Pets

We've acquired a few new pets recently.  There may be nothing Caleb likes more than catching things in a dip net.  Something I can point out to him when he bemoans living in a place where it never snows - at least we have easy access to seagrass.

He caught 2 hermit crabs recently and brought them home.  Since we weren't expecting them, we weren't prepared for them and they died overnight.  Then he caught 5 more and we set up the 10 gallon tank.  They are very interesting little creatures.  Some of them like to try on all the empty shells and (despite the name) they seem to enjoy the company of the other crabs.  He also put some shrimp and a little fish in the same tank.  Although hermit crabs eat shrimp, they must like very tiny shrimp because they are leaving his (1 inch) shrimp alone.  They do seem to like pellet food and evidently can eat lots of other things for snacks.

Another creature he caught in the dip net is this sea horse:

Try as we might, it is impossible to take a good picture of it!

Actually, he caught 2 - one is a baby.  They are Pygmy seahorses - the larger one is about 1 inch tall.  They are cool to talk about, but hard to find in their tank and move very little.  They also are going to be complicated to feed - either we will have to find smaller creatures for them to eat, or grow colonies of rotifers or brine shrimp.  I'm thinking this is as bad as being a cricket farmer when you have a pet frog.  Maybe worse.  Maybe a whole lot worse.  Definitely a lot more expensive!

So in short, I am trying to talk him into releasing the cute little seahorses, but the hermit crabs can stay for a while. 

One creature we did not keep - except to get a good look at - was this dragonfly:

For some reason, when Joaquin was east of us we got swarms and swarms of dragonflies (maybe for an unrelated reason, but hurricanes make good scapegoats).  The bigger kids succeeded in each catching one and then we let them go.  Afterall - they eat mosquitoes and nothing is quite as cool as that!

We also have a Cherry Barb - a little red fish - that Caleb bought at the pet store and a very small ciclid that he caught dip netting in a canal.

Mako is hanging in there.  He refused food for about 2 days (or threw up any time he ate), but that passed and he seems to have regained his appetite.  He is up to 35 units of insulin, which is almost a a full mL.  He still doesn't mind the shots and C & A both regularly help with his injection.  I always hold on to Mako and the syringe when they help, but I let them push the plunger.  He doesn't seem bothered by this at all.

And outside we have 4 small monarch caterpillars munching away and we found a small snake in the backyard!