In the many months of looking at Pet-tubes in our spare time leading to the opportunistic adoption of Son’s Bearded Dragon Giffin from the SPCA, we discovered the trippy and somewhat bizarre world of the Exotic Pet-tuber.
There’s Guy With A Gadzillion Tarantulas in tupperware whose multi-million-views channel appears to be lots of footage of talking tweezers feeding hairy legged creatures and changing their water. The things often have very different ways of webbing up their lairs and digging tunnels. (Welcome To Aileen’s World Of Useless Knowledge. I Type Stuff No One Cares About Just For You!) For real though, this one’s a thank you to the random kids who’ve been teaching my kids cool stuff (from making sushi out of the paper cones in the water dispenser to various native language (clean! 😀 ) phrases to the safe Ryze tricks and everything in between), legit. And as for Spiderman (sorry) he then had his channel taken down for awhile, something about not having enough warnings in case little kids stumble upon his millions-of-views footage of Spiders Attacking Tweezers, for the moment though it’s back up now.
Alex Green of Goherping however is probably our favourite. I picked the clip below because he unboxes axolotls in heavily leaking, filthy bags, packed in standard cardboard. And they don’t die. Also, the whole Mailing Animals Around The Country totally amazed me (now I know why Flat Stanley tried to travel the world in an envelope!) because I mail stuff all the time and standing in line at the post office it just cracks me up imagining a conversation with the good people of HongKong Post that involves putting a freaking snake in their delivery system using their standard cardboard boxes 😀
He discloses what he receives, including the handful of “dead on arrivals” (I’m including the ones he buys off Craigslist; for the ones in the mail it’s mostly when the sender doesn’t check the weather report before putting the animal in the mail and it’s too cold, there was a python who arrived loopy because the heat pack that should be taped securely to the top of the box fell on it), or animals with conditions so inaccurately described they’re in too bad shape to be saved and die shortly after arrival (in which case the sender is obviously not supposed to ship the animal.) Yes it’s heart breaking when he loses animals. He addresses that too.
The comment section also opens up a whole new world of understanding – there’s people saying “Oh, I’m so glad to see that (the animal they sent) arrived alright,” or “I was so worried you were going to ream me out on Youtube for not packing it properly,” and then others will reply the comments saying kind things like, “He was obviously well loved and cared for, you must have been so sad to have to give him up…”
Alex started doing animal videos when he was a little kid, also a nature blog that he says when he was 12 he dreamed of one day taking on National Geographic with, then built a reptile business with a partner (when he was 17), driving around the country picking animals up, using his parents’ car in the beginning before he could afford his own electric car, then had the “usual-ish” business partner issues whereupon they split the company assets including the website and name, once got stranded in the middle of nowhere in the cold and dark and kept a lizard alive by putting it in his coat (and then deciding to keep it)…. He’s very open about how much he makes from selling the animals documented on his videos. Like this one.
(Don’t scoff. Sir Richard Branson’s first business was selling Budgies. The hot hub’s was wild-caught fish in the river behind his house and ice lollies. Mine was silkscreened stationery supplies to establish an Interact Club in secondary school.) This more recent one below then goes back to ages 10 to 13, and then all the way up to 19 (he’s now 20), detailing when he first tried various ways of making money. This includes attempts with crypto. And Minecraft Servers. And halfway through the video he starts talking about buying stuff from China and drop-shipping it on Amazon “because basically everything from Amazon is from China anyway.. Actually Target’s stuff too” 😀 )
Why we really like Alex however is because he invites people to send him their unwanted animals including the ones with issues. His reason quite simply is, the more problem animals he gets to work on, the more he will learn (and thanks to his channel, this is how all of us get to learn as well and that indirectly saves animal lives too.) Another thing if you watch more of his stuff – he’s taking delivery of sick animals on New Year’s, a lot of the animals arrive filthy or in relatively pressing need of a cleaning or swabbing with disinfectant, sometimes he decides to finish filming the last bit of a video at 5am.. The one below is a meatier video about a 10yr old Beardie left in a large pet department store his entire life in incorrect lighting, who was expected to live another 6 months tops when Alex first took him and they’re now going on 2 years. And yes, sick old neglected animal complications come with. His name’s Stan 🙂
It’s hard work nursing the animals, blending all kinds of gunk to feed them in syringes, cleaning enclosures… His “animal-flipping* business” pays for vet costs (which he also discloses). S-o the flipping business makes a small profit after covering lots of its own costs, and then Alex’s “real” income is from Pet-tubing. (But he hates being recognised in person, he’s mentioned several times.) And then there are the Facebook Groups haters. Because Newton’s Law Of Social Media states that For Every Halfway Popular Action On Social Media There Is An Equally Proportionate Number Of Haters. No Matter What You Do.
*”animal flipping” – first time I ever heard the term used on animals – buy low(er), fix it up, sell for higher price, keep the difference. So much more common for property.
From what we could tell skimming commentaries and other Youtuber posts, Alex used to be in some Facebook Groups about animals, where he then got shish-kebabed and set on fire, then when he tried to defend himself he got kicked out. Y’know, so people could carry on skewering him in peace without the inconvenience of him being there (caveat to all the kids who want to get famous doing this stuff), carried on focussing his energy on the actual animals to be cared for. I found footage of other people posting their own (tens of thousands of views) videos describing that particular group as “very disrespectful. They call people names.” NO I DON’T KNOW THE NAME OF THE FB GROUP THOUGH IT SHOULDN’T BE TOO DIFFICULT TO FIND BUT WHY WOULD YOU WANT THAT. Learning more about taking care of animals and constantly getting better at it is a very different hobby than that of bitching <shrugs>. God forbid an animal freaking dies while you’re preoccupied with bickering about how to care for it on Facebook.
Alex’s website (emeraldscales.com) includes disclosures if a reptile for sale has issues (for eg “MBD” = Metabolic Bone Disease which means deformity usually due to poor feeding/ lighting – also another reason I don’t want to get babies – the risk is higher that without the right nutrition/ lighting, they develop deformities for life. AND it’ll be your fault.)
OK next Pet-tuber. Cold Blood Creations is the father-and-daughter, occasionally-also-other-family-member Youtuber team who I first got Beardie diet advice from (especially the one where the dad says if his own kids don’t want to eat their dinner they go to bed hungry so if your adult Beardie is otherwise healthy and doesn’t want to eat his veggies…. 😀 ) It comes from how baby beardies need a diet ratio of about 4:1 bugs to veggies growing up, and then when they’re adults they’re supposed to get used to a diet that’s the other way around, 80% veggies and fruits and 20% bugs. Eating the way they did as a baby is bad for them as an adult. Switching over however can be hard. Even our Giffin who is a pretty good veggie eater just looooooves his bugs.)
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Third and final Pet-tuber for now (because this one’s long. And quite heavy going): Taylor Nicole Dean. Probably the most well-known. You’re about to read why else she’s famous…
This is Taylor Nicole – screenshot off her Living In My Reptile Enclosure youtube
Here’s one of her feeding videos when she was about 17 or 18 and before the bad boyfriend and drug addiction (after which the way her look changes can be quite scary – the makeup, tattoos (fake and real), if you don’t already know she was following a heavily tattooed and drug-taking rocker musician on tour etc before going to rehab and cleaning up. She explains that some of the makeup is because when she was on drugs her skin got really bad, necessitating very heavy makeup..) CAVEAT the video below still has various dead mice that she’s feeding her snakes and things with:
She is very candid about being a recovering addict and having been emotionally vulnerable (she’s described herself as “very co-dependent,” always needing to be with someone). At which point lemme mention straight off that she’s not a “typical” kid.
Firstly, she has Ehler-Danlos Syndrome (if I recall correctly she’s said her joints dislocate easily and she’s susceptible to bad injuries), which led to her being home-schooled since Grade 5. Because of this, she didn’t socialise much or go to a lotta parties growing up and I’m guessing she doesn’t get to play a lot of sports either (which I always think is really important for kids). Secondly, the guy who gets her hooked on heroin is 10 years older, has a history of abuse allegations, and the general consensus is while it’s still “her fault, her choice” to take the drugs the “balance of power” in the relationship was clearly in her older boyfriend’s favour. So this is a Pet-tuber who has a helluva drama in her back story.
As a teen Taylor Nicole appears to already have some money (I’m not completely sure if it’s as a Youtuber after quitting a job in Petco (which she took to have access to more animals) but she does have a big following). She then keeps paying for her rocker boyfriend’s big expenses, including extensive dental work, and when her parents stage an intervention, she is sent to one of the best rehabs in the country.
Her daring to put all this out there helps many more people. She’s described how having a popular Youtube channel increased her insecurities about whether she was liked, whether she was doing things “right”. (There’s a popular Singaporean couple who created successful Youtube channels as well, and the husband ultimately decided for a similar reason that he didn’t want to be part of the couple anymore because of the intense pressure the Youtubing placed on the marriage. So now they’re close friends and business partners, but no longer married.)
Anyway. The part I really wanted to mention re Taylor Nicole Dean is how she says she got into drugs. She describes that when she met this guy online she was very taken by his musical talent. She also admits there were “red flags” even from the beginning that she chose to ignore. She says what kept running in her head was, “I don’t think I’m going to find anyone else who likes me.”
She talks about how this guy knows exactly how to appeal to her in her current state of vulnerability. He says he is nothing without her. That she makes him happier than he’s ever been in his whole life in just the two weeks they’ve been together.
Then one of her reptiles (his name is Kronos) has respiratory infection and she is given preloaded syringes from the vet. Her boyfriend sneaks one from the freezer (for the needle, not the animal drugs). When she tries to talk her boyfriend into getting clean, he basically says, “I’ll go to rehab tomorrow. Tonight, let’s do this together as a couple.” There is footage where she describes her initial reaction as dumbfounded he could think that’s a good idea. But – guess what? She eventually caves and lets him inject the stuff in her.
They never make it to rehab together in the morning.
“He’ll be better in the morning. He’ll be the boyfriend I want again, in the morning.”
Taylor Nicole will keep telling herself this, eventually disappearing from Youtubing at the height of it. While she follows her boyfriend touring with his band, he will keep encouraging her to use cocaine so she’s off his back about quitting heroin. The justification is that since she doesn’t “become a scary other person” on drugs, it’s ok for her to take it. While still on tour, his drummer quits in protest.
Several times, Taylor Nicole is still able to stop using cocaine. She says this is why she initially doesn’t understand the concept of addiction. She doesn’t understand people saying addiction is a disease and that when you find your “drug of choice,” you will not be able to put it down. The night she catches her boyfriend taking the needle meant for Kronos and he gets her to try heroin is when she is no longer able to stop.
When she comes back, she documents her journey as a recovering addict. Oh yeah, and she dumps the guy who got her into it, checking into rehab without him. Not commenting or encouraging any other possible issues about her (way too much footage out there but commentary is generally supportive of her), given her original personality of emotional and possibly also mental weaknesses, I do think she deserves credit and encouragement for breaking free, not simply stigma. Stigma keeps people who need help from getting it. Not getting help causes their loved ones pain.
Since Imma mummy blog, here’s the parenting story – at the very start, Taylor Nicole’s mom tells her she thinks the boy is bad news, but that her daughter is too old (about 20) for her parents to stop her seeing him. Therefore if her daughter insists, she is not to come home anymore. Taylor Nicole does move out. OMG. Note to self – DON’T TRY THIS WITH THE KIDS. Since we don’t have that large a tank to lock them in though, restraints will have to do. Near the snacks, of course. <pause> This is about when my kids’ friends start telling them their mom is blogging about chaining them to the fridge.
Taylor Nicole finds a nice place, pays for the guy’s air ticket and he moves in with her a week later. He also tells her he is a heroin addict. He is incredibly charming and vulnerable about it. She says on the one hand she felt she couldn’t leave him because he needed her, and on the other hand she felt she would never find better than him.
At the height of it, one of Taylor Nicole’s friends sends her mom a picture of her bathroom strewn with needles. The mom goes over to her place and convinces the boyfriend to stay away from her for a week. It’s not mentioned how she did it, but bearing in mind the guy is described repeatedly as a “scary terrifying other person” when he’s using, I do think it took some guts for her mom to do that. Without the boyfriend to inject or supply her, Taylor Nicole goes into terrible withdrawal. Her mom stays with her, and then brings her to the rehab.
“I’m sick and going to have this problem for the rest of my life.”
I’ve mentioned long ago that the reason I’ve never even taken an experimental puff of a cigarette is that I’m scared – in my early 20s I read an essay by a young woman recovering from addiction, who described watching others drink or smoke. She said that if you have never smoked, you will never understand the craving. S-o… I had a former life in pricing and execution of derivatives that went up to USD 10 mio per transaction for equity, USD 20+ mio for interest rate or currency swaps (which means if you are slow and the price moves or if you make a “small” mistake, it can translate to a lot of actual money lost because the transaction size is big: 0.0001-sized mistake X USD 10mio)… and then when things slowed down in the wake of the last financial crisis I went looking for action elsewhere which is how I went to jump out a plane (shout out to SkyDive Lake Wanaka whose tagline at the time was, very fittingly, “Adrenaline Is Legal”… but what “scares” me is ever having the craving of an addiction.
The thought of potentially never again feeling (or believing you can be) as “satiated” except by something you know to be very bad for you.
Taylor Nicole describes how on one hand are the physical symptoms – those can be treated with medication (she went to one of the most reknowned rehabs in the country). But you cannot so easily escape the addiction that is in your head.
Now, I do drink moderately, and have done so ever since I “could.” By which I mean my dad was terrified of me ever drinking, and then one day in college I fell down the stairs going to class wearing 3 inch platforms and the first thing he said when I told him was “Were you drunk?” And I got so offended (apparently it’s easier to believe I lack control, than that I just wear stupid shoes) I often kept alcoholic soda in my dorm fridge AFTER that 😀 (What? They sold it on university campus in Singapore, and to this day I have never been drunk in my life. I have a glass of red almost every night (if it’s going to be alcohol it may as well have resveratrol) but have virtually never gone beyond two full drinks even in high pressure work/social situations (worked in quite a few dealing rooms remember? Also, I read somewhere the female liver can handle up to two.))
Taylor Nicole describes getting addictive cravings and terrible withdrawals after sipping vodka, I’ve never had that and drank alcohol before realising that could happen, so in case it happens for me with smoking, I don’t try that <shrugs>.
Ends.
ps: here’s Taylor Nicole’s vid: I’m a heroin addict. (The truth about everything). And here’s a pretty good commentary about it: Taylor Nicole Dean’s Fall From Grace. It includes a freaking spreadsheet of Taylor Nicole’s animals. Some of her mistakes highlighted were when one of the lizards she got was not the species she thought it was (implying he needs different care), adopting too many animals too fast (like, 12; she’d arranged for various animal “experts” in the area to keep checking on the animals, and she has an assistant btw).
