Chirpy
This post has NO PHOTOGRAPHS because I know that some of you just won't like them.
Emily and Gareth have moved to York. But they have left their three geckos behind them, temporarily at least, and I am Gecko Feeder-in-Chief.
The geckos are cute little lizards. They are brainier than the snake, but then so is this coffee cup that I'm currently drinking from.
The geckos eat crickets.
The crickets come from the pet shop in little transparent plastic boxes. I transfer them to a bigger plastic tank, which I have christened the Cricketarium. It has long dark tubes in it. Crickets love long dark tubes.
The crickets are about a centimetre long, and eat apple, and something called Bug Grub which seems to mainly consist of calcium. The calcium's not vital to the crickets, but it is vital to the geckos.
I'm glad I don't have to explain it to the crickets. "Sorry you've got to eat all this calcium, but it's because - - er - - "
Looking after the crickets is nothing new to me: Emily and Gareth, who love the geckos, are not at all keen on the crickets.
"Too many legs - - ewwwww" is their full explanation.
The crickets, if poked or otherwise provoked, can jump a couple of feet in the air and this was quite a problem in my early days of dealing with them. When I transferred them from their little boxes to the Cricketarium lots of them used to jump and escape. However, I have become an expert now. I know how to remove the lid of the box and put them in the Cricketarium without them knowing a thing about it: they just continue sitting there on a piece of eggbox thinking their crickety thoughts as I move them.
But, although the Cricketarium is supposed to be cricket-escape-proof, there are tiny holes around the long dark tubes, and one or two crickets in every batch always creep out and hop away.
They invariably end up in the bathroom, because they like the warmth. They crawl under the bath, where they live happily for weeks, chirping merrily to themselves, like grasshoppers. only louder. And again, I have become an expert at catching them, as soon as they wander out into the middle of the room. I know just how to make them jump into my outstretched hand. I'm wondering if this is a marketable skill that should go on my cv.
There - Expert Cricket-Handler. Modest bow. Oh yes, even if you've been reading my blog for a while, there are still some things you don't know about me.
Emily and Gareth have moved to York. But they have left their three geckos behind them, temporarily at least, and I am Gecko Feeder-in-Chief.
The geckos are cute little lizards. They are brainier than the snake, but then so is this coffee cup that I'm currently drinking from.
The geckos eat crickets.
The crickets come from the pet shop in little transparent plastic boxes. I transfer them to a bigger plastic tank, which I have christened the Cricketarium. It has long dark tubes in it. Crickets love long dark tubes.
The crickets are about a centimetre long, and eat apple, and something called Bug Grub which seems to mainly consist of calcium. The calcium's not vital to the crickets, but it is vital to the geckos.
I'm glad I don't have to explain it to the crickets. "Sorry you've got to eat all this calcium, but it's because - - er - - "
Looking after the crickets is nothing new to me: Emily and Gareth, who love the geckos, are not at all keen on the crickets.
"Too many legs - - ewwwww" is their full explanation.
The crickets, if poked or otherwise provoked, can jump a couple of feet in the air and this was quite a problem in my early days of dealing with them. When I transferred them from their little boxes to the Cricketarium lots of them used to jump and escape. However, I have become an expert now. I know how to remove the lid of the box and put them in the Cricketarium without them knowing a thing about it: they just continue sitting there on a piece of eggbox thinking their crickety thoughts as I move them.
But, although the Cricketarium is supposed to be cricket-escape-proof, there are tiny holes around the long dark tubes, and one or two crickets in every batch always creep out and hop away.
They invariably end up in the bathroom, because they like the warmth. They crawl under the bath, where they live happily for weeks, chirping merrily to themselves, like grasshoppers. only louder. And again, I have become an expert at catching them, as soon as they wander out into the middle of the room. I know just how to make them jump into my outstretched hand. I'm wondering if this is a marketable skill that should go on my cv.
There - Expert Cricket-Handler. Modest bow. Oh yes, even if you've been reading my blog for a while, there are still some things you don't know about me.
posted by Daphne at 5:44 pm
6 Comments:
... along with rabbit wrangling, I do believe...
A vital and necessary skill. Do you catch worms as well? I was left in charge of a batch for our wormery whilst Mrs BW was away and they all made various bids for freedom. Took ages to catch em and there was a high attrition rate.
Thankfully we don't seem to have a cricket problem here in mid Florida - apart from the fact that ESPN aren't showing any of the current England v Sri Lanka series.
Shame on them.
We do have loads of little 'lizard' critters who are super cute....and quite tasty in a hot dog bun - which seems to have been designed with them in mind. A sort of gecko sleeping bag.
My bad.
Ian
Oh yes, Dizzy, rabbit wrangling, I forgot I'd told you about that one.
I don't catch worms these days, Mr BW, but I did once take a whole jar of them to school for my classroom's nature table. They weren't appreciated at all.
Ian - - photos of lizards, please, we like lizards in this house. NOT in a bun though, thank you.
That's nothing. We used to house dead baby mice in the fridge for my son's snake. Ex husband actually rang me at school in a rage when he discovered them! :)
I was working up to the mice, Jennyta, for fear of scaring off all my readers. We have a corn snake, and a freezer full of mice. Great big grown up ones. Dead. We have to thaw them out in the fridge. Sometimes visitors go "What's that?" and I have to hustle them quickly in the general direction of away. I wonder if your son's snake was a corn snake too.
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