June / July 2006 -- A trip to Philippinas - stay tuned :)
December 2005 -- Egypt again, I will produce some photos, hopefully, with an usual delay... :)
May 2005 -- An expedition to Ukrainian nature!
Pictures -- I had to apologize a bit for the pictures quality - maybe for the last time I made slides, and unfortunately, in
the processing lab they were not ... say ... perfect ...
So, scanned.... in the ZOO of the town Nikolayev, a prison for the guinea pigs ....
one general true ("parents, keep an eye on your children" - a bit funny though) .... a poor reptile with too overgrown nails
.... with my bare hands, I have overpowered this terrible constrictor :) in the waters of junction of rivers Dnyepr and Yuzhnyi Bug
.... buying of many kilograms of supreme caviar, yes, this is not a movie-cliche (anyway, everyone got fed up and hated that at the end) ....
a dramatic sky near the Swan islands (I like such sceneries a lot) .... a "pedestrian" crossing
Pictures, the second row -- Askania Nova, an african nature in Europe, and, moreover, truly the last piece of the original steppe, never been used agriculturaly .... a wild look of the resistance of the steppe runner (Eremias arguta) .... another cutie .... here we changed the vehicle for this heavy duty, anyway it had a big delay, for it lost one wheel during the rough way, and they had to weld it back.... unique biotop of the Kinburn tongue with its gathering point of many species of birds .... pelicans
Pictures, the third row -- At last the turtles! - plastron of European pond turtle .... the same one from top .... one more turtle .... several steps from the semi-desert such a swamp -- of course, what was very interesting - the serious hypothesis, that this is the former meteorite impact filled with water ... a cute Vipera ursini .... a queue for a typical russian fermented drink in Voznyesensk
September 2004 to May 2005 -- no great news to report, even the divorce has happened ... :-(
... and, the sulcata's eggs were infertile
July and August, 2004 -- Just at the beginning of July, new hatchlings have born :-)
Pictures -- in incubator, two heads at the moment are visible ... hatching in my hand ...
a container for them, with a wet towel... they are eating, very soon after hatching -- that black thing suspiciously looking is really a poo from the adult tortoise, used intentionally, to start-up the guts-microorganisms to allow a proper digestion.... and yes, they ate that very gladly and as a first thing in their life ... on the left, that baby has an egg-sack in a normal size, on right it is fully absorbed
Pictures, the second row -- a necrotic shell-disease of Barbora is healing nicely ... a bit grown-up babies after some 6 weeks ... and a completely new pen for them
June 2004 -- With the others from TSP, we went to the Danube delta and adjacent area. The whole mini-photo-diary is here. Few pictures extra -- Terra typica, hills called Macin ... a photo to be proud of :-) and few other reptilians... one too much sweet photo :-) ... and a beautiful toad
May 2004 -- 1st of May, Zuzana laid 4 eggs (17-17-17-19g). Pictures taken at the end of nesting, it is clear how she "push by the head"
(i. e. she push the egg out of her body and the head movement "inside" helps her to push it). Eggs movement, as usual, in the pot :-)
A view to incubator.... Plus few additional pictures of the tanks of the TSE and helmeteds.
April 2004 -- Zuzana (horsfieldii) is preparing to nest, first she is training, then frantically runs and search for the best spot.... Now the new photo of a garden with the flowering pear tree and a new change of a setup (it was necessary to separate the males from females to avoid the bloodshed (too much sex-eager male) -- which is critical during the period when the female needs to nest and the males do not allow her to do so. The next feature is the hollow log as a hiding place.
So here I show as promised my pictures of the new lighting design. It is a lot of wiring,
a bit of drilling and so on. I have used standard construction reflectors, waterproof switches, leftover boards white painted,
metal connecting parts used to thermal insulation constructions. Above the light & heat source is glued a thick thermal reflecting foil.
At all, such double lighting costs no more than 15$. More pictures with different setups...
February 2004 -- Julie outside, having a snow-fun. Another picture, a bit nostalgic, from the mountains (Spindleruv Mlyn, North-East Bohemia)...
December 2003 -- Again with Julie -- pictures taken under ultravitalux bulb, not really special. Next pictures show the building of a new, huge section of the Prague's ZOO -- the Indonesian jungle. We had a special tour through the building site.
Autumn 2003 -- At last, the indoor setup of the turtle room made a progress (of course, it will take a lot more time to settle it). The reason was the coming winter, so the tanks, just laying around the house, had to get in. Few pictures to that topic. The turtle room itself has about 5 x 3 meters, the floor is made of the silicate sand mixed with epoxy (undestroyable), a bit sloped -- a maker of that all on the picture -- with the water valve... Setting up using the unigue equipment... the horsfieldiis in the upper bathroom, the pictures of the snake tank and tanks...
July to August 2003 -- The picture of Zuzana's eggs in the incubator, unfortunately nothing out of them (& a lot of mating right after that). Anyway, during the gardening works I was leveling the heaps of the leftover soil. Suddenly, the lizard eggs started to roll (in a rough way, for I did not expect the nest there). However, I put them to the incubator -- in few weeks, the small Lacertas emerged from the egg, at 100% success rate. Gladly I have released them "back" to a garden.... last picture, temporary setups outside -- just the glass tanks left around the house, tortoises in a fenced pen...
June 2003 -- A trip to Bulgaria with the Teraristic society. I am working on "general work" on turtles and tortoises in Bulgaria and the rest of Balkans....
May 2003 -- At last, the moving in the re-built house with a garden (1st picture), an evening picture with a strange mood, few miles away.... a week after the moving a horsfieldii Zuzana laid the eggs, but they were infertile (as written above)...
February to March 2003 -- A trip to Thailand (needed a break to stay sane)... well, you'd find the turtles on a foodmarket or ZOO, much less chance in the wild.... a picture of the turtle nesting beach, the islands Ta ru tao, musicians with the instruments made from the tortoise shell, elephants in the water close to a city Chiang Mai in the Golden triangle, snake farm.... a lot more pictures I have here (only the comments in Czech so far).
December 2002 -- We have held a kind of private party by occassion of reopening of the giant tortoises' hall after the devastating floods. ... view to the group ... a heart of the Czech Chelonia Club :) ... nice talking ... the turtles from quarantine have been moved to other building and are OK ... the most agile Ocadia borneensis have been released into the section of the same hall
August to October 2002 -- I got few TSE after the floods ... Family picture of Testudo horsfieldii (mother of the young one to right) .... After some time, picture of Julie, she is staying temporarily (?) by a friend Petra ... her male looks so much like Julie that we both feel it is necessary to make a pair from them. A picture of the couple ... building of the overwintering cage .... Julie already in box (2x1,5x1m = 6,5x5x3ft)
June / July 2002 -- Pictures from the end of Turtle / Tortoise Exhibition of Czech Chelonia Club (KCHZ) -- as you may see, I look really tired (last day). The second event -- we have visited the quarantine area of the ZOO Prague. Here are the turtles from the contingent of Hong Kong confiscation (more details published at Turtle Survival Aliance pages. And, as a bonus, nice picture with a giant tortoise :-) ...
So ... I had a bit delay in updating -- I had some certain reasons, luckily I have sold my company Hosting CZ ... which was a time- and strenght-consuming process. To make the situation even more stressful, we have bought a house and started some reconstruction and modernizations works etc. So it means enough fun in future ... and enough background to turtles and tortoises in future. All tours etc. were abandoned (except of a beautiful week in London) ...
March 2002 -- Few pictures of helmeted terrapins, another of Veronika (outside, it was quite a warm weather) ...
February 2002 -- The meeting of KCHZ, it was characteristic that we had the turtle cakes .... One more about the food -- the preparation of the turtle jelly by the formula of Ms. Brigitte Artner ... it works :)
January 2002 -- Veronika has grown a bit ... (well yes, there was a big event of the International Turtle and Tortoise Symposium in Vienna ... I was there of course :))
December 2001 -- Few pictures of the tortoise on the snow ... she likes it very much (must be well warmed up before).
End of October 2001 -- Journey of Terraristic Society to Moravia, Palava ... a beautiful view as by Tolkien ...
August / September 2001 -- Usual "expedition" through the Balcan peninsula -- this time most of Croatia, south parts plus Slavonia and Krajina, criss-cross through Bosnia and Hercegovina, Slovenia. The only quite tortoise-rich area was the south of Bosnia (i.e. Republic of Serbia). Still there, I had to solve by phonecalls the hatching -- first of hatchlings got the name Veronika after the turtlesitter. The second hatched exactly in the time of arrival ... I was so tired that I let him stay in the incubator instead of getting him to the tank ... during the night it had climbed over the of the side of the bowl (with the eggs), fell to the water and drowned. It is extremely terrible that such basic errors (to shallow bowl) result so often irreversibly bad :( ... one can certainly learn how to prevent it in the future ... but for such price :( ... So the numbers of the first litter of turtles (aprox. 8 years old female -- that is not bad): 5 eggs, 3 of them fertile, 2 hatchlings, one alive.
Pictures -- hatching .... the results ...
July 2001 -- I happen to had the birthday .... many people knew I was sorry because of my helmeteds, so guess, what I got 6 times :))
Pictures -- this is the video of a typical Pelomedusa subrufa olivacea ... may take quite long to download .... plus one picture of Julie indoors.
Saturday 20th June, 2001 -- So the second clutch od the same female has come (3 eggs this time). Meanwhile the bad news -- the recent commercial incubator is not too good, both eggs are gone, one was fertile and containing 10mm embryo. I have built the new incubator immediatelly (though it is not too much sofisticated ...).
Pictures -- inside of the egg ... the new incubator
červen 2001 -- The new setup in the greenhouse is fine, but both of helmeted terrapins have died :-((( .... the necropsy result: acute poisoning ... I have sterilised all the material prior to use, so this is clear that the cause is the pool itself (tortoises half a meter away are OK).
Pictures -- several views to the greenhouse
Saturday 12th May, 2001 -- My female Zuzana, Testudo horsfieldi, has started to lay eggs ....
It took her 3 days full of nervous trying and digging .... Funny thing was, that I had just at that moment
a visit of the small group of turtle-friends .... So, it was a really good timing :)
Pictures -- just very recently I have finished this setup in the glasshouse -- to provide
her some privacy, I put there a chair and basket -- this was a big success for she left the former sites in
the corners, half-hid herself under the basket and laid the eggs. First picture -- she made about 10 cm (4") hole,
reletivelly wide even at bottom .... pushing the eggs out ... moving the head forward and back slowly,
at full strenght .... first egg appeared, hard work .... on a way to incubator .... This is how the new
setup looks (the other part it) -- a pond for African helmeted terrapins
Easter 2001 -- a journey to Rome, beautiful city. The city is famous, except the antic part,
by its fountains -- one of them at piazza Matei (pzza Tartarrughe) is a turtle fountain!! I recommend it,
it is about 100 mts from Capitol. ZOO -- well some parts are not "OK" but some effort to improve it is visible.
The best part is the reptile house -- one of the very best of it's kind I've ever seen! Oh, I nearly forgot ... the
Italian ice-cream is excelent.
Pictures -- close to Villa Borghese .... a very good turtles' setup in ZOO (several Asian box turtles Cuora)
.... a cage of the Ball Pythons (they breed them) ... a view to Capitol, the heart of the Republican and Imperial
Rome .... Entrance to Cloaca Maxima, the enormous brick sewer built by Etrurian kings, so it is probably the oldest
building in Rome at all (nice name, btw. yes, the cloaca of birds and reptiles has its name by this :-) ....
a typical picture from Vatican
Pictures -- second row -- inside of the biggest cathedral in the world .... famous De Trevi .... turtle fountain (European pond turtles)
Saturday 17th March 2001 -- half-organised trip of KCHZ to a new AkvaTera and Pilsen ZOO, quite a lot people, a peek behind the public areas including the rescue / rehab site for tortoises, picture of Geochelone radiata
february / march 2001 -- Our friends from UK called that they was going to fly to Egypt, Luxor. So we arranged a meeting in the centre of the city -- who will come first they would book some hotel. Well -- I have a sort of intensive impressions from the trip. Intensively nice (historical sites, sailing the Nile, snorcheling in the Red sea, meeting the sea turtle underwater, the Sahara) and disgusting (totally polluted air, heaps of garbage on every step, unbelievable behaviour of Egyptians, comparing to f.i. Tunisia etc.)
I have lots of slides, just call me :)
Pictures -- several from the ZOO (anything money could buy), a mixture of OK cages and horrible dens killing animals, the worst case -- loggerhead sea turtle in few inches of water, in a complete darkness... ... on a rack in Egyptian museum in Cairo the turtles, not labelled though :(( ... older architecture (Luxor) and the new one (no comment...)
(Click to enlarge)
Pictures -- second row -- a typical chaos in the streets .... Coptic part of Cairo .... tortoises for sale (no comment, CITES I)
New Year's Eve in a group of the turtlers in the city Hradec Kralove
Pictures -- Ales Marek after slipping on ice .... just few minutes walk away, a breeders center in H. K. --
Geochelone radiata youngsters .... two small Carettochelys insculpta ..... Katka has purchased
a Ball python named Monty Python :) -- a composition with him
October 2000 -- several pictures from my home -- I borrowed a snapper female named Mana (4 kg) to make
a party to my male Kryspin (2 kg). It was terrible how he did not stop for a moment to chase her ....
finally she developed the only way how to escape his desires :)) -- she nestled against the side glass of the
tank to be able to sleep a bit :)
Pictures -- chasing, courtsip, mating, running away ...
November 2000 -- meeting of CETTA in Znojmo (Moravia)
September 2000 -- Innsbruck (Austria), regional meeting of Austrian SFÖ -- cooperating chelonian club. By the way we stopped in Garmish-Partenkirchen to enjoy the first snow in 1200 m height and have some refreshment (they refused to boil the wine -- in the winter only :))), and certainly, in Munich we stopped in the ZOO.
Pictures -- ZOO, giant tortoises, very nice setup .... one of them excavating the nest .... radiatas
and sulcatas ..... in the mountains, me, Katka, Stanislav Traykov
September 2000 -- an excursion of Czech Chelonia Breeders' Club to the city in
the north Bohemia, Liberec -- ZOO, botanical garden & aquapark.
Pictures -- ZOO, its tortoise area .... the garden
August / September 2000 -- in north Croatia, there is not a big chance to find a tortoise in wild. I convinced Katka to
go to such searching for the first time, she was surprised that we did not use the walking paths :) ...
and well, we were caught by the terrible thunderstorm. So that's how the nature pay you back :(
Anyway, Katka spent as a child about 3 years in Yugoslavia, mostly in the south Croatia. At that
time the chicken eggs were too expensive so they fed them by the sea turtles' eggs (which was absolutely
normal there that time). Every day's breakfast, tasty, greenish. She told me also, that she saw a boat full of
tortoises probably from Greece which turned over and sank near the harbour, thousands scrambled to the shore
where tourists were picking them and putting to their cars, pockets, bags ... Uh-oh.
Pictures -- International reptile exhibition in Croatian town Pula (kinda funny) .... Slovenia has its beauties ...
June 2000 -- three weeks in Turkey -- so far the best turtler's experience, not too comfortable, but
the paradise on earth and the promised land to tortoises. I saw the first sea turtle laying eggs in the night
in Dalyan.
Pictures -- first tortoise found in Turkey, 20 minutes after entering to Asian part (i.e. the first stop
along the way :))) .... the the biggest tortoise found, near Dalyan as well as a lot of others .... comparation of two
youngsters picked up at the same spot .... eating the natural weeds .... in the ruins of the ancient city of Kaunos ...
here we are discussing two tortoises, I have just spotted another and yell "look, another one" .... all three in one spot,
all found in area 2x2 meters, quite different look though
Pictures -- second row -- Mauremys rivulata right on the edge of Dalyan, another near the river system close to Dalaman military base .... in the mountains plus the view from that spot .... ruins of the theater in Efes ... city of Kekyra, half-sunk to the sea .... in the ruins of Myra ... a beach close to ruins of Olympos .... Emys orbicularis (hellenica?)
Pictures -- third row -- quite big Trionyx triunguis near Dalaman .... the city on two continents .... "pet shop", Egyptian market close to the Golden bay .... a foul setup in the ZOO .... shadow all the day, on concrete ...
June 2000 -- the new exhibiton of turtles in Rychnov nad Kneznou. Some pictures to be found here..
Easter 2000 -- A visit to London, several fine museums with the matters to see and think about .... small but nice ZOO.
November 1999 -- celebration of 10 years of Czech Chelonia Club -- KCHŽ, great ....
November 1999 - January 2000 -- interesting initiative -- CETTA, Central European Turtle and Tortoise Association. Members are from Austria, Bavaria, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary. The goal is to complete the single animals in private collections to the breeding pairs / groups.
September 1999 -- Journey to Bulgaria, wonderful experience .... This is a half-made page.
June/July 1999 -- We've peeked to Africa, Tunisia.
Pictures -- several pictures of the landscape .... typical European behaviour on a beach .... a fast way of enjoying the hollidays ....
Pictures -- second row -- a big spider on a tree .... Chameleo chameleo in Sousse ..... Testudo graeca naubulensis (Furcerochelys naubulensis), market in Sousse .... me and Katka in Monastir
-- To see the rest of "news", click HERE (www.zelvy.cz/news2.html)