BTS Expo, Our day and what we got!

By the time my alarm clock started (7:30am) i had been awake for nearly 3 hours. Months of research and planning had gone into this day and i was not going to let a lack of sleep ruin it!!!!

Sleep was not a problem for my partner though and we managed to leave the house 15 mins late. we got in the car and started our 2 hour trip to Birmingham. we pulled up at around 10:30 the line was already several hundred people long so we parked up and got into the line as quick as we could.

what followed was 2 hours of mayhem in which my wallet got alot lighter and my arms got alot fuller!

We left the show with the following:

2 Smithi juvies
2 Chaco Golden knee Juviles
1 Indian ornimental Juvie
1 Adult Female Indian ornimental
1 female brazilian whiteknee with a setup
1 male B.smithi(just need a female now)
6 Giant african millipedes

Now i will be doing bios for all our new critters but i just want to say now that the whiteknee is a killing machine and dont relax when trying to rehouse a 7" pokie..... they are fast!

Invert Communities

Hey Guys,

Hope all is well. one thing i keep finding since i got into the hobby is that there is always another critter that you want. Most of the Critters we keep would love nothing more than to be put in an enclosure with another Critter or "Dinner". The problem there is that any Tarantula or mantis left alone with another would love nothing more than to eat its buddy.

So after spending some time researching and getting advice from some people in the hobby i have decided to set up my own Invert community, I am going to start off with my millipede Ziggy and 6 sun beetles. Now the beetles are very short living so i am going to be interested in seeing if they can breed even with Ziggy in the mix.

Im expecting my Beetles to arrive by Friday and they will be in the larvae stage. i will be posting updates of their growth. If this proves a successful experiment i may start to do starter packs. I think it would be a wonderful gift for hobbyists or newcomers alike. Getting to see not only how different types of beetles react to each other but how they get on with millipedes.

I also have some african land snails on the way, these guys are something i have always wanted to keep and breed, they are just amazing, full of personality and dare i say it cute? They are easy to breed easy to keep and a great starter pet.

One thing i will be documenting with the snails is just how fast the reproduce, African land snails have both a male and female sex organ and do need another snail to breed, i have read reports of a snail reproducing with itself but im not sure i believe that. they can still produce fertile eggs a year after being separated from another snail.

Thanks again for reading and if you have any questions please put them in the comments below or find me on twitter @thorney_critter

Future Plan

So, the plan with Thorney Critters is to eventually open up a shop. This may take a while but its what we eventually would like to do. Another idea is to set up shop on our own premises. Meaning we would have out buildings and use that as a shop set-up, either way that's the future plan.

We accept we have a journey to get on yet before we can even start to prepare for that, but we are making tracks. However, most importantly, we want to provide the best of everything to you, our costumers.
For only recently starting out, we have done plenty of mooching around exotic pets shops around the UK of all different sizes. Quite honestly, I can only think of a hand full that have really impressed me. Yet, some we have been in have been a little different and this is where we want to come in and make the difference, set the standard just a little higher.

Our aim is to stock critters because we like and we want them! We also want to be able to tell you all the information you need to know about them, such as caring, handling, habitat and so forth. Well obviously, you may think, you will be working in a critter shop... Ah, but you see this is the point I am making. You will be surprised that some shops are not fully knowledgeable about all their animals, not keen on touching them and quite open by the fact they don't really like them. Now, I don't know about you, but that doesn't really fill me with confidence when buying an animal. Our motto here at Thorney Critters is, if we don't feel confident with them, we are not confident to be selling them on, it's just not fair. We want our costumers to have confidence in us and our stock and the only way we can show that is to love and know everything about every critter we have. We don't want to be scared of  our Critters, we don't see the point!

Another problem we are coming across is pricing! Its shocking how pricing of all kind of Critters is so sporadic from place to place and it doesn't really make any sense! So we will have honest and correct pricing for our Critters.

Our shop will be welcoming, vibrant and a interesting place to visit, it's always awkward when you walk into a silent sweaty shoe box sized shop. Thorney Critters aim is to be family friendly, knowledgeable and fun! This is where you, our costumers come in! We want your comments, thoughts and even your experiences  good or bad on what you expect to see in a Critter shop.

• What kind of Critters would you like to see?
• Would you want to hold a Critter?
• Would you want a points reward system of some kind?
• How would you create a vibrant, funky environment?
• What are your thoughts and experiences?

Thank you
Sam.