I guess it had to come... So far it's been fairly standard fare, but Zac now, in the lead up to his 12th birthday, has his first REAL African pet - "Ronaldo the 2nd" a scorpion.
The initial problem was, what do you feed pet scorpions? The internet is helpful of course, telling us that the cricket (not the sport) is one of its favourites. None around lately, so we popped some live flies in... seemingly not interested.
What to do?
That's when I discovered something troubling about my son - he's a specist (a naturalist version of racist)! You see, I suggested a baby gecko might do the trick (tons around here). I even captured one to feed our illustrious friend, but it wasn't seconds before I heard an ear-piercing "NO!!!!" and was literally wrestled to the ground with the miniature lizzard being loosed back into the wild, a visible light film of sweat on its brow.
I asked Zac, how it would have been if the roles had been reversed, a juicy scorpion being fed to a large gecko? "No problem", he said. On being asked why, he explained that geckos are cute. (is that why I've lasted so long?)
So for the time being, in our house at least, being cute is a life-saver...
Not very Canadian, if you ask me, but there again, the Aussie side of us kicks in with "If I like you I'll keep ya', otherwise I'll just ignore you or feed you to my pets!"
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