Wickens Wicked Reptiles vs Spider Ball Haters | Reptiles With Podcast S04EP26 (REPTILE PODCAST)

Welcome back to the reptiles with podcast. Um, so before we get the ball rolling, there's a little topic going around right now. It turns out that Brian Bartchick has cancer. Yeah. So yes, the C word. There is a Facebook group called hashtag stay strong Brian for anybody that wants to put like a nice message for him. That's definitely the place to do it. The cancer that he has is pretty is pretty rough, to say the least. And it's you watch the videos you put out. I did watch the videos and I kind of had a feeling it would be that just off of like a couple of the things that he was saying. But of course, you're like, no, let's let it let it not be that. But yeah, so that's the situation. I pretty sure one of the next podcasts that we do will probably just really touch up in detail about how we're feeling about the thing. Yeah, especially you know, when Chuck's here because he's not here because his tummy hurts. Um, so we're actually going to call him in the bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad something. But yeah, we'll go in details. Actually, this podcast bumped one of the other podcasts that we have coming out and just so that way we can touch on some like really like new topics that just yeah, but let's get the ball rolling on these topics. Yes. You're so disgusting. I just came back from a trip. Nice. Okay. The I'm not going to say where it was. Because of the reptile shops that I'm going to talk about. Yes. Mind you, at least one of the people that works at the shop definitely listens to the podcast. Oh, okay. Because when I went into the shop, they mentioned they were like, I was just talking about you. This is the podcast guy. I was like, but yeah, yeah, dude, literally like about that trip. It was solid. I got to hang out with my wife and her friends. Um, yeah, that it was one of their baby showers. I ate like some shitty fucking, why is there no like good food over there? The pizza that I had over there was so bad. There's no standards general college town. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's a college town. So like no one's going to fucking like these kids are eating hot pockets and like micro burritos. There's no standards. The place was called. I love New York pizza. I didn't love that pizza. I wouldn't even I would not have even fed that to like an alligator. Like I would. That's bad fucking pizza. That's so bad. Oh my God. But I did. I visited some of the shops there, which I know that you're familiar with. Um, dude, like, I'm not the reason why I'm not saying the names of the shops is because I'm not trying to shit on the shops. But dude, it was not a good time. Yeah. The the service was whack. I mean, I don't know if it's just because I'm used to how we do things here. Okay. Where like somebody walks in and everybody that walks in is greeted with, Hey, how's it going? Or hi? How are you? Whatever? How can I help you? Right? I walk into the shop. I'm in the shop for 30 minutes. The employee and I have made eye contact. It's completely ignored me. Just working. Mind you, if they're busy, they're busy. I'm not paying attention to me. But I was like, yo, gakita service. Okay. Then I'm like walking around like, yo, fucking it smells like reptile shopping. Yeah. And then I'm looking at the fucking enclosures and there's literally like shit smeared all over the class. I'm like, how am I supposed to see the fucking animal? Yeah. You know, and it made me think like, how many people, like, especially with how populated that area is, how many people walk into that shop? And that's their first example of what a reptile shop is. Yeah. Right. They walk in. They're like, this is the reptile community. Yeah. And that is, they're either going to see that and walk the fuck out. Yeah. Or they're going to go in there by the animal. And that's going to be their standard. Not so much to justify it because I'm not trying to justify it. But more kind of explain. Yeah. It is an old area. Okay. Old area with a lot of old Herpers and Herpers like her people. Not people with herpes? No, no, no, of course not. Maybe actually, they definitely hurt me. But yeah, so it's like, it's not a it's not justification at all. It's more like, yeah, the people there have been there for years. Like they've had their customer basis. Like, they've had regulars like age with them. You know, it's like, geez, that's crazy. And that's the problem with like, when things get too old, and they don't try to make anything new, they don't try to do anything better. They don't keep up. It's like, yeah, yeah, it's going to turn to nothing basically. Yeah. But the thing is, like, the owner of those places, the person that old, no, have better standards, my dude. The place is open. It's how do you hold? I guess. I guess it is. Yeah. Mind you, one of the workers that didn't know me. Yeah, he was very nice. Yeah. You know, but we already have a rapport. Yeah. Yeah. And I was raised, raised, like grew up in the in the reptile industry, like shown the ropes, I guess. Yeah. By older heads. So like, you know, so it's like, and sometimes I bring it here sometimes where it's like, to an extent with the reptile sound like, look, we're we're there. I fall into the mites like we're a peck shop. Like you really expect to not to smell. Yeah, like this is rats and animals living in tanks. You know, like, of course, it's got to smell those turtle tanks. But of course, yeah, you do your best to like, make it presentable, make it better. Yeah. Like, they're, of course, yeah. I stick my hands in like crickets and like, yeah, like it doesn't matter. I don't use gloves or whatever. Yeah. Who cares? A smell here, right? Because there's a lot of reptiles, right? insects, rodents, whatever. But no, this fucking place, bro, it smells, dude. Yeah. Yeah. Fucking, that's a fucking air circulation in that shit, dude. Yeah, dude. But I kind of hope that they see this, because maybe the it puts a pep in their stomach. I did go to both. Think it's like I said, man, at the end of the day, like people are walking into that store and that's what they think. If they don't go to any other stores, if they don't really like venture out in the reptile community, and they're going in to see that, like it's a shame because that's not a good representation of the community. That's not a good representation of what we're trying to do. What the community is today, you know, and that should not be a representation of how you should care for your animals. No, it's not. But yeah, that's that. And on the shit about shit that we've done, we just did the ball shit podcast with Sean Bradley. Yeah, it's funny during that podcast. I didn't realize why I was called ball shit. And I was like, it's bullshit. Yeah. Hello. I quality me. Yeah. Dad puns. How did you how did you feel about it? Interesting. It was cool to have a different person kind of talking with us. Yeah. And we usually have like live, but it was like a weird perspective because it was my first one to like over the screen. So it's like, whoa, interesting. It was interesting. No offense, very long. Because I was like, oh, I never hadn't seen one until like we were really like talking about doing it. Yeah. And then I was like, how long are these? And they're like two hours ago. Yeah. Like because ours are like 45 minutes, like an hour and 30 minutes. Yeah. Okay. And there's a reason for that, you know, because I mean, I guess when you're doing it live, it creates a different experience, right? But with how we do it, that it's a little more produced. It's more of a show. You know, what I've known is that people tend to tune out after like 30 minutes, 45 minutes. So I'm like, okay, 45 minutes is a good place to be at. We shoot for the hour, but if our good topics end by 45, we're good at 45. Yeah. You know, because at the end of the day, like, I mean, I listen to a lot of podcasts and yeah, I do listen to Joe Rogan, which those are always like three fucking hours. I could never. Yeah. But the thing is, is that like, it's, I'm really into the topic that we're talking about, or, you know, you already have the rapport, but like, I don't think we'd be able to do a three hour podcast. We did two and a half with Ron. And yeah, that was like the max. It was always entertaining. But dude, that bullshit podcast, it was, it was fun, but it took a lot, not a lot. So was there anything from that podcast that like stood out to you? I mean, I don't want, I don't want to talk too much detail about like, everything we spoke about. Yeah, go look at it. Go watch it. But watch that one. But we were talking about with Sean about how potentially maybe the US might that actually start looking like Europe. Yeah. So like, racks might go out. More legislation might come in. More legislation is going to come in. We're talking about things like that. And he's, not no offense again. He's older than us. So he's been like, he's seen a lot more. He's been in the hobby a lot more. He's in other hobbies as well, like the aquarium stuff. So it's like, yeah, he has a lot of input and like wisdom to kind of throw on that. So it was like, wow, it was, it was really nice that other perspective. His cucks also like the three of us are young dudes. So it's like, yeah, young dudes in the hobby as well. We haven't been in this like, yeah, decades. So it's like, wow, I like being called young. Thank you. Did you think that it was going to be primarily ball pythons because of the news? Yes. Yes. I was, I was like, all right, I got my three sentences on ball pythons. We're good. I know four more. We got this. But you were surprised though. You were like, oh, we have to talk about all kinds of shit. Yeah. Yeah. Ball shit. Yeah. I did a podcast recently with Daffy's reptiles in Canada. Right. So the topic. Yeah, I went to Canada. That's crazy. It was fun. It's cold. And I don't like it there because the United States is better. But the it was another zoom one. So if you want to go check that one out, it's under Daffy's round table, I think is the name of the YouTube channel where we spoke about if breeders should be influencers, right? That's like an open topic because it's like, if you are a breeder, should you be taking the time to like almost exploit your animals? Should there be a divide there? Okay. And I'm not going to again, going to give too much of my pain on that because I spoke at nauseam, check it out. But I wanted to hear what you had to say about that. So my philosophical brain automatically says we need to define breeders and influencers. What do these terms mean? So let's say a breeder is someone I'm assuming. Let's give examples like a nerd, an El reptiles, you know, large companies that are producing animals, okay, however, which way because I still think within the term breeders that that's what we're meaning, like people that are like pushing, I guess, a couple bit of animals. Okay. And then influencers, I'm going to say YouTubers and Instagramers, people that don't necessarily have a lot, but are posting a lot and are giving a lot of information about what they're doing, what they're keeping, all that kind of stuff. So I think there is a lost potential in having particular breeders not being influencers. For example, arid's only. I forget your name, I'm sorry, but like he does most of your mastics and he has like a whole bunch of species and even like I think locales, which is like a fire is fantastic. And it's like that guy should be an influencer. And he does a podcast, I think Project Hair Predator culture, I think is the one. And so that's awesome. I get to hear specifically from the guy who knows what he's doing, you know, same thing with nerd. Nerd is another facility that goes ahead and like actually, not necessarily a day to day, but does put out videos a lot of the times about how it is to keep these reptiles, you know, tips and tricks, different ways of doing things, that kind of thing. And it's like, these are the people that should be talking, not necessarily influencers that cake like a goldfish and a freaking sugar glider. And it's like, you, you, not to shit on those people was like, you don't really know what you're doing. Why would I be listening to you? I think like the biggest, the biggest concern for the, for that that we were all speaking about the four of us was the amount of power influencers have, right, and how they because of that influence, they really have a like, almost like a stronghold on specific species and markets and stuff like that. Mexican Black King snake is a perfect example. Also, a lot of people, so already a Black snake, everyone likes it, but like 10 years ago, you get one 50, 60 bucks, no problem. All of a sudden YouTube started really, really picking up Instagram, started really picking up TikTok and people had Mexican Black King snakes one because they're cool, but then like everybody sees the Mexican Black King snake, boom, the market goes up. I'll do you a real life example. And it's right behind me. You gotta say blue tongues? No, no. Axolotls. Axolotls. Yeah. Another, well, it wasn't influencers. That's, well, I guess if Minecraft is an influencer, it has influence. But it did seriously influence axolotls sales. It's crazy because we see parents come in and they're like, acts, acts, they can't pronounce it. Yeah, they're like, trying to get you to finish the sentence or like, acts, acts, who's it? But then their seven-year-old kid comes in, it's like, axolotls. Oh my gosh. On that note, I'd also like to add this is something I find very amazing. There are multiple occurrences. People have come in not knowing that axolotls were real. Shut the fuck up. It was just an animal that they made up in Minecraft and they'll walk in and their minds explode. That's crazy. How did you live? Oh my gosh. I can put the lizard in the water. So maybe why is it in a block? Yeah. That's interesting. So like, yeah, it's like an example. So I guess maybe with if breeders were to go ahead and like really, really have more of a grasp on the influencer thing. Do you think that that would be like a negative thing or like maybe they'd influence a wrong way? I don't. This is the thing. My actual concern with it is, and I did speak about it on the podcast, my actual concern is that we give a certain amount of power to these people by following them continuously, liking, commenting, whatever, and allowing them to give to give us their opinion. Right. But now it almost creates like a disconnect. Like if that person is above. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Someone to admire to follow. Exactly. Now let's say that person with hundreds and maybe 1000, maybe hundreds of thousands of followers starts doing, did a bad thing to meet. Okay. And I am a singular person in the back. Right. How am I supposed to speak out against this goliath? Okay. And that that is like my my actual concern is like, okay, like what if that person is doing some shady shit behind the scenes? And I know about it. And but I can't go out there and say anything because then their army destroys me. Okay. You know, I see what you say. And that that is like my issue with it, especially because we are not talking about commodities and like regular products or just like somebody's persona and the person that they are. No, we're talking about live animals and dealing in live animals. And a lock and happen with live animals. Right. Right. You know, I think this is a lot of, but like I get I see it mostly as like regular influencer ethics. You know, like as an influencer, you have a responsibility. You are going to kang probably markets. You are going to influence a lot of people to do certain things depending on what it is that you're doing. Yeah. No matter what it is. You know. And I think Chuck would honestly say that it's not your responsibility. You can do whatever the fuck he wants. And I'm not telling you to do these things. You know, it's like, but yeah, you still do have that responsibility because you are influencing. You're doing it. And showing people it can be done. One such instance, I was in working out the old shop that I used to work at where my manager, he came in, he was like, man, I hate this person. I'm not going to say who they are. But it's an influencer, big influencer. It's like, I hate this person. And I was like, yo, why? Because I had been watching them for a little bit. And they're like, because they're telling, they're teaching kids, like little teenagers, little little boys, that they can go ahead and get venomous snakes and free handle them, do whatever they want with them that this is easy, this, that, and the other. You know, and it's like, yeah, I mean, he's not, they're not literally doing it. This YouTube channel is not literally doing this for these kids and stuff. But it's like, you know, it is because these kids don't see this person as any different than them. You know, they're like, that guy's just like me. I can do this, you know, and it's like, and in some states, like in Florida, for instance, you can't be just like him, just because you choose to, you have to go through the work process. But if you go to somewhere like Texas or wherever, you can just do whatever the fuck you want. Yeah, grab it, do it. Do the thing that you saw on YouTube. And is that his fault? To an extent, I think so. You showed him that it could be done. Yeah. And that it wasn't that a big a deal. Yeah, for sure. Well, on Chuck, we should call him. He has a pinion. We are going to give him a phone call. We have a between the shitting and the vomiting. Yeah, give him a call. Yeah, this guy. Come on. Come on. I think from my perspective to about breeders, like probably being the ones that should be influencing, it puts like kind of an obligation on the breeders, doesn't it? Let's say you're working with Abronia, for instance. Abronia Alliance does have their own Instagram and stuff. But like, let's say you're working with Abronia and you are killing it with Abronia. You're producing them like no problem. And you are taking care of them. Great. Like you're doing it. You're doing really, really good work. And then you don't teach people how to do it. You don't show people how to do it. It's like, and everybody gets their Abronia and they just end up killing it. They do it wrong. They're breeding it wrong. It's not working out for them. And then it's like, but they could be. You could show them the right way to do it. You know, and that's what sucks. All right, we're going to give you a call. There's nothing better than the smell of coffee in the morning. Okay, there's also nothing better than the smell of reptiles in the morning. Psych reptiles with coffee. That's the smell you want. The strongest coffee. All right, we have it for you. Head on over the description or go to coldbloodedcaffeine.com and use the code reptiles with to get your reptiles with coffee today. All right, so do you think that reptile breeders should be influencers? Should reptile breeders be influencers? Yes. I don't see how they do correlate. Yeah, I think so. Do you think that because they're reptile breeders, if they become influencers, they'll have too much control over people's opinions on certain animals, certain markets, stuff like that? I mean, yeah, but regular influencers do the same. So it is what it is. I feel like with breeding specifically, like if you're talking like stupid stuff, like ball pythons and stuff, doesn't matter. But I think like, let's say somebody's breeding some rare shit, like they might have like a trick or two that they can teach other people to be able to breed something. So yeah, I think they could be influencers. Okay. Just because like, as it is, like regular influencers can influence for bad and for good. Doesn't change much. I feel like it's the same way with breeders. I had said the same thing for the most part, like my thing was like, oh, there's such a wasted potential. And like, the actual good breeders, the breeders that are doing like really, really good work, not being influencers and not teaching people right ways to do things. Or like, like you said, tips and tricks to like actually have success with what they're doing. And that's and that the influencers that we currently do have are like seriously lacking in a lot of those aspects. Oh, yeah, for sure. And it's not like to force anybody to be an influencer, but it's like, a lot of the ones we have do fucking suck. And anybody to be a breeder, you know, anybody could buy some shit and like breed leopard geckos at a facility or something. That's great. Man, anybody can do that shit. So with the other points on that on that podcast, I mean, those were the that was the big ones. I don't want to give away too much because I would like for people to go check it out. Yeah. Now Chuck, you just did a podcast, the non dude podcast, how'd that go? That was fucking awesome. Yeah. Very interesting to look at other like, what do you call that? Like, like another world, another industry. They're all comedians. Yeah. Yeah. Like it was interesting seeing a whole other world of people doing podcasting. So similar to us. And it's like, when I got there, they watched ours and they were like, yo, like, it's exactly the same thing. It's a whole bunch of boys hanging out talking shit. And like, they say some wild shit on the podcast. Like we do on ours. And like, that's pretty much, again, it was a lot of that I got to hear a lot of things about comedy that I didn't know. And like, as a community, you know, like that community, I got to hear some things. I, I don't know, I got to learn a lot. Well, if you, if you link up again with them, I want to go. I want to go. I want to be them. They look cool. For sure. It was fun. It's fun. Isn't, isn't their house, too? Oh, hell yeah. They have a podcast, like room. Yeah. If you notice, if you watch the podcast, I am in, like the background and stuff is all plants and stuff. But that's like, they change it every time. Oh, yeah. Depending who's coming. Yeah. Oh, that's cool. I saw you showing off your balls to them, dude. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I actually talked about that a little bit. They asked me like, because like, that's the most I have of. And they're like, why? And I said, well, this is how I started, like, as a young kid. And then the ones that I still have, like, they gave me, they opened a lot of doors for me. So why not take care of the animals that took care of the animal? Like, I'm like, yeah, like from WWE, like artists and photographers and shows that like, of course I have them. Yeah. Yeah. For sure, man. Well, yeah, dude, let's, if it happens again, let me know. I'd like to meet these dudes. You know that obviously I'm super into fucking comedy. So, yeah. Oh, one of them, one of them actually opened up for Angie Shultz. Oh, no way. That's cool. Yeah. Well, yeah. So it's like a crazy connection back to like, oh, I want to end up there. That's my info. Yeah. Well, you told did you tell them that like we that's like kind of like our inspiration for this shit? Yeah. Yeah. I told them. I'm like, yo, because that's when I told them, because they asked me like how we run it and like, what got us to run it that way. I said, Angie Shultz. And then he cut me off his image. Pedro Pedro coming off and he goes, yeah, I actually opened for Pedro for Angie Shultz. I'm like, what the fuck? That's so cool, man. Fuck yeah, bro. Hell yeah, dude. But all right, bro. Feel better. The community loves you and wipe your ass and clean your mouth. Yeah, that's fucked up. To mess. All right, bro. Later. That was mad by a rap sauce. Yeah, that was his opinion on the matter. I thought he would talk less. I'm not going to lie to you. Eric, do I leave your phone? Here? Yeah. Okay, cool. But yeah, dude. So that's his shit. Well, how did you feel about what he said? Yeah, I agree a lot with the info. It's so weird that we're all the same page on this. Yeah, we never are. We're like, where the fuck is he arguing? You know what though? So, okay, like I said, with the obligation thing. So like, let's say I'm doing the Plato listeners, right? I have an obligation to go ahead and start posting everything that I'm doing about the Plato listeners and like any success I've been having and like all that stuff because there isn't a lot in terms of like breeding success with them. You know, that's an interesting topic. Obligation. And if you decide no, is that gatekeeping? Very interesting. It's what, you know, so with remind me of DM exotics that the Amalery, I talk about this guy a lot. Yeah, but recently he was putting out, I think within the last year, I think he put out videos about any species he's bred. He put out a potayas video, ganjosoma video, beauty snake video about like his success breeding them, any tips and tips with imports, any kind of how to raise babies, get them onto rodents, that kind of thing. And like his whole thing at the beginning of the videos were like, hey, I'm old. You know, it's time that someone put this information out there because even when I'm long gone, people are still going to be importing these animals. You might as well know what you're doing when you get them, you know, instead of having to do all this learning all over again, you know, for every single species that comes in. So he's like, oh, I'll just put it all into YouTube cement it forever into history. And it's like, yeah, you know what, that's like, that's like the thing. If people should do that, you know, teach each other the things. And I think that it can become a lot of gatekeeping. No, I know how to do it. I'm not going to tell you about it. Like, sleep out thing on the market, which I think is a potential negative if breeders start to become influenced. True. Well, I won't show that. A lot of like, I am not saying that I am an influencer. He's saying is an influencer. I am not saying that. But when I got into the blue tongues, it was hard to get solid information out and the people that did give me information. I mean, one of them was Manny and he helped me out a lot. But then some of the other people were like super picky about the information that they gave me. And they only wanted me to do certain things their way, right? And now I'm in the middle of pretty much writing an actual paper, not like a fucking study, but like all my whole experience, the way that I keep temperatures, feed, diet, went to feed, went to brew made, how to breed, what to feed from baby to middle to adult. And I'm going to do a whole thing on blue tongues. You better YouTube video. Well, I've thought about your influencer. Yeah, those things would meet. So it pretty much be, I'm going to write this paper. I'm going to do a video on it, tag people to that paper on the website. So if you want to support us, head on over to modernreptoshop.com or in the description where you can find our merch. And the best part is, is that a percent of the proceeds from the merch gets donated to conservation. One more time, that's modernreptoshop.com or head on over to the description. But on the influencer shit. So, wiccans, I always fuck up the name of wiccans, wiccans, wiccans, wiccans, wiccans, wiccans, wiccans, wiccans, weiccans reptiles. There you go. All right. So he just did a video, or he spoke about his opinions on spider ball python. Here we go. So I, I really liked the video. I liked this point of view. He's a solid dude, but I hated this point of view. I unfollowed. He literally lost a lot of followers. It was me. I didn't know. Did you watch the video? I did. I did. I did. How did you feel about it? You know, I felt honestly, it was, it's surprising that he lost so many followers because I thought it was very on the fence. Like he, not that he was indecisive, but it was almost like he wouldn't want to go one way or the other out of probably fear that exactly what happened, what happened. Got you. You know, well, I think that he was very clear in that he says that he doesn't have the need to breathe these things, but he doesn't think that we should just shun the fucking animal. I like precisely. This is what he said about it. He's like, there's nothing wrong with keeping a spider ball python. And it's like, yeah, absolutely. If someone came in with a, let's say a fully disabled animal, there's no, there's nothing wrong about keeping that animal, giving it the best life that you can get for it, doing the best to care for it, giving it to a vet, you know, whatever. There's nothing, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Where it's fuzzy, where it's really fuzzy is like, because like, yeah, there are spider ball pythons already, you know, there's no reason not to give them homes. Yeah, you know, they're already here. The problem is this, when you purchase one to give it a home, you pay the breeder to do it. And you, you, you fund them. Yeah, and you make them want to keep doing it, you know, and that's where the ethics of whether or not we should breed them comes into play. Yeah, and it's, it becomes a certain responsibility. Yeah. The my ball python quote unquote collection started with spider ball pythons. Actually, I had the with the 12 animals that I had, the majority had spider, you know, had a killer bee, bumble bee, lesser bee, some other animals, right? So my first ball python breeding season, I literally just had a shit ton of fucking bumble bees, you know, and, you know, my, that's where my collection started. I didn't back then I didn't really know the stigma. I didn't really understand. But as I've grown and I've seen, you know, what honestly, a lot of it is what the market looks like. And the fact that if you're not in a pet store setting, those animals don't really sell because the broader community doesn't like it. Yeah. So I've little by little taken that stuff out of my collection, the stuff that I have is very minimal. And it's because of all the other genes that are in there. And it's nothing that I hold back. So there is a responsibility when you're breathing these things, something that that that he mentioned. And mind you, it wasn't something that was his opinion. So I'm going to clarify, it was just something that he was saying, like, there is like a study that potentially this is a thing that potentially it's not really an neurological issue. It's like, like a developmental thing in the school or something with the the ear, something like that. The brain not being having a sufficient space to grow out. Yeah, or like when we were talking a little bit the other day, a little bit of an equilibrium thing. So it's maybe it's like, so maybe potentially it's possible to agree. Yeah, to like outbreat to like animals that have maybe a bigger head structure, something like that similar to what they do with a crested gecko that a lot of crested geckos beaters, cherry pick, certain crested geckos just because of the size of their head. Right, right, right. Pause. But at the end of the day, like that's, you know, that was just like something that could be potential, but nobody's doing that fucking work. Nobody's going to sit there. But yeah, ball python people are not like that where they're like, like what we're talking about on the boss podcast, we're just like, that's a nice pastel. That's nicer than my pastel, but I already have pastel. You know, like that's that's how ball pythons. Yeah, there's no line breeding with ball pythons. You know, a little bit. A little bit. And you know, with it's just so for me, actually, I'll know earlier episodes of the podcast, Chuck actually convinced me why you probably shouldn't breed spider ball python. Yeah, and he's like, it's because for me, it was always like, I can, I've never heard an argument against breeding ball pythons. That wasn't also an argument for euthanasia in human beings, you know, and it's like, oh, you know, like someone's disabled, they shouldn't have kids. It's like, whoa, whoa, what is wrong with you? Like, that's horrible. Yeah. You know, and one of the things that he had said is like, you know, because it's like, you're intentionally making them reproduce to have that. You know, you it's not like, oh, they just reproduced, you know, we got to take care of the babies. Oh, well, you know, like we're here. It's like, no, you're intentionally doing it so that it would do it would happen. Yeah, you know, like, yeah, that you're right, that that does suck. That is bad. With the with the spider ball pythons, it's not absolute. Like, you can have animals that don't show it. You can have animals that only show it through stress. Right. And then you can have animals that are corkscrewing, throwing around, backing that ass up, twerking, the whole thing is crazy. But yeah, and the thing is that sucks is that if spider ball pythons didn't have that issue, that'd probably be the most sought after mutation for so much. Actually, I sent, I think I sent a rep diverse, a literally an example spider and I was like, that animal's insane. Yeah, that animal's gorgeous. Yeah. You know, and it's like, but damn, spider. And you know what? That's a perfect example of influencers influencing. Yeah, yeah, literally. Yeah, I mean, like, oh, like, uh, uh, uh, Alex Green with Go Herping, he was like, we should ban spider ball pythons. Yeah. When that video came out, I think honestly that video probably killed the spider. Honestly, a lot of it did a lot of that shit. Actually, when I started breeding, I think ball pythons, the goal was to make an exotic fire be the whole project was based off the spider ball python because you're talking about, uh, like the band's skinny and nice looking on black and white snake, you know, but we pretty much for the most part of band in that project because, you know, we understand the stigma. We we choose not I'm not going to shit on somebody for breeding spider ball pythons. Like if that's what you're doing, you do it. I'm not going to be the guy to do it, you know, stuff that I keep super minimum. Uh, but eventually it'll be out. You know, it's crazy too is that a lot of the times, sometimes more or even combination of more might have certain consequences that we didn't even see because the neurological condition, that's going to present itself from birth. You know, but let's say if it's something like week lungs, makes it more susceptible to our eyes, boom, that animal dies. Let's say something that actually shortens lifespan, you know, and let this animal literally can't live past 20 years old, you know, and that kills it. That's like, well, damn, or even like a developmental issue, like this animal doesn't produce a certain way. It doesn't have the same ability, you know, whatever, a certain pigment combination that creates tumors on the fucking animal in later life. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. That's like even albinism. Albinism. Eventually, if you have an adult albino animal, that's in a lot of light. It'll go blind. Yeah, it does. So it's like, those are also little things that inhibit the animal. Yeah. Are those things that then we shouldn't breed? Some, I would say, honestly, dude, like specifically albinism. Yeah. Well, for albinism and captivity, depending on the animal, they could do their thing. Uh, the ones that I have gripes with are specifically ones, honestly, the fucking leaven frost leper get go, where it's just like, no, dude, like these things, like what they have is like a skin cancer. And that's what, you know, that combination in their DNA creates this color and it's very pretty, but it's also gives a fucking tumor. But pretty much. Here's what's really interesting about the leaven frost specifically is that you cannot, you cannot be born with cancer. There's no gene that gives you cancer. You know, it's just cells that are doing it wrong. To be fair, I don't, I actually don't think it's like actually cancer. I think it's like tumors. Okay. Is that, I don't know if that's one of the same. I mean, that's just a clump of cancer cells. Is it? Yeah. I'm not a doctor. But like, okay, for me, it's like, it might be what it really is, is a reduction in immunity and an induction of immune response. And so because of that cancer cells, because cancer cells develop in normal people, just like without any kind of excessiveness. And so the cancer develops and the body in a normal, healthy human body will fight it and kill it. You know, but that's saying leopard geckos and lemon frost leopard geckos, like certain gene doesn't allow immune, an immune response to be brought about properly. And thus, cancer is rampant, cancer is stronger. Yeah. You know, it's like, well, that's, that's crazy. And that could, but that could happen with anything. Yeah. But the thing is with the leaven frost is that there's like a legitimate science study of paper that it's like, yo, like this equals this. It even if it doesn't show, like it's there, you know, and it's like, people still try to breathe the shit and people trying to outcross it to see if they can prove it out. But I don't think that that's possible when, when a scientist is literally like this equals this. Yeah. You know, it's hard when it's like, because a wobble isn't going to kill the animal, but something like kind of outcross super lilies or super zeros in bearded dragons or lemon frost. I don't think there's super zeros, bro. No, they die. No, but they're no, it's not a super zero bearded dragon. Oh, it's no. So, okay. Okay. I got you. Which one is it? So yeah, yeah, it is the zero. Okay. Right. But it's that you cannot breed zero to zero. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Incomplete dominant. Yeah. You're right. Yeah. Yeah. Connection. They said the healthiest way to do it is head to head. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. That's my B. You're good, bro. Yeah. I was like, oh, you combine the two super. Yeah. Sorry. I'm still in the ball python. But yes, the lily whites like that actually the spider ball pythons are like that. Same thing with the lily whites. The people have bred spider to spider before and the super version appears to be a white snake, but it never lives. It dies in the egg. And now mind you, I don't know if it's white because it didn't develop all the way. But yeah, that's what happens with super spider ball pythons. Yeah. So it's like, you're gonna cross the super form. Hell yeah, brother. Yeah. I don't know, dude, like I said before, I'm not gonna shit on people for if they want to breed it or not. I don't know why the fuck so many people unfollowed this dude. I think maybe just because he had an opinion, bro. Yeah. Yeah. He influenced the wrong way. It's the community. It's the community. You got to remember who's watching the type of video. Yeah, who's watching it? Describe them. A lot of pet keepers. Wow. Eric, where are you going to realize? Hey, it's the truth. I'm sorry. I'm not gonna be a light. Sometimes it's just soft people. Yes. Not everyone's soft. You got to be erect as fuck. But yeah, no, I agree 100%. I agree 100%. If like, let's say you'd post a lot of, let's say axolot of content. You post a lot of axolot of content. Chances are majority of your audience is gonna be kids. Not necessarily because axolot of kids are for kids, but kids like axolot of the Minecraft. Look, it's a circle. It's all connected. And so if you post something like that's gonna be more mature, then your audience is supposed to experience something like, let's say, I don't know, you comment about an adult topic, an adult topic, and then boom, you lose half your followers because these kids are like, what the fuck? Yeah. And it's like, yeah, that's gonna happen. Not that we can, we can tell those viewers are soft, but like, you know, they're not, they're definitely not erect. They're not spider ball python breeders. So it's like, yeah, no, or swine ball on supporters. Especially in the community now that everything so divided with pretty much every opinion. Yeah. It's not really surprising. It kind of sucks. That's how it is that people kind of just completely like, if someone believes a certain thing, it's like an automatic. Well, that's what this podcast is here for. Yeah. To bring people together. We did it. We did it. We did it for the videos. Yelly got each other every week on Wednesday. If you're listening to this, you're a reptile lover. All right. And what do we all need? We need supplies. So we got you covered. Head on over to imperial reptiles.com and use the code reptiles with to get a specific discount special to us and our listeners for your reptile supplies today. One more time, that's imperial reptiles.com. Use the code reptiles with. I'm not gonna be the person, like I said, to tell people what to read, what not to read. You sent us that Chris Leon video that pretty much he was saying that people, Eric, what is it that people don't care about certain animals anymore? Was that the whole situation? Essentially, people don't. Because something is so common. And this is a very interesting thing that I've noticed with just the reasons why people get certain animals. People don't tend to care about what's common. A lot of you like that. Damn. Well, I know somebody who if you tell him what I'm not going to say his name, but he may or may not be in this room, that if you tell him what you work with, he will judge you based on what you work with. Okay, there's two of them. There's two of them. Yeah, yeah, there's two of them. So it comes in here. Is that one one of them? I'm not going to say who it is. You guys, everybody listen to this podcast. Listen, they don't want they don't want my opinion on shit. They think that I suck because I breed ball pythons, but they still ask me Yoshi, what do I do? What am I supposed to do with this? Should I set it up like this for the record? I don't know. I breed ball pythons. I asked a group chat. Oh, and what did you guys end up doing? Tell me what you guys ended up doing. I don't know. Setting them up the way that I set them up. Yeah, everybody gave opinions. I do disagree. To be fair, I would still do it, but everybody was like, look, I'm not going to be the one to text us. I'm like, listen, hey, I'll choose the guy with the opinion. That whole situation. I just had something. Whatever. Listen, anyway. But I could be cool and breed ball pythons. You guys can go fuck yourselves with the I have cooler things. You have reach settles now. That's not it. That's my brothels are outside again. Allos on a hammock. There you go. I bought a fence. Nice for the turtles. But yeah, with the with the crystal only thing about like common reptiles, if they matter anymore. And like the first part of this video, he's talking about how cool these animals are. He's like, look, leprechakers are super cool. He's talking about their actual ecology. He's the only person that I've ever talked about. Good things about redewed sliders. And I'll for it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was like, it's, it's, they're, they're, and he said it too. He's like, they're common for a reason. They were popular for a reason because they were fantastic. They are fantastic animals. You know, there's nothing. And I'll admit, I am, I am the first person to be like, you have a leprechico? Wow. Nice. You know, oh, you breed leprechakers? Whack. Whack. Oh, you breed ball pythons. Whack. Fuck you. But frogs on my side. I had said like, so like, because I'm always an advocate, like, hey, if you go ahead and you research the animal that you want, you're passionate enough and you put enough money into it, you can keep whatever you really can. My first snake was not a corn snake or a ball python. It was a dildo. It was a blueberry rat snake, which is not what people recommend for beginners. But I was like, I did the research. I've worked with them before. I was like, I love this animal. I'm going to have them. And so like, that's mostly my mentality. It's everyone you said, one of the employees was like, well, I want a ball python. You're like, you know what, dude, you could try something else. You don't have to start with a ball python. Again, not that there's anything wrong with this guy breeds him, but it's just like a matter of, Hey, why not try something new? Why not do something new? And so throughout the video, I was thinking like, is then there an obligation to continue to produce these animals? Like, let's say for normal ball pythons or fissel cotytortices, you know, because good people be like, yeah, no, we should keep reading these so that they never go out of the hobby. Dude, it's weird because like, yes and no, with it, there's no such thing as an obligation, but there was a demand with certain animals, you should reach that demand, right? Ball pythons? Yes, you should reach the demand because at the end of the day, they do make great pets. Leopard geckos, same thing. People love leopard geckos. They're an easy gecko. You know, it's basic, but fucking socotytortices. There's a lot of them, and most of them go into the wrong hands. Of course, yeah. Those things get huge. If they don't die by the time they get that big, usually I would say the majority of them end up in a rescue. And it's so sad because they're in danger where they're from. Yeah. In Africa, they are protected. I'll tell you that something that got put into my head from the conversations with Chuck and you is that like, that's great that they're here. And it sucks that they're endangered over there, but we're never going to release them back over there because there's the bloodline here is probably not clean. You know, so then... Oh, there's no progress to go there. What is the point of that argument then? Oh, they're endangered there, but we got them. You know, that's the thing where I'm like, yeah, you know, back and forth with those kinds of comments. But I do like the sentiment that if they go extinct in the wild, they would not be extinct because we have them as pets, you know, but not everybody should have them. Yeah, I agree. I understand. But see, like, so I've had this conversation with you before. You don't think the ball python will ever go out of favor. It'll always be the number one pet snake, you know. It's funny because it wasn't always. It was corn snakes. Yeah. Corn snake was the number one pet snake. And then with leopard geckos, leopard geckos, yeah, they're the number one right now. But honestly, anyone who has a leopard geck, I'd be like, dude, you want a fat tail? You know, an African fat tail gecko? Dude, those are a little bit better. So, or even with bearded dragons, I'm like, dude, dude, do you want a yourelmastics? I'll do you want a blue tongue skink. You know, it's like these animals can be replaced. Yes. And does that mean that they will face out of the hobby? Okay, so the thing is, yeah, corn snakes were first, right? But the reptile community wasn't one of it was what it was today that corn snakes were like the thing and like everybody's dad had a corn snake, kind of thing, then ball pythons came and that's the every man snake. Everybody can have a fucking ball python easy to care for. They don't get that big, solid temperament, and variety of colors. Just by those standards, no other snake can legitimately beat it. You know, now with the leopard geckos, honestly, I don't think that's the best pet gecko. Get a fucking crescent gecko or a crescent. Yeah, if you want something terrestrial, then I'd say fat toes are cool. But yeah, if you just want get going general, crescent geckos are the way to go. What was the only thing you said? Oh, bearded dragons. That one's tough. I'm on this. You know, me. I'm on this kick. Blue tongues are a better pet, but they're a lot more active bearded dragons. Kind of like, yeah, yeah, maybe blue tongues aren't nice. They are they are they are. Yeah, they have they have a spunk. But dude, like by the time that a baby blue tongue comes into like front of shop, like it's fine. Yeah, you know, because you're talking about is mean when it's out of the fucking womb, this big, the size of your palm, you feed it, you clean it three times, you know, and you're handling it during those times. It tames out like that. Yeah. The imports are different. Yeah, of course. Yeah. And that's like Captain bread. That's like the only thing that the ball python really, really has the strongest holdover. I guess they have morphs, but there are other snakes with morphs, you know, but it's like it's the strongest hold is that a baby ball python is just like so tolerant. They take so much. Yes. You know, and it's like a baby corn snake will not take your shit. A baby hognose will not take your shit. What was the name of the, a baby sample will not take your shit. What was the name of the little girl from Finding Nemo that would poke the glass? Darla Darla. Yeah. Darla. Ball pythons are Darla's name. Like that's the thing that could take everything. Yeah. That's the Darla's name. They are. Hell yeah, dude. Yeah. They just take it. You know, it's sad. It's sad. But like that's what makes them number one. It is. That's what makes them number one. Anyone can have a ball python. Yeah. Did you take anything from that video where you were like, Oh, this is like solid. There was anything that you disagreed with that he said? Um, I don't think so. I know actually, no, the only thing is that the obligation to continue to breed them. You know, it's like, will ready sliders always be the number one pet turtle will so called us always be the number one pet. I kind of, what did you take off of the ready or comments, Eric? I know that that you said that you liked it in terms of what like you said you liked it. What did you like about it? About what he said about it? Yeah, that the wonder still there. Like what I was going to say earlier was about how people tend to view certain animals. Like they'll only it's a, it's kind of like a status thing. Like people will only go after a certain animal because, Oh, it's endangered. So that that means it's more. Oh, he did. I'll be cooler if it's in danger to whatever. Um, but it's like whatever we have here just because it's common doesn't mean it's worthless. You know, because honestly, like if you put in perspective on paper, our red is a really cool turtle. Yeah. You know, it's got beautiful colors. The turtles that we have here in the States don't look like anything else. You know, sliders and cuters, we see them all the time. They're 25 bucks, but it's a different animal than what a lot of people are seeing across the world. Yeah. You know, and just because they're everywhere, people kind of, I understand the stale feeling people get from it. Yeah. But we should out of respect for the animal itself. Like we should still, this is it's objectively a good animal. I'm just because it's every reason. It's worthless. Right. I wouldn't say that it's worthless, but I would say that that's fair. I have very similar feelings about so katas that I do read your sliders. Because that's not everybody's fucking turtle, man. Those things, if they make it into adulthood, there are new shit because nobody wants to put a pond outside. We're talking about two aspects, really. It's like the mindset towards these animals is like, no, these animals are cool. So katas are awesome. Leprechas are awesome. Reddy or sliders are awesome. Yeah. And then the the ideal pet for the people that are getting into this and starting this. It's like, no, no, they're not. A lot of the times are not. I agree. You know, and this just reminds me of a YouTube video that we're planning that we're thinking about doing. They're passionate taste us. No, that's common. And all that if you're if you're only listening to this, subscribe to the fucking YouTube channel because we're gonna be doing videos on there, other than podcasts, we're gonna have videos on Fridays, but that like what animals would we recommend over the popular version of it? We're not gonna go into it because I want it to be in the video. But yeah, red ears, I feel that if you're gonna have a mess pets, you should get the mutations because if you have any ounce of you want to throw that thing outside, it may not survive. And therefore it will not harm the ecosystem because the mutations that people are throwing it outside so that it doesn't die with them. They're not like go die outside. Yeah, but sometimes they are because some pet people are going to get the notion that it's okay to throw out your pet, which is at least that if you're gonna throw out the pet, like don't throw out the one that's going to destroy your ecosystem. Yeah, you know, if you actually reminded me with your comment about a point that I had thought about in the video and it's like, because I sometimes I don't have the mentality of judging someone for like, sir, sometimes I do. I sometimes I am checking. But like an instance where someone is like, oh, I go ahead and breed leopard geckos, you know, and it's like, or ball pythons is another example. I'm like, you know how many people do what you do? It's enough to sustain the whole hobby. You don't need to do this. There's no need for you. You're not gonna make it unless you do something insane. But it's like, if you do something different, if you work with a different animal, for instance, people who breed. You just shadow my whole business. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm kidding. Who breed like veiled chameleons. And it's like, dude, if you got a hold of carpet chameleons, or if you got a hold of panther chameleons, I started breeding them readily, we wouldn't have to be importing them anymore. People would have them any like up the ass. Yeah, but you're talking about animals that are significantly more difficult to breed to somebody that's successfully breeding a specific species. And it is viable that it gives a business and it helps feed their family. I could care less about how you make a living. I really could, because people do unethical things to make a living and doesn't justify the life. Would it be great if you had one less cage of it to try to fill the niche for something else? I think that that is important. I guess. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. If you're like, if you're doing, for instance, if you're doing Frick, let's say you're a mastic. Let's say you're a brea- Say fuck. Fuck. Thank you. Let's say you're a brea- You're a mastic. Yeah. And you're breeding, I don't know, or nates. A lot of people are breeding or nates, you know, probably not enough to supply the demand. But like, if you were breeding something like a Yemenensis or a Thomasi or the Nigerian, so they don't have to be as important as much. Like it's like, you're doing something that is, and in my head is literally the opposite of the Christian, the only way is like, that's more meaningful. You're doing something that's actually might actually be important and might actually matter. But if you're just breeding radio sliders in your backyard, you're not doing shit. You're not, you're not, you're not, you could be doing more. You could be doing something that actually makes a difference and matters. But it does matter. And it does, if you're, if that you're that specific person. Yeah. I mean, it's always subjective, isn't it? Yeah. So like, let's say, let's say, I forget Brian Marklek's company's name. BHP or up there. Bxme. Okay. So let's say he just decided to stop breeding ball pythons. That would have an impact. That's a huge impact. Cause he's like, that's like the number one, or Canova. It's like, that's one of the number one ball python people, you know, but like, someone who's like breeding ball pythons, cause they just want to, it's like, it's almost the way. It's almost the way to the next step. I'll tell you what you think about it. If you were breeding diamond carpets, right? Oh my god. Of the ball pythons. No, dude, you probably, we might make more money depending maybe. No. And then significantly harder to breed the more space. We keep diamond carpets in the hobby. My thoughts should not be in racks. You don't have to do them racks. Yeah, but the ball pythons rack. All right. This is the thing. So I'm going to give you my point of view on that since you've shadowed over my business. No, no, no, no, no, blue things are cool. Yeah. No, no, okay. So if I'm being honest with you, I've actually, I actually have a similar mindset, which is why I am phasing out like 90% of my, of the animals of the ball pythons that aren't like investment grade like, okay, I'm doing this because it's like business move, like no more pet grade stuff, except for the blue and Lucy's because that feeds the, the, you know, so the majority of my animals will not be average pet grade animals. So I can see where you're coming from, because in that instance, I think your argument is not, I know I was making the joke you're sharing on my company, but your argument is not for me. Your argument is for buddy that buys a fucking pastel, a Mojave and a spider ball python. They're just like, I'm going to breed these fucking snakes. Yeah. You know, like it's, it's that guy that you're like, you're like, why are you with turtles? You, you're breeding muds and you bred diamond backs and you want to try the reeds. It's like, yeah, these are, these are turtles that make better pets. They do better. You know, if you were breeding right inside of his bike, damn, you know, she fucking wasting your potential. I am, I am though. I have read the more spider, the more spider, nobody give me a saying I get a saying. The more part of it or what? No, just a go. Yeah, no, I, yeah, I'm in love with some radio marks. You know, that that's my problem. But even then, dude, like that, that used to be the radio marks almost was like the mindset of like the Al Dabra and the Galapagos Tordis. That's the, those are your retirement projects. It's not like that anymore because China was like, we have too many turtles. You can't do this. So you're talking about like an albino pink belly went from $800 to $200 in a year. It was crazy. Yeah, man. I think that's the podcast, bro. That is the podcast. Yeah, that was it. Well, pretty cool shit. But but but but the old shit or the the common shit that come still cool. It's still cool. He likes ball by thoughts. .