 

Strange pets

1 have known

by Mark Voorhees

ltirst met an ”exotic pet" (in this
campus as i walked into a small
party on campus over [all break,
Mike Daley’s cute six foot long boa
constrictor was snugly wrapped
around a woman's neck. I had not

een a crazed snake lover before

T'and I certainly did not leave the
party as one. i summoned up the
courage to wrap Andrew Jackson
Fauhacher around my neck with
. e's assurances that he would
not Constrict, bite or nibble, This
hardly comiorted me, but 1 par»
tially cured one oi my phobias. i
sure wasn’t ready to run down to
Steve’s Aquarium and tiuy one the
next day either.

At the time little did I realize that
Faubs was only one oi a iew cuties
hopping, sliding, and jumping
around campus Student Margaret
Reed-Lade introduced me to Otak,
lier imlicking, irisky. and iurry

hinchilla, Usually chinchillas are
used to make tur Coats but some

people enjoy having them
scrambling around their room and
inside of their shirt. Margaret
apparently has a good rapport \vith
Dtak, often reierring to her as “my
little dingbat." As If a chinchilla
were not enough Margaret also
introduced me to Ezekiel, her
Columbian rainbow boa Ezekiel
was comparatively mellow,
preferring to stay hovered lin-
derneath a box in his aquarium. He
was rumored to have a distinct
personality: one of his favorite
pasttimes is drinking out oi water
fountains Ezekiel will eat. any
small rodent but seems to
especially enjoy hamsters.
Margaret noted that Ezekiel
seemed interested in Otak and
could probably kill him. She says
she must be caretul when playing
with both of them. Recently the
snake pushed about 30 pounds of
books off the top 0! her aquarium
and escaped ior a week, wandering

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through Norris and feasting on the
field mice.

The next stop in discovering
exotic pets was at Pam Neil's
room, the infamous snake lady
She first introduced me to Guthi
‘meamng ”moody” in Old Norse),
her Tiger Oscar, a small fish which
enjoys steak and ﬁngers, Aspasia,
a piranho, lives in an aquarium
close by Pam had something or a
hard time convincing me that these
two fish had more interesting color
and shape than most other pet iish.
It seemed wasteful to have two
good sized glass tanks with only
one fish in each of them But that's
the price one has to pay ior owning
fish that like to eat each other.

Pam also showed me Armilla her
red milk snake and Agustos, a
Columbian red tailed boa. It was
encouraging to know that each
snake I was introduced to in the
course of the evening was getting
progressively smaller i was also
beginning to wonder Whether it
was just coincidence that all these
animals happened to have unique
names or it there was some reason
behind it.

This pattern continued when I
met Gillian, Elissa Barnett’s red
rat snake, who had just eaten his
weekly mouse and was contently
Viewing the world irom his
tank. Elissa enjoys snakes [or
their gracefulness and [or the way
they move. Most of the snakes I
observed were similar to Gillian in
that they all spent much time
sttting at the bottom at a tank.

Kim Tucker brought her wolf
spider over to Pam ’5 room to show
It on It must have been at least
one inch long with legs all over the
place, Kiln was quite impressed
with the white lines on the under
side otits legs, though I only found
it mildly interesting. Kim also
brought Gekel along. Gekel is a
Tokay Gecko, a type oi reptile
natural to the desert, She let Gekel
crawl around her legs and up her
shirt, Unfortunately Gekel had not
quite adjusted to Kim so she had to
wear a glove to avoid being bitten

Dave Haas wandered into the
room just to say he had black and
brown widows from South and
North America respectively. They
were lodged in the Science
Building, however. because people
on his floor were a little wary oi
them. Dave.a member of an insect
society in New York city, was
particular to note that not all
spiders are dangerous, it just
happened that his are.

Pam mentioned as she was
ieeding a mouse to Agustos. that
her snakes liked to go bike riding
Wlth her. Kim was quick to note
that snakes ”need somebody to
love," Right then Agustos in a
flurry ot movement strangled the
innocent mouse and began to

pagliai's

A gallery of Grimm” exotim, above: Pam Neil gazes adoringly
at Gulbi, ber Tiger arm Ieft: Kim Tucker eagerly display: 1m

affectionate Wolf Spider

below: RtA. Mike Daley puzzler

Andrew Jackron Faubacber, bi: xix/not long Boa Constrictor

swallow it. i must have been the
only person in the room not to have
seen a snake eat a rodent because I
was the only one to jump a con-
siderable distance and give a
healthy scream. At that point i was
ready to leave ior the night and not
return ior a long time. Pain then
mentioned that Susie i-laverstock
had a snake in hcr room . . i took
Pam’s word for it,

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tEd. note: We regret. to announce
that as this issue went to press Ms.
Tucker inioriiicd iis oi the untimely
death at oekel. the Tokay Gecko.
We lurthcr regret—with some
alarmethe conspicuous ahsencc oi
the Smith American black widow
spider irom these photos. The
spider et‘lected an inopportune
escape trom its cage just heinre
our planned photo session.)

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