Having written about Beauty when she passed I realized that I will treasure those words forever. This is my first blog, and I am beginning to see why some people consider it a kind of journal. So what I would like to do is make a short series of blogs dedicated to remembering certain special animals that have come and gone at the Wildhouse rescue. Some passed away, others went on to families or back to the wild. I do not think I shall expound on the manner in which they went unless it is something special or memorable, but will tell you instead about how special each was.
Beast was Beauty’s cage mate. He came with her when we received them from the Case family in Rigby, ID. Being a male red-tailed boa, he wasn’t as big as she was; only about 6′ long, but he had way more attitude. He loved to eat, and in one instance that included trying to eat my hand. It was partially my fault. I’d just been playing with the ferrets and Jessica suggested we get out the snakes next. I reached in and CHOMP, he got me. It didn’t last long, but he tried to pull me in and I tried to pull away, and if you don’t know, snake’s teeth are thin, sharp and curved and there are a LOT of them. So after just a second Beast realized I was too big for a meal and let go, but the damage was done. It felt and looked like I swung my hand into a rose bush. Jessica, ever sympathetic, was more interested in me describing what it was like than worried about my hand. The little tooth holes themselves didn’t hurt much, but was did was the huge bruise that formed in the middle of them. Apparently the two of us pulled so hard it caused my skin to stretch too far. Needless to say, I was too careful from then on to get bit again.
Beast didn’t do a lot of shows, for obvious reasons, but he was still a great addition to the “in house” exhibits, as he loved to climb and move around. For a short time he got to have another roommate, Gaston, who came to us from the Idaho Falls animal shelter. They’d confiscated him, but lacked the equipment to care for such a large reptile. For the time that we had all three adult red-tails, it was a spectacular sight to behold.
