At Rplank's invitation, I made my way over here from the Kingsnake.com forums.

By way of introductions, my name is Rick, I'll turn 44 here in a few weeks, happily married for nearly 24 years now, and have two grown kids. I'm an electronic technician by trade and a flute student by hobby.

I've had my Ball Python, Phil, for about a month and a half now, having bought him from the local Herp Society's show here in Tucson. He's a captive bred, normal colored male, almost 4 months old now. I have him residing in a 20 g Long terrarium on my desk, using newspaper for the substrate, an inverted flower pot saucer with a hole knocked in one side for a hiding spot, a ceramic dish for water, and a mesquite branch for him to crawl on (he seems to really like the mesquite branch). I have a red "heat" lamp shining into the terrarium for him to bask on, and since our nights are starting to cool off, I'll be installing a 7 watt heat mat under his tank for additional warmth (and likely changing to a slightly thicker substrate that will make it less likely he can get directly against the glass above the heater).

Phil has been readily accepting F/T mice about once a week, and while I've fed him an adult mouse once, the hoppers seem to be a better size for him right now.

That's the introduction in a nutshell. I look forward to some interesting reading in these forums, and hope to be able to contribute something of value from time to time myself.