Welcome to the Reptile Rainforest website! Enjoy your visit, and come back often...we can never have too many fellow herper friends!
I've got news for you...
January 20th, 2006
I guess it's pretty obvious that there have been a lot of changes made with The Reptile Rainforest lately. (Improvements, WE think!)
* New web site! The old one did the job, but we decided the site needed to grow with the business.
* New breeder animals. Well, this is not too much of a surprise. We have always been adding a few here and there for the past ten years, but we are making a conscious effort to meet the demands of our customers. We expect to see a lot more little noses poking out in the incubators with each following year.
* Pic of the week. Yep, sometimes there will be a silly web poll, other times it will just be a cool pic of an animal. either way, there's always room for a bit of herpetocultural goofiness.
* Prices. The main difference here is that we are now including the tax in the price of all of our animals. This means that some of the list prices have gone up (Some have not), but you really aren't paying any more. In fact, in some cases, the end price is lower than if you added tax no the original price. Basically, we're just trying to save you from any ugly surprises.
* Photos. We're still in the process of taking new ones and adding them to the site, but I think you will notice LOTS of new and updated pics!
Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to sign the new guestbook on the HOME page!
Season's Breedings.......
February 26, 2006
We are just about sold out of all of our animals from 2005! The good news, is that geckos are starting to hatch right now, and some of the other herps (beardies, Ball pythons) are breeding. Also, we are starting to warm up the colubrids at the beginning of March, so things are going to starting getting back to the "normal chaos" of The Reptile Rainforest pretty soon! The summer is getting booked up with fairs, shows and public events. Hopefully we'll see you there! If you are in need of an unforgettable reptile party or demonstration, email me HERE!
March 24, 2006
It was a crazy March break for reptile shows and it's already shaping up to be a busy spring in the breeding department. We have some beardie eggs cooking already, and many of the cornsnakes and hognose snakes have started getting busy. We are waiting for the first female Ball of the season to drop some eggs...she looks ready! It looks like the spotted pythons got the job done (keep your fingers crossed) and all of the geckos are laying eggs and hatching quite regularly now. Since we keep scorpions for our animal demonstrations, we occasionally have babies (well, not US, the scorpions...). Check out the Photo Page to see!
March 31/06
More breeding news to report...both the Kenyan Sand Boas (Check out my article on them in the upcoming REPTILES USA Annual magazine) and the Black Pine Snakes have been courting - much earlier than usual. Let's hope we will see the arrival of little ones early too!
April 10/06
The long anticipated weekend of the annual Wildlife Festival came and went! Thanks for everyone who took the time to stop by and see us, as well as our reptilian friends! Thanks also go out to some of the other exhibitors for helping the weekend go smoothly, and to Little Critters Billing's Bridge for letting us use (and mess up) their facilities! Madeline Kallio also deserves a big thanks for organizing the whole thing!
We hope to see everybody at the Gloucester Fair this year, in the Kids Zone tent from Thursday evening, May 25, and the rest of the weekend- Friday, May 26, Saturday May 27 and Sunday, May 28.
Here Josee takes a well deserved break from the crowd on the weekend:
April 26/06
It looks like One of our female Black Pines is in pre-egg laying shed, as are many of our corns. Some are just starting to breed now. We are still waiting on certain Ball Pythons, but all of the signs are there...I wish we could squeeze those eggs out, but the snakes would not likely appreciate that! Thanks to everybody who stopped by our table at the Toronto Expo last weekend. It was great to see and talk to all of you!
We are really looking forward to the June Toronto show, and for those who will still be in the Toronto area on Monday night (June12), my band (Black Ju-Ju) will be playing at the Horseshoe Tavern (370 Queen Street West) at 11:30pm. We would love to see you at both shows! For more info go to www.darrenboyd.com or www.blackju-ju.com.
No concrete news on whether or not the Pastel Pink Albino Hogs will be happening this year or not, but they have been trying, so we're keeping our fingers crossed.
It's Snapping Turtle saving season!
May 29/06
It seems the Gloucester Fair came and went in the blink of an eye - what a busy weekend (thanks to beautiful weather on Saturday & Sunday)! It was nice to see so many familiar faces, and as always new ones!
The ball pythons are finally showing up...still waiting on some females to lay eggs!
I have an article in the new REPTILES Magazine on Herp Supplements...check it out! I am working on one for The American Toad in a special all-amphibian issue, but that's all I can tell you...
The Western Hogs are getting things done!
Doo Doo the Clown says The Reptile Rainforest is
UNBELIEVABLE!!
July 11/06
Life has been more than a little crazy at the Reptile Rainforest this summer. July and August are showing a record number of educational reptile show bookings, and we are running out of space for our hatching babies. This means you can watch for a sale on leopard geckos in the next week or so!
Speaking of shows, I have been too busy at the shows to actually add the public ones on the website, but I will get to that soon! Keep checking the shows page for updates. The same dilemma goes for the animals. We have babies, but hardly enough time to photograph or list them on the available page! I will work on that ASAP as well.
On the down side, we have had a lot of bad corn snake clutches this year, for no known reason. We still have plenty of good ones, but the percentage of dud clutches is too high for my liking. We'll get that worked out before next season!
October 8/2006
We are getting all geared up for the Kemptville/Ottawa region show on October 15th....It's been a challenge (right Grant?), but I'm sure it will be worth it!
The herpetocultural community lost 2 great ones this year. Everybody is aware of the sad news regarding Steve Irwin, The Crocodile Hunter. It is still hard to believe. We also lost a friend to everyone in the local herping community; Mike Rankin. He will be missed by many. His absence is felt, but his memory and contributions to all of us as both herpers and human beings will live on.
We hope to see you all at the show. Email us, or click on the banner below for more information!
November 28/2006
It's been a while since the last update! The Kemptville/Ottawa region show on October 15th was a huge success, and my thanks go out to everyone who attended as well as all of the fine people involved. It was a stressful pleasure, and we look forward to doing it again!
We will be in Petawawa again this New Year's Eve with a festive display of herps. We will add info to the Roadshow page as soon as we get it. If you're from the area, come and say "Hi"!
I guess it is also worth mentioning that we just reached our 11 year anniversary this month!
December 23/2006
Christmas is only a few days away, and one of our Bearded Dragons is searching for a place to lay eggs (Christmas Beardies - gotta love it!). The colubrids are almost all cooled down, and the geckos (Cresties, Leopards & Fatttails) are all breeding. Some of the balls have even started - a little early for ours, but that's just fine! In less than 11 months we have received 10,000 hit on this site. COOL!
Merry Christmas and Season's Breedings everyone. Have a safe and happy holiday!
Darren & Josée
January 11/2007
It turns out our "Christmas beardies" became New Year's Beardies. Well, the eggs did, anyway. We had our first clutch of the year on January 1st. Exactly 1 week later we were given our first Leopard Gecko eggs of the season. Our New Year's Eve display in Petawawa was great fun as always. A big thank you to Jodie and the team, as well as the people of Petawawa who always make us feel welcome!
Some of the Ball Pythons have started copulating, which is a little early for ours, but with the winter we've been having they might be confused! Oh well, early Balls and less snow...I'll take it!
We hope everyone had a safe and enjoyable holiday season!
Darren & Josée
February 24/2007
We have been busy doing some renovations to make room for the increasing growth of the collection (both in volume AND in animal growth). What better time to do it than during winter brumation, when at least 50% of our animals are cooling? You can see a little glimpse of one of the projects on the "pic of the Week" page. I'll post more photos when more work is done!
As for breeding news, every day brings us increasing numbers of gecko eggs (Leopard, Cresties, Fattails). We are also waiting on a very fat female Spotted Python to pop, who is in her pre-egg laying shed right now. We can't wait, but I guess we'll have to!
Darren & Josée
May 10/2007
Spring is definitely here! We have been trying to find time to do some local herping, in between breeding and shows! It's also been a challenge to keep up on the website at this busy time of year, as several of you have pointed out! No worries, we're on it. And we are also trying to make changes to improve the available page to include as many photos as possible, as well as make it easier to update.
We have Ball pythons hatching and incubating, and all the colubrids are filling with eggs as I write. We have hognose eggs cooking right now, and plenty more to come.
Darren & Josée
May 29/2007
We made it through the big weekend...The Gloucester Fair AND the Kemptville Reptile Expo! We also had several local TV segments to promote both shows, so there wasn't much time to sleep! It was great seeing everybody who made it to both of the shows (vendors and attendees). Grant and his team did an amazing job with the Expo, as always, so kudos to them!
In Breeding news, we have Black Pine eggs, More Balls, several corns have started laying, and lots more are gearing up! We finally have Pastel Pink Albino Hognose eggs incubating!
This season we are going to need to fire up our fourth incubator for the first time. Life is good.
Darren & Josée
August 27/2007
As always, summer is our busiest time of the year. This means there is a ton of stuff going on, and no time to put it up on the web site! My apologies to those who have been wondering if we're still alive.
We have spent a lot of the season on the road, doing reptile presentations and displays, and spreading the herpetological gospel. We just got home from Florida (The National Breeder's Expo in Daytona) and had a great business trip/vacation - not to mention a thrilling herping trip. We caught more venomous snakes than non-venomous, and when I get a little more time I will be adding a pile of new photos. Josee took hundreds of shots, so there will lots to see up here soon.
And speaking of time, we came home to incubators with several hundred more corn snake hatchlings, so we are working of feeding, cleaning, and hopefully updating the "available" page ASAP!
Oh, and pick up the new REPTILES USA Annual; I have an article on Curlytail lizards in there. I also have an article on Gray Treefrogs coming out in an upcoming issue of REPTILES magazine, so keep an eye out for it!
Another bit of shameless self-promotion is that I have been working in the studio with my new band THE wHORROR, and plan to have a CD out some time before I die of exhaustion or old age! Great for a stocking stuffer....
Darren
November 12/2007
It's hard to believe we are approaching our 12th official year in business this month (November 23rd, to be exact)! In some ways, it feels like we've just started, but in others it feels like it's been a lifetime. No complaints though! When I tell children I have the best job in the world, I absolutely mean it. Of course, there are good days and bad days. One of the good days recently gave us a dozen beautiful little Kenyan Sand boas, many which have already found new homes (Some are still for sale). We also noticed breeding action in our Rainbow Boas, as well as a rather randy male Spider Ball Python, making friends with some ladies.
I (Darren) have also been asked to write a few columns for Reptiles Magazine in a new feature called "Breeders' Notebook." Keep your eyes open for that!
Darren & Josée
December 14/2007
Here it is, almost Christmas! This means we have been in business "officially" for over 12 years now. I can't tell if that makes me experienced, or just OLD.
We are getting many of the colubrids ready for winter cooling. No time for us to hibernate, though, we have to gear up the geckos for breeding. Many of the Pythons have already started getting busy!
A few pages have been updated recently, including our links page and Pic of the week (which was fixin' to become pic of the year there soon...). Check them out!
Here's wishing everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year (and good Season's Breeding's)!
Darren & Josée
January 18/2008
2007 is finally behind us, and we're looking forward to an exciting 2008! Spring should keep us busy with breeding, fairs and shows, and the REPTILES magazine issue with my article (Breeders' Notes) on the Kenyan Sand Boa and Josée's photographs should be hitting the stands. And speaking of Kenyan Sand Boas, we still have a few for sale, some eating dead food already. We still can't ship, but we will hold some until shipping resumes with a deposit.
We also have African Fattail eggs cooking, and we should be expecting Amelanistic hets this season as well.
Darren & Josée
February 20/2008
The geckos are all starting to lay eggs, as the season dictates. Some of the Ball Pythons and Rainbow boas have been thinking about love, but many seem confused by the rather bizarre winter weather we've been having!
We have slowly starting bringing some of the colubrids back up to normal temperatures, and we expect everything to be buzzing around here by mid-March. (Not literally buzzing, we don't have rattlesnakes anymore...)
We are getting booked up for March Break shows, and well into the summer already. If you need to book us for your event, please contact us ASAP to avoid missing out! We look forward to sharing our passion for herps with everyone!
Welcome to SPRING! I guess we're not totally out of the woods yet, but it's looking like Winter is finally on it's way out.
Some of the colubrids have already laid eggs, and many others are starting to breed.
If you are on Facebook, we have a Reptile Rainforest group HERE. Please join us! If you like loud music (and who doesn't), Darren's band's (THE wHORROR) Facebook group is HERE.
It seems fitting that the current REPTILES magazine has an article Darren wrote about the Kenyan Sand Boa in, and we happened to have a litter of 10 born on Easter Sunday. Not even close to the normal time of year for this species, but we're not complaining!
We are getting booked up for summer shows, and expect to do a lot of traveling due to business this season...hope to see you on the road!
