My dad likes critters and when I was a kid, we'd vacation often at this place up in northern Michigan near Boyne Highlands that was jointly owned by my parents and several other people. There was a golf course that ran less than a few hundred yards from the back of the house, and some of the natural water features were swamps and bogs. Plenty of golfers would knock nice, expensive balls into the swamps and not be willing to wade in after them. My dad would put on his swampers and wade in to track down the golf balls for his own use, and when I was like...six, he started letting me come with him. I'd follow, with two buckets...one for found golf balls, and one for CRITTERS.

He'd catch me frogs, turtles, sometimes salamanders in the drier areas of the woods, and of course snakes were the best. Little garter snakes, cute little things. I loved them. The rule was I could keep 'em but only for a little while, then I'd have to let them go again. My dad even showed me a hog-snake once, showed me how it'll play dead if you don't let it be. XD

I grew up loving reptiles and amphibians. For some reason my kid brother never did.

I had a few anoles and things as pets when I was still young, and some wee snakey things, but got away from herps in general...

...until many years later when I was in college. I needed a pet that was silent, easy to care for, didn't need much in the way of space, and wouldn't die if I didn't pay attention to it for a day or three at a time (exams suck) and what could be better than a snake?! I did some research, and decided that the Ball Python was the right animal for me.

No sooner did people find out I was in the market for a Ball that one basically got handed to me. e.e He was a skinny, dehydrated wild-caught thing with ticks under his scales and an infestation of mites from the crappy dealer. His face was all banged up, too...shipping accident. I fed him up, cleared up the mite issue (god that sucked, too) and got rid of his ticks...dealt with his wounds (loooots of vet bills) and named him Precious, since at the time I was reading Lord of the Rings and it just seemed appropriate.

I had 'im for a few years, then sadly had to sell him due to moving...I was moving out of the country and could not take him with me.

I kindof forgot my love of snakes...I spent so many years without even really thinking about them, and moved back to Michigan.

I did somewhat enjoy snakes vicariously through my boyfriend, though. He has a few Corn Snakes, and I loved seeing pictures of them and hearing him talk about them.

One day someone at work (I work in a pet store) peered around the corner and asked if I was afraid of snakes. I said "NO, I love them" and when she came around the corner she had a very scared little Pueblan Milk Snake in her hands. Seems she arrived at the store more than six months prior as a juvenile, was sold and promptly returned for "agression." For the next six months she grew and grew, but still lived in a little six-by-twelve box on the sales floor, being harassed by everyone who walks past. The store declared her unsellable and offered her up basically for adoption just to get rid of her, but since she doesn't like being handled they were even having a hard time finding anyone to take her for FREE.

That irked me so I drove to my dad's, rummaged in the attic for my old herp stuff, and set up an enclosure for the little snake and took her home the following weekend.

BTW, she's never acted agressive at ALL, never S'd up or acted like she was even THINKING about biting. She's easily scared and still not thrilled at being handled, though. We're working on it.

Having the little Milk Snake around (named her Bowline, a type of sailing knot, since she's kindof goofy...tried eating a Fuzzie SIDEWAYS for crying out loud!) made me miss my Ball Python terribly...years ago when I had Precious, I remembered that a new morph had come along, the Mojave, and it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen and so far out of my price range it HURT. Just for fun, one afternoon a few months back I did a google search for Mojaves...and found that not only had the Super been bred and god is it prettier than even the Mojave, but that the price had fallen into my range.

Cue my glee. I hit an expo, met a breeder, drove to his place a week later to pick out a Mojave male and couldn't be happier. I love having a Ball again!

I plan to breed myself a Super Mojave at some point, and would love to have a small collection of my own. For purposes of selling superfluous animals, I decided I'd eventually set up a website or something, and I'd name my little home-based hobby "Heathertoft," since the house I learned to love snakes at was called the Heather House, since it faced Heather's Run at the Boyne Highlands ski area. The -toft part means "homestead" or just "home;" it has a lot of personal meaning.

Yeah I'm a sentimental kind of guy, LOL.

Anyways, that's my story of how I got into snakes. I blame my dad...he's awesome.