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Jonathan's Jungle
News from
September
and October 2011
25th
October 2011 My
many many
horsehead grasshopper nymphs are all doing
really well! The first of these hatched in
late August but more have hatched in recent days so
that I now have individuals at all three of the
first stages of the life cycle. The life
stages of grasshoppers (and also many other insects
such as praying mantises, stick insects and
cockroaches) are known as instars.
Newly hatched individuals are known as first instar
nymphs, those who have moulted once are second
instar and so on.
Pictured above are first
and second instar nymphs (with the first instar on
the right) and below is a picture of first, second
and third instar nymphs, clearly showing the
significant increase in size at each stage!
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As well as the Peruvian
horsehead grasshoppers my
giant Florida katydid nymphs are doing really
well too, and have grown surprisingly quickly!
 
All of my nymphs of this
species are at the same life stage so I cannot show
a size comparison as with the horsehead
grasshoppers, but if you compare the pictures above
to those taken when they were newly hatched (as
reported as part of the news update dated 22nd
September 2011) you will see just how much they
have changed in terms of both colour and size!!
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As well as the grasshoppers
and katydids growing well I am pleased to report
that two of my three new baby
Antilles pink toe tarantulas have moulted
successfully since my last update! I am
expecting the third one to follow these very soon,
but for the time being look at how beautiful these
little spiders are soon after moulting!
I still don't think there
is a prettier spider in the world! For anyone
unfamiliar with this species or if this is your
first visit to the website please click
here to learn much
more about how these amazing blue spiders will
change colour during their development, it really is
astonishing and I am so looking forward to reporting
their future moults and colour changes here for you!
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6th
October 2011
I am delighted to say that
I have acquired some amazing new animals since my
update last week, the most exciting of which is an
absolutely beautiful new snake. This one is
particularly special as it is an individual of a
highly endangered species from Madagascar known as
Dumeril's boa or
the Madagascan ground boa.
In the wild this wonderful
species is tragically threatened with extinction,
due mainly to the large-scale destruction of its
habitat on Madagascar in order to create
agricultural land or areas for livestock grazing.
Sadly these snakes are also sometimes killed for
their beautiful skins and some are even eaten by
local people, whilst others are killed because
ignorance leads people to believe they are dangerous
even though they are not.
Thankfully they are bred in
good numbers in captivity and what makes this
individual even more special to me is that it has
been donated to me for use in my educational talks
by the Cotswold Wildlife Park in Burford. This
is a fantastic wildlife park and one which my family
& I visit regularly and which I started visiting
myself with my own parents at a very young age!
It is also a place with which I have had links for
many years through my interest in reptiles in
particular. In fact I did my secondary school
work experience in the very same reptile house where
this snake was born in July 2010 but that was way
back in 1989, 22 years ago as I type this!
For more information about
this beautiful animal and its conservation status
please click here.
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As well as this amazing
snake I have also acquired many new invertebrates
following my sixth consecutive visit to the Amateur
Entomological Society's annual trade fair at Kempton
Park racecourse, a highlight of any invertebrate
keeper's calendar! First up are these simply
remarkable blue rainbow
katydids from Ecuador, bred by a friend of mine
based in Somerset!
I think that all insects
are amazing in their own way but these are just
absolutely sensational, the colours are just
amazing. For more information and pictures
click on the blue species name in the text above!
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I also bought a beautiful
subadult female
giant leaf insect, surely one of the most
incredible insects on the planet! If there is
a creature with better leaf-based camouflage then I
certainly haven't seen it yet!
Whilst not a brand new
species to my collection this is the first one I
have had in some time and I am delighted to have
her! This one was bred by a friend in
Herefordshire who has had great success for many
years in rearing this tricky species.
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Next up is a fantastic new
spider, specifically a female
Mexican red rump tarantula!
This is one of my favourite
species of tarantula because of their beautiful
black velvety legs (they are sometimes known as the
Mexican black velvet tarantula for this very reason)
but also because of the fantastic bright red hairs
on the abdomen (rump!) which you can see below:
Once again
for more information and pictures click on the blue
highlighted text above!
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As well as this larger
tarantula I bought three new babies of the
Antilles pink toe tarantula,
which must surely be the cutest baby spiders on
earth!
Regular
visitors to the website will be familiar with the
story of Smartie, my first
ever Antilles pink toe tarantula. I bought him
a year ago, from the same breeder at the same event
as these came from in fact, and absolutely loved
watching him grow from a tiny blue baby to a
beautiful blue/green/red/purple/pink adult!
His development was recorded on these very pages and
it was tragic that after moulting for the final time
to maturity he showed himself to be male and not
female as I had always hoped. This meant that
his adult lifespan would be approximately 4 months
rather than the 10 years of a female! He is
still with us but sadly won't be for too much
longer. I am therefore looking forward to
watching these beautiful little fluffy blue babies
grow and develop and once again will be recording
their progress here, so watch this space!
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As well as all the new
animal arrivals this last week has seen another
significant event in the life of one of my other
tarantulas. On August 9th 2011 I wrote here
about how I had bought a baby Brazilian black
tarantula for the first time, and I am delighted to
say that it has moulted successfully in recent days!
Here is the scene which greeted me just before going
to bed a couple of nights ago:
As you
can see I caught the tarantula just at the end of
the moulting process whilst it was lying on its back
resting. At this stage the body is very soft
and vulnerable to damage so it must not be touched
or disturbed any more than is necessary at this
time. Within a couple of hours s/he had turned
over and was stood in a resting position which just
happened to be over the top of the old exoskeleton
(exuvia):
At about
36 hours post-moult the body colour had darkened up
quite significantly:
The moulted exoskeletons
(exuviae) of tarantulas continue to amaze me no
matter how many times I see them! Here is the
one moulted on this occasion, looking just like the
real thing!
Finally
here is the real tarantula on my hand about 48hrs
after moulting.
Whilst
it is already very attractive it will continue to
get more and more black and more and more velvety as
time goes on. With this in mind I have been
asking people for name suggestions for it, ideally
something to do with the colour (i.e. black) or the
fact that it is a Brazilian spider. Any
suggestions would be gratefully received!
Watch this space for further developments...
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The
New
Caledonian giant gecko which I bought back as a
tiny baby back in early May 2011 now has his (or
her) own page! I am still trying to think of a
name for him/her as well, any suggestions would be
most welcome. As you can see from these
pictures this is one beautiful gecko with very baggy
skin, a pale green base colour and even paler pink
blushing!
When I
bought this gecko back in May it weighed less than
6g and despite now weighing in at 35g s/he still has
lots more growing to do as it could one day reach
closer to 250g!
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28th
September 2011
At the weekend I completed
my 300th
birthday party visit since starting Jonathan's
Jungle Roadshow!! The birthday boy at this
party was James (5), pictured below with myself and
Rafiki the royal python, his parents Paul and Polly
and one of James' own snakes (made of plastic)!
Thanks to the Pitman family for their hospitality on
the day!
I do birthday parties for
boys and girls aged 4 and upwards as well as for
adults of all ages! Please check out the party
pages of this website for more information by
clicking here
or here!
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22nd
September 2011
I have now been involved in
my first two 'Deadly Days Out' and they were
absolutely AMAZING! It is such a privilege to
be involved in such huge events and to be a part of
the lovely BBC team, spending all day talking to
people about my animals which of course is what I
love to do! I have also had the chance to meet
and talk to Steve Backshall and Naomi Wilkinson from
BBC's 'Live 'n' Deadly' as well as many other
fabulous people including Shaun Foggett aka TV's
'Croc Man'! Here I am below with Steve (left)
and Shaun (right) at the Swindon event on Sunday
18th September, a superb day in my hometown!
As you can see Steve is holding
Mei-Ling my beautiful mandarin rat snake, whom
he seemed to love as much as I do!!  
During the events my role
along with the rest of the roaming animal team
(Pete, Jess and Jim) is to entertain and educate the
crowds with our animals. When you consider
that these events can involve up to 10,000 members
of the public there are certainly lots of people to
get around! Here I am presenting some of my
invertebrate friends at one of the events!
 
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In the
past few days I have had lots more new babies hatch!
As well as another 35+ baby horsehead
grasshopper nymphs (see news story dated 27th August
below) I've also had my first ever baby
giant Florida katydids! I am amazed both
at how small and utterly gorgeous they are!
They
look so different from their parents when
newly-hatched so I will very much look forward to
seeing how these tiny nymphs grow and change in the
coming weeks, watch this space!!
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6th
September 2011
The beautiful Smartie, my
Antilles pink toe tarantula,
has recently moulted again and is now
looking even more amazing than ever as you can see
below.
As
regular visitors to this page will know I would
usually be delighted about Smartie having a
successful moult (this being the seventh in 11
months) but it is sadly not the same this time.
It is almost impossible to tell whether a tarantula
is male or female until their final moult to
maturity but now that Smartie is mature I know that
he is definitely a male, not a female as I had
always hoped. This is very sad because once
they have reached maturity the males of this species
do not live more than about 3-4 months, whereas a
female might live for more than ten years.
This means that he will not be around much longer at
all and having grown very attached to him and his
beauty this is very sad news indeed, particularly as
I have watched him grow from a tiny baby to an
amazing adult.
It
really is incredible to think that this beautiful
spider was just blue in colour all over and had a
leg span of less than 2cm when I bought him back in
early October 2010! Just 11 months on, and
using my watch as a reference point, you can clearly
see how his size and colouration have both changed
dramatically now that he is fully grown.
For lots more pictures and
information about this stunning spider please click
here. I will hope to
purchase at least one more individual of this
species either before or after Smartie's death as he
has consistently been the animal in my collection
which I receive the most comments about, both from
people I meet and also via my Facebook page where I
regularly add pictures of him and many of my other
animals. Even many people who are fearful of
spiders have talked or written to me about how they
can appreciate his beauty, something I have really
enjoyed.
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As well as Smartie
moulting, one of my juvenile
imperial scorpions has also moulted in the last
couple of weeks. Here is the empty exuvia left
behind following the moult!
The scorpion this exuvia
belongs to is named Stingo and he is very popular
indeed with everyone he meets because he is
different from all my other scorpions. You can
see in the picture above that the exuvia does not
have a sting. This is because when Stingo
moulted for the very first time as a tiny baby
(having been born in my house in March 2010) his
sting (or telson) broke off inside the exuvia.
This was the first and only time this has ever
happened to a scorpion in my collection and I was
really surprised to find that it had happened at
all. I decided to keep the baby along with a
few others and decided there and then to ironically
name him Stingo!
The picture above is of
Stingo soon after moulting, a time when the
exoskeleton is quite soft and looking quite pale
compared to his normal dark colouration which you
can see below:
Not having a sting hasn't
affected Stingo in any way at all, as imperial
scorpions have very powerful claws which they use to
catch and kill their food rather than using their
sting as some less powerfully-clawed scorpion
species would. He is in great condition and
very docile, as this species usually is, so children
can enjoy getting up close and personal with him
with confidence due to his lack of venom!
One of Stingo's siblings
(who is as yet unnamed) is pictured below, the only
difference between them being the presence of a
sting on this individual. Despite being
venomous the venom of this species is not dissimilar
to a bee sting and they are reluctant to sting
anyway unless they feel threatened in some way.
Despite this I still don't let children, or indeed
anyone else, handle any of my venomous animals but I
am happy to do so myself!
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