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Jonathan's Jungle News!
Last updated 1st May 2013
News and important events in the lives of the
animals of Jonathan's Jungle Roadshow are reported
and updated here from time to time - feel free to
check back in the future to see what is happening in
Jonathan's animal collection! For more
information about any of the animals featured here,
follow the links to each animal's page by clicking
the
blue highlighted words
in the relevant text or where highlighted to do so.
**N.B. Older
news stories (and their page links) may refer to
animals which I no longer have in my collection so
please check the
Meet the Animals
page for correct & up-to-date information about the
animals in my current collection!
1st May
2013
COMPETITION TIME!!
From today
I am looking for
a name for my beautiful male
rhinoceros
rat snake (bel0w). The person or
organisation who suggests the chosen name will win a
half price visit from some of the animals & I to a
venue or event of their choice!
Full competition details,
information on how to enter and lots of information
about the species to inspire your suggestions can be
found on the rhinoceros rat snake page by clicking
here. I
will look forward to receiving your ideas!
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I am delighted to report
some new babies since my last update last week.
On Monday 29th April I found 40+ tiny
dead leaf
praying mantis nymphs (Deroplatys dessicata)
which is particularly exciting as this was my first
ever attempt to breed them!
There are few
things cuter than a baby praying mantis as you will
see here:
It is hard to be absolutely
sure exactly how many nymphs (babies) there are
because they do not stay still long enough to count,
but certainly 40+ have hatched! Here are just a few
of them on the mesh screen lid of their enclosure:
As they
will not stay still it is quite a challenge to
photograph even a single nymph, let alone a small
group together, so I was particularly pleased to get
the photos below of a group of five on my hand!
I will certainly look
forward to seeing how these grow and change in the
coming months and will report their progress here.
For more information about the species please click
here.
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24th
April 2013
Today marks the second
birthday of the rather gorgeous Tiny, my
ironically-named female
New
Caledonian giant gecko!
Tiny now weighs in at just
over 180g, making her anything but tiny in gecko
terms! The next heaviest gecko here in my
collection of 35+ individuals is a large adult male
leopard gecko weighing in at around 80g, so Tiny is
already 100g heavier than this one and she is still
growing!
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15th
April 2013 Today
marks the first anniversary of the day I received 74
tiny baby
Antilles pink toed tarantula babies from Bristol
Zoo! They are looking fabulous as you can see
below.
For anyone
not familiar with the story of how and why 74 of
these beautiful spiders came to be with me please
click here
for LOTS more information and pictures!
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29th
March 2013
Plenty of news to report
since my last update! First of all I had a
crazily busy National Science & Engineering Week,
visiting seven schools in six counties over six
days, so a big thank you to everyone involved in all
of these visits. The first animal news is of a
couple of newly hatched
crested geckos,
one which hatched on March 26th and one today!
The pictures above are of
the baby which hatched on March 26th and the ones
below are the one which hatched just this morning,
March 29th.
As always the babies are
extremely beautiful and very strong and healthy too.
These are nos. 2 & 3 for 2013 and I envisage many
more where these came from!
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The incredible insect
pictured below is an newly-matured female
jungle nymph,
possibly still my absolute favourite insect in my
entire collection! The significance of this
individual though is that she is the very first
yellow individual I have reared from hatching and I
am absolutely delighted with her!
Female jungle nymphs are
usually bright lime green and, whilst I have kept
yellow ones before, I have never personally hatched
out an individual here which turned out yellow on
maturing so I am incredibly pleased with this one!
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The final piece of news is
also about a significant insect moult, this time an
adult female
Malaysian leaf katydid Ancylecha fenestrata.
I bought this female as part of a large nymph pair
back in February (as reported below on the 20th
February) and it is truly remarkable just how much
she has changed in such a short time and also how
incredibly beautiful she has turned out! I
hope you agree.
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5th
March 2013
I have a couple of great things
to report which have happened since my last update!
Firstly, and most importantly of all, I have
acquired a pair of new snakes which I could not be
more excited about! These amazing creatures
are juvenile
rhinoceros rat snakes which in the wild are
found in subtropical rainforests from northern
Vietnam to southern China.
This species has been at
the top of my animal wish list for some
time so it is very exciting indeed to have acquired
them, I collected them just a week ago on February 26th. They are unrelated and were
captive bred in two different European countries but
were being sold by a UK breeder who had bought them
for himself but then had a change of mind, I was
more than happy to be in the right place at the
right time to have them from him!
For LOTS more information
about these beautiful animals, including information
about the amazing colour transformation they will go
through as the months go on, please click
here.
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As well as acquiring these
stunning snakes I have also had my first baby
crested gecko for
2013 hatch, this little beauty popped out of its egg
on February 24th!
Here is
how s/he looks today, just over a week later.
It is certainly one very beautiful baby!
I definitely envisage this
being just the first of many gecko babies for 2013
with plenty more crested geckos as well as gargoyle
geckos and leopard geckos expected too, much the
same as in 2012 in fact! Watch this space...
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I have this week taken new
photos of some of the crested geckos which I kept
for myself out of my own babies hatched in 2012 -
all of them are looking fantastic as you will see
below, as well as being much bigger than they were
in April last year when they hatched. In fact
these are now almost at a size where I will start to
include them in my JJR visits so watch this space!
This first one (above and
below) is a female dalmatian whom I have named
Cluster due to the enormous cluster of spots on her
back and left hand side!
Amazingly this next one is
Cluster's sister (and clutch mate) and she has been
named Sunset by my children because of her beautiful
red and orange colouration - believe it or not she
actually looks better in the flesh than in these
pictures!
This final one is a male
and is as yet unnamed - he is another dalmatian and
very attractive indeed!
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As well as the crested
geckos I have also recently taken some updated
photos of my juvenile
New
Caledonian giant gecko (also as yet unnamed) who
is now approximately ten months old and weighing in
at 45g+! S/he is looking very gorgeous as I'm
sure you will agree.
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20th
February 2013 Since
my last update I have acquired a few new
invertebrates for my collection, most of which are
simply additions or 'new blood' to existing breeding
groups along with one which is a species new to my
collection.
First up is a new group of
Malaysian leaf
katydid nymphs (Ancylecha fenestrata),
undoubtedly one of my very favourite insect species
in my entire collection.
These beautiful creatures
are a fabulous mix of greens and browns as juveniles
and have thorny leg spines which are very
impressive! For more pictures and information
please click
here.
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Next up are a
juvenile pair of a new stick insect species for me
known by their scientific name of
Haaniella echinata. This species
originates from Sabah on the island of Borneo.
In both pictures the female is the larger, somewhat
chunkier individual.
For more
information and pictures of the other Haaniella
species I have in my collection please click
here.
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Next up is
another beautiful female
Australian king
mantis (Hierodula majuscula) - one of my
favourite mantis species.
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I also added some more
Tirachoidea jianfenglingensis nymphs to my
collection - these are the largest stick insects I
keep in my collection at the moment and are hugely
popular with everyone they meet! These ones
are only around 15cm long but they get MUCH larger,
check out their page
here
to see just how large!
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6th
February
2013 I
have today taken a few updated photographs of some
of my beautiful baby
leopard geckos which hatched in the second half
of 2012. These are five of the individuals
which I have decided to keep for myself because they
are all absolutely gorgeous!
This is the very species which got me started
keeping reptiles 30+yrs ago, I still think they're
absolutely fabulous today and I'm sure it's not hard
to see why!!
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20th
January 2013
Since my last update I've
done a complete audit of all my
Phasmida (stick & leaf insects) and among the many
species I keep here I was delighted to find that I
currently have 30+
jungle nymphs
(Heteropteryx dilatata) in my collection,
here are just a few of them!
All of the 30+ individuals have been hatched here
and I currently have at least one individual
at every life stage (instar) of both genders!
This is very cool because as some of you will know
jungle nymphs are my favourite Phasmid species by
far, they are also a species I love to use in
schools to talk about both life cycles and also how
animals are suited/adapted to their particular
habitat. The pictures above are of a few of
the females, here are some of the males:
Although the male nymphs
never turn the vibrant lime green colour of females
in later life
I
still think that they are absolutely beautiful with
their mix of browns, creams, peaches and white. Here
are two males to prove my point!
For more information about this fantastic species
and for lots more pictures please click
here!
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6th
January 2013
First of all I would like
to wish everyone involved in education a very happy
start to the new school term, I trust that you are
all well rested after the Christmas & New Year break
and raring to go! I will very much hope to see
many of you during 2013 and would recommend getting
in touch as soon as you can if you are looking to
book a visit as I am now taking bookings right up to
(and beyond) the end of the academic year.
Dates in some periods of 2013 are already quite
limited so please book early to avoid
disappointment!
Secondly I am delighted to
be able to announce the winner of my competition to
find a suitable name for this stunning female
gargoyle
gecko who had her first birthday on New Year's
Eve.
She will henceforth be
known as Ember,
a fantastic name reflecting her beautiful orange and
red markings. This name was suggested by
several people before the competition deadline but
the first person to suggest it, and the winner of a
half price visit from the animals & I to a venue /
event of her choice, is Mrs Julia Newstead from
Chipping Campden in North Gloucestershire.
Congratulations to Julia!
Thank you to absolutely
EVERYONE who got involved and suggested names, I was
overwhelmed by the response both via email and also
via my Facebook and twitter pages! I will plan
to run another competition in the coming
weeks/months so watch this space...
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If you would like to check back on any 'old'
news please use the links below!
News
November - December 2012
News
September - October 2012
News
July - August 2012
News May
- June 2012
News
March - April 2012
News
January - February 2012
News from 2011
News from 2010
News from 2009
News from 2008
News from 2007
Adults, you can also keep up-to-date with
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