Casa Reptile

09/09/2024

This is not art.
‼️A living being is not your canvas‼️
🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢🐢

Please do not paint the shell of any tortoise/turtle
- Paint hinders the animal's ability to absorb UV light properly.
- Paint makes the animal an easy target for predators.
- The chemicals can be dangerous to the animal.

TEXAS TORTOISE (GOPHERUS BERLANDIERI)
Texas Status: Threatened
IT IS ILLEGAL TO COLLECT, POSSESS, OR
HARM A TEXAS TORTOISE. PENALTIES CAN
INCLUDE PAYING A FINE OF
$273.50 PER TORTOISE.

Over time, I will gently scrub the paint from the shell and try and get this Texas tortoise back to normal💚

09/05/2024

Thank you to another amazing summer🔥🔥🔥 We appreciate all the support and business💚
We have a passion for what we do and we are only getting better!📚 Certified, insured and experienced, we take pride in being reptile educators for our community🐍Casa Reptile
We are ready for spooky season👻

08/26/2024

Thank you to everyone that came out to adopt a dog or cat at Laredo Animal Care Services clear the shelter event🐶🐱💚🐍 Casa Reptile is proud to support these events and we look forward to assisting Laredo Animal Care Services, with our trainings or any reptile related services🐍🐊🐢

08/23/2024

Casa Reptile will have a educational/interactive booth with our animals, tomorrow at Laredo Animal Care Services Clear the Shelter Adoption Event!🐶 Come meet your new bestfriend and make a difference in the life of a shelter animal💚

All adoptable furry friends will be available for FREE ADOPTIONS. Come out and enjoy the reptile booth(indoor for the animals🐍), food, family activities, and vendors.

🗓️ Saturday, 8/24/2024.
📍The event will be at L.A.C.S. located at 5202 Maher Ave from 10am-2pm🐾🐢

08/19/2024

We have been booked for Halloween🎃 3 years in a row🐍🙌 Halloween for this year is still available! Want to amaze your guests and spook your neighbors this year?👻 Book the day before its gone😊🐢🦎🐍
UPDATE: Friday the 1st booked so far, Thursday 31st still available at the moment🖤✍️🎃

07/16/2024

🐍Happy World Snake Day🐍

Happy World Snake Day! Did you know that rattlesnakes, while often misunderstood and feared, are critically important? 🐍👀

Rattlesnakes have an important role in the food web as both a predator and a prey item. Not only do they help control pest populations, but rattlesnakes and other types of snakes are a food source that other animals like birds of prey, wading birds, and even other snakes depend on! 🦅🐁

Rattlesnakes offer ecological benefits, too. One team of researchers from the University of California at Berkeley found that rattlesnakes are seed dispersers who save seeds that would otherwise be lost. This is great news for the birds, bats, bees, and even the small mammals and rodents that depend on the microhabitat that saved seeds help to create. 🌱🌻🐝

Additionally, rattlesnakes remove disease vectors and rodent-bourne illnesses from their environment through their natural predation! One study from the University of Maryland found that a single timber rattlesnake can remove up to 4,500 ticks annually! 😮

Finally, did you know that rattlesnake venom could save your life? Venom is a complex, bioactive substance that is varied from species to species, and even within different populations of the same species. It's composed of countless combinations of enzymes, proteins, peptides, and molecules that are continuously evolving alongside the rest of nature and cannot easily be reproduced in a lab. It's used in research and in medicine! In fact, the life-saving drug Integrilin (Eptifibatide) is made from a protein that was discovered in the venom of the Dusky Pygmy Rattlesnake - and it's just one of many treatments available made from venom! 🩺💊💉

07/08/2024

Thank you for all the programs we have had so far this summer!🔥 It is incredible to see perspectives being changed and seeds being planted for a nature minded future🌱 2 Texas boys making a difference📚🐍

06/21/2024

Our summer programs continue🔥🔥🔥🦎🐍📚 Message us to book yours. Limited availability🐢 Shout out to Poka Dots Learning Center & Daycare for the awesome kids and staff!😊

06/17/2024

Trainings, relocations or programs, we always prioritize safety at Casa Reptile 🐍 Thank you to Texas Reptile Expo for providing us with the tools we need teach the Laredo community about safety⚠️📚🐍 We educate about the native species we have in our area and how to identify them. These snake buckets will be headed to a local department and help keep their workforce safe. Message us for your organization's class📖

06/15/2024

Thank you Laredo Fire🔥 for reaching out to learn about native wildlife🐾🐍 I look forward to future trainings and collaborating with other departments to benefit our community📚 Stay tuned😊
Thank you Laredo College Lamar Bruni Vergara Environmental Science Center 🐊

06/12/2024

Teaching the Laredo Fire Department cadets about native snake identification, snake bites and pre-hospital care📚 I love what I do and being able to share it with our community🐍
Message us to setup a training for your organization📖

06/11/2024

Summer camps are underway🔥🐍🦎🐢
The campers at Laredo Fair summer camp were a great bunch😊 A lot of enthusiasm, reactions, and eager to learn📚 Limited Availability, message us to reserve your summer program🐢

06/10/2024

The beginning of a slew of events for June and July📚🐢🐍🦎 Happy birthday Jaxon🥳 Limited Availability, message us🐢

05/30/2024

This is a juvenile Western Coachwhip snake, found at Lake Casa Blanca State Park by a park ranger😊 This is a Non-Venomous snake and one of the fastest snakes we have in Texas. Western Coachwhips are widely distributed throughout the western three quarters of the state. They are generally about 4 to 5 feet long, but can reach up to 8 feet. These snakes are diurnal and very active, they can been seen out even during the hottest part of the day. They are highly visual predators, with big round eyes because their eyes are their main method of detecting prey, unlike Pit Vipers. Coachwhips are often seen periscoping, or elevating their head to get a better idea of their whereabouts and to keep an eye on potential food and foes. Their diet may consist of eating lizards, small rodents, birds, frogs, and even other snakes. Their scales are said to resemble that of a braided whip, hence the name Coachwhip snake. Thank you, for taking the time to learn about one of our wildlife neighbors!
(Released back to the wild‼️)

05/11/2024

Ringtail rescue from last night🐾 But what is a ringtail? Cute for sure💚 but let's learn more📖📚😊
Ringtails are distributed statewide, but uncommon in lower Rio Grande and Coastal Plains of southern Texas.
The Ringtail is a cat-sized carnivore resembling a small fox with a long raccoonlike tail. It's bushy tail is flattened and nearly as long as the head and body, with alternating black and white rings.
These animals are almost wholly nocturnal and spend the majority of the day sleeping in their dens. They leave their dens at night to feed. Ringtails eat a wide variety of foods. Birds, rodents, carrion, reptiles, amphibians, and insects such as grasshoppers and crickets that form the bulk of their diet, although they also eat native fruits and berries as well.
Ringtails live in many different habitats, but they prefer rocky areas such as rock piles, stone fences, canyon walls, and talus slopes. Ringtails are expert climbers, capable of climbing vertical walls to find the most protected crevices, crannies, and hollows in which to build their dens. In woodland areas, where they are less common, they den in hollow trees and logs. They have also been observed living in buildings. Thank you for reading!
ALREADY RELOCATED BACK TO THE WILD‼️

04/29/2024

Although our scheduling is more limited we are still doing our exotic photoshoots📸📸🐍🐍 Message us with your ideas for your session📸
Indoor/Outdoor, Classy/Exotic, Bday/adventure

Beautiful work!🙌 by Skarlet RED Photography

03/22/2024

Casa Reptile would like to announce that we are no longer accepting bookings until further notice, but we will still have educational community events throughout the year📚😊 We will update our upcoming summer programs soon! Thank you so much💚🦎🐍🐢

03/14/2024

This is snake sighting here in Laredo,TX🐍That our friend Rolando found last night on a sidewalk. He sent in the picture to us to identify🧐 It is a NON-VENOMOUS Plains thread snake also known as a Texas thread snake, worm snake or the Texas blindsnake. The Texas blind snake is considered beneficial because of its feeding habits. It is active on the soil surface at night or early evening, feeding on larvae and pupae of insects, termites, and earthworms. They are a good natural enemy of many insect pests. Blind snakes indicate a healthy environment and should be preserved and encouraged in the landscape📚💚

I will be keeping a log of all the sightings the community sends me to collect data✍️📖 If you participate, please do so safely, responsibly and do not touch the wildlife😊