The Fun of Do It Yourself Snake and other Reptile Cages

Are you nuts? You think banging your finger with a hammer is fun? No, I dont. But building your own snake and other reptile cages can be a fun and rewarding experience.

Before you even start, it is important to spend some time planning your reptile enclosure and carefully examining at how other cages are manufactured. Check out all of the parts, examine the locks, joins and vents. How is the lighting done? What about the heating?

Use this information to design your own cages, based on the needs of your reptile and its size. Work out the size of cage you require and design it accordingly, altering the basic designs as needed to suit your purposes.

Building something yourself is a great feeling. I personally enjoy the process of shopping for materials and deciding which is best for the purpose.

There are quite a few questions to consider, such as:

what should I make the base from
what is the best way to make a vent
how do you make the base water resistant
what sort of lock should I use
what sort of door should I use and how do I make it
what is the best light fitting
How should I heat it

Getting the materials home and the anticipation of starting your reptile cage is an exciting time. The will be frustrations to overcome, problems to solve but the feeling of accomplishing and achievement you finally get from building something yourself is fantastic.

Every time you go into the room and see the cages you made you can feel good about them. Sure, you will sometimes get a bit picky about the smaller details. What could you have done better, what if you had done this here etc. well maybe next time.

Some people even use the skills they learn to make cages for other people and make a bit of money. Once you have the skills and tools it is easy. Even if you don not have all of the tools, there are ways around it. You can go to local cabinet makers when you need something cut to size that is too large for you to handle. They are generally happy to oblige for a small fee and you get a perfectly square piece of timber.

On a final note, making your own cages is a fun and rewarding experience and is recommended it to anyone considering it.

Mark Chapple is the Author of "How to build enclosures for reptiles." Find out how anyone can build reptile cages. Full color pictures, detailed diagrams and easy to follow, step-by-step instructions. http://www.reptile-cage-plans.com

TSUNAMI The Next Big Wave:The Grandaddy of Them All

A few days ago on Melbourne's 60 Minutes, renowned scientist Dr Kerry Sieh predicted the guaranteed next big wave or giant Tsunami will definitely happen, and it will be the Grandaddy of them all.

Indonesia gets the full force this time around ... When?... whether it be in a few months, or in a decade is all Dr Sieh cannot accurately predict at this present moment.

Kerry Sieh, a Geology professor at the California Institute of Technology, knows Indonesia's earthquake zone like the back of his hand ... and he did in fact predict the first earthquake that hit parts of Indonesia on Boxing Day. Now he predicts another Tsunami will hit, and this will be the grandaddy of them all!

From Melbourne MSN Channel 9's Sixty Minutes Richard Carleton explains why the earthquakes and ensuing Tsunami's occur:

RICHARD CARLETON: Dr Sieh's focus is on the faultline, 5000km long, where moving plates of the earth's crust grind against each other. The plate under the Indian Ocean slides beneath Indonesia, much like the disappearing stairs on an escalator. But some sections get stuck and then later snap upwards, releasing gargantuan force.

DR KERRY SIEH: The plates get hung up and they can't slip past each other, so the upper plate gets dragged down as this plate sinks and with it, the islands get dragged down, slowly but surely, and when the earthquake happens, they pop back up and out.

RICHARD CARLETON: And that's what happened last Boxing Day. The quake jolted the mainland so violently that people were thrown to the ground.

What a pointless waste of life! ... Dr Sieh warned the governments concerned ahead of time, he even went down personally and alerted inhabitants of the affected villages in Indonesia to protect themselves against the Tsunami he just knew would happen ... but nobody paid any attention to him ... now when he walks into these same villages, he is welcomed and treated as a hero !

From his 14 satellite research station, high in the mountain tops of the humid Indonesian jungle, Dr Sieh now predicts the next Tsunami will hit:

.. and the precise location .... right opposite the city of Padang in Indonesia ... inhabitants: 1 million people!

Repeat: All he cannot pinpoint is when ... this disaster could be in months, the next decade or in a hundred years!

The city of Padang is base for Australian surfers who go there to surf the waves of the Menwawais ... where some of the best surfing breaks in the world may be found .. as an Australian citizen this is startling news.

Geographically, the city of Padang would have difficulty dealing with a high tide, the devastation caused by the grandaddy of Tsunamis is incomprehensible.

Imagine a mere 15 minute warning before the earthquake ..

... and then the waters of the giant Tsunami gushing down the streets of Padang, just like it did in Banda Acheh washing everything away in its stride ..

... a moving torrent of cars, oil, broken trees and precious human life!

My call to all my fellow Marketers, the Search Engine Optimization community, Retail colleagues and anyone who reads this post: do everything in your power to reach your readers in Indonesia, particularly the city of Padang, they need to take heed and make adequate provision, to stop the pointless human slaughter this time around.

Whether this be in the form of lobbying your local Government bodies, or through local press release, we must help this time, before the devastation of this giant wave; the grandaddy of Tsunami's takes away more precious human life.

But above all do this in a responsible manner .. causing wide spread panic amongst unworldly village inhabitants or your worldwide audience will not help at all.

Melbourne's 60 Minutes at MSN Channel 9 has the whole story including a video of the interview available at their site . The video version is half-way down the page. Due to the ever changing nature of News, I cannot guarantee how long this link will be up.

Whilst this news is hardly topical for an internet marketing and search engine optimization Blog, as a parent the irreversible damage to our environment has me greatly concerned ... please do whatever you can to stop this alarming trend.

Entire article available at:
Marketing Defined on the next big Tsunami

Copyright 2005 Marketing Defined. All Rights Reserved.

This article may be reproduced in its entirety, with no alterations. The resource boxes, live URL's and Author Bio must be included.

Roseanne van Langenberg is a Marketing Consultant and Publisher from Melbourne, Australia. Roseanne shares her findings on legitimate back-door search engine optimization and internet marketing techniques, for online blogs, which earned her a No. 1 ranking at the new MSN search engine, at the Marketing Defined seo and internet marketing Blog.

Easy Science Fair Projects Benefit Students and Parents

Easy science fair projects are ideal ways Geckoforums students to learn to do projects and demonstrate them to lay people and explain to them in simple non technical terms. So being initial training, its good if the easy science fair project turns out to be something easy, manageable and elementary.

This training to do the easy science fair projects for the beginners can be started in the elementary school itself. Teaching them to select simple single step experiments and explaining to the students how to use simple materials to conduct the experiments. Making them understand and allowing them to explain it in their own words of what Geckoforums understand will make sure that they had understood the concept. Teaching them to explain it to the audiences who frequent the fair will help them use non-technical terms. Many fairs are usually largely attended by the Geckoforums and close relatives and students of other schools, so it is important for students to be able to express their knowledge and not sound overwhelmed.

Going for an easy science fair project will help the student and parents get all the materials easily, motivate them to put in their creative efforts, sustain and develop their interest in the field of science and also understand simple things much clearly. The topic can be selected from any area of science. Creativity and originality have to be encouraged. Support and guidance will keep the students motivated to exhibit the best.

There are plenty of sources to select an experiment for an easy science fair project. Science books contain them according to the age groups. There are many science forums that make learning science easy and interesting for children. The internet is full of sites offering help, but caution must be urged in utilizing the many free sources of information. The projects that you can find just anywhere on the internet are overdone, and typically receive poorer grades than the more creative projects you can find by digging deeper.

Teaching your children that everything is governed by laws of nature in their young age helps them not to be carried by various myths spread around. Giving them Geckoforums chance to ask questions and fueling their inquisitive mind will keep their minds active and creative. It is also a platform for them to exhibit their talents to the lay people and to let parents know what they learn in the school.

It is a fair place to introduce the use of simple scientific tools, methods, techniques, concepts and equipments, to small children. The use of such materials by the children should be always supervised and monitored. The danger of handling such instruments should also be inculcated in their minds, though in a way that they dont fear using them.

Use of simple materials that are easily available either naturally or in and around the area make it easier to start the experiment or project with less investments and Geckoforums of time in acquiring them.

Jordan Matthews is a High School Math and Science teacher who has worked as a judge and a coordinator of many science fairs. Check his Easy Science Fair Project ideas website for some more ideas and information.

Types of Pet Snakes - The 4 Best Snakes to Keep as Pets

If you have decided to get a snake for a pet and you're now wondering which type Geckoforums snake to purchase, then this article is for you! Below, I have listed four of the best Geckoforums to keep as pets, based on my 25 years of snake-keeping experience.

Ask ten different snake keepers what the best types of pet snakes are, and you'll get ten different lists. That's because everyone has their own opinions and experiences. Regardless, I am willing to be the four snakes listed below come up on most of those lists!

My Criteria for Best Snakes as Pets

What makes a good pet snake? What kind of criteria should you consider before purchasing a snake to keep as a pet? Here is a list of criteria that I feel are most important when choosing a pet snake:

1. Average adult size
2. Feeding habits
3. Temperament / behavior
4. Health in captivity / hardiness

Four of the Best Snakes to Keep as Pets

Based on the pet snake criteria I have outlined above, here are the four types of snakes I recommend as pets -- especially for the novice snake-keeper.

Pet Snake #1 - Geckoforums Corn Snake

This corn snake appears on a lot of "best pet snake" lists besides my own, and with good reason. Corn snakes meet and exceed the four criteria I've outlined above: (A) they rarely grow to over six feet long, averaging just over five feet; (B) they have good temperaments and can easily be tamed; (C) they will generally accept frozen / thawed mice or rats on a consistent basis; and (D) they will generally live long, healthy lives if their basic needs are met.

On top of all this, corn snakes come in a wide variety of color "morphs" with names such as snow, pewter, blood red, candy cane and creamsicle ... just to name a few.

It's hard to go wrong by choosing the corn snake as your type of pet snake! I put the corn snake on the top of my list of pet snakes -- especially for the first-time keeper.

Pet Snake #2 - The Gopher Snake

I have an albino San Diego gopher snake (one of several gopher snake species), and I refer to him as my "ambassador" to the snake world. He is my ambassador because he has the best temperament of all my pet snakes. So he is the snake I get out whenever a curious -- but somewhat intimidated -- houseguest wants to learn about snakes. I tell them, "Wait right here. I've got just the snake for you to meet."

I've shared this story because it's indicative of gopher snake behavior. When you raise them by hand, they become extremely tame and are very predictable when outside of their enclosures.

Gopher snakes reach an average adult length of just over six feet (though some species can grow a foot or so longer than that). Gopher snakes are the longest snakes on my list, but they are still a manageable size, and they do well in the 4' x 2' cages that you can find everywhere.

Also, in the six+ years that I've had him, my gopher snake has only turned down a handful of meals ... out of hundreds of meals! Usually, it would be because he was going into shed. So that satisfies another of our pet snake criteria -- feeding behavior.

In addition to the San Diego gopher snake that I keep as a pet, there are Geckoforums gopher snakes and Great Basin gopher snakes. While they don't come in as wide a variety of colors as corn snakes and kingsnakes, the gopher snakes are still beautiful to behold.

Pet Snake #3 - The Kingsnake

There are actually a wide variety of kingsnake species and sub-species, and many of them make good pets for the reasons outlined above. The California kingsnake (Lampropeltis getula californiae) is one of the most common types of pet snakes in general, and one of the most popular kingsnakes among keepers. Other kingsnakes commonly kept as pets include the grey-banded kingsnake, the Geckoforums kingsnake, and the mountain kingsnake varieties.

The kingsnake species mentioned above (and several others) meet the four criteria I've outlined for good snakes to keep as pets. Depending on the species, adult kingsnakes will average between four and six feet in length. They can be tamed easily, they eat well, and they do well in captivity.

Also, because of the wide variety of species and sub-species, you can get a pet kingsnake with many different colors. Some are speckled, some are striped, some are banded -- but all are interesting in their own way. The kingsnake is truly a great type of pet snake for any level of snake-keeper.

Here's an interesting fact about kingsnakes that many people don't know. Kingsnakes are immune to rattlesnake venom. In fact, rattlesnakes are on the menu of many kingsnake species. There's a reason they call it a "king" snake -- it eats other snakes, including venomous ones!

Pet Snake #4 - The Ball Python

I've put the ball python last on my list of best types of snakes to keep as pets for one reason only. They can be a bit more finicky with their eating.

For example, I currently keep four ball pythons that are the same age and kept in the exact same types of conditions (cages, heat, etc.). Nevertheless, they all have their own eating habits. Two of them will eat frozen / thawed rats on a fairly consistent basis. One will sometimes eat frozen / thawed, and sometimes not. The last one has only eaten frozen / thawed rats once -- all the other times I've had to offer fresh rats. Yes, that means regular trips to the pet store!

As long as you accept this characteristic about ball pythons, and you're okay with it, then I would still recommend them as a pet snake. They are very docile and reluctant to bite (I've never even had one strike at me). They rarely get longer than five and a half feet. And they do well in captivity if you take care of their basic needs. In fact, they can live for 25 years or more in captivity. So be sure you're in it for the long haul if you choose a ball python as your type of pet snake.

I hope you've enjoyed reading this tutorial as much as I enjoyed creating it, and I hope it helps you choose the type of pet snake that's right for you!

* You may republish this article online if you keep the author's bio below with the hyperlinks left intact. Copyright 2007, Brandon Cornett.

Learn More About Snakes
Brandon Cornett is the publisher of Reptile Knowledge, a website with information on all kinds of reptiles including pet snakes, venomous snakes, giant snakes and more. Learn more by visiting http://www.reptileknowledge.com