struggling to locate very many, if any, that are still active.
Outside of this introduction post, I have no idea how active I'll be. I may just spend most of my time lurking and learning. We'll see!
It's nice to me you all!!
Last edited:
thank you!