We rocked the Snake Farm

If you are a fan of Discovery's Dirty Jobs, you are somewhat familiar with The Snake Farm in New Branfels, Texas. Apparently, they cleaned out an alligator pen on the show. We headed out early Saturday afternoon to get a load of the animals and hopefully try to persuade Jill to take interest in another species of pets. Didn't work, but luckily, we missed "feeding time" by a good 15 minutes.

Well, our trip was focused on the snakes, of which there are about a hundred on The Farm, more than I've ever seen in one place and surprisingly, albino versions of every variety. There is also a true menagerie of other creatures [more on that later]. Clad in a retro 70s print dress [of course] and her trendy haircut, Jill was immediately taken with the snake collection, especially the venomous ones. The anacondas, pythons, boas, cobras, rattlesnakes, adders, mambas and what I think was a pit viper, did not phase her one bit. I just kept saying, "Yeah, [suck in breath], that one could really hurt you." I admit that I kept it together, for the most part, until I came upon an empty tank and wondered where the animal had gone.

After a quick run through the 1st room, The Snake Farmer offered to let her hold Benny, the Ball Python. She was just tickled and went in for the grab. The 8 and 9 year old boys, who where there for a birthday party, looked on in amazement as the 29 pounder with the mental fortitude of spoon-bender wrapped the thing around her neck. Keep in mind, this is a child who would not go down a slide until she was almost 4...I just don't get it. Turns out, Ball Pythons are "good entry-level snake pets." Right, kind of like marijuana is a gateway drug. I'm still Just Saying No.

Outdoors, there are a number of monkeys, peacocks, hens and chicks, tortoises, free range chickens and "ungulates, Dad, that means hooved animals." There was also a curious collection of what looked like giant ground hogs, but with legs that looked like they belonged to an Italian Greyhound. Turns out, they are the world's smallest breed of deer.

The petting zoo had a llama and a family of pigs that had 2 piglets. Apparently mother pigs are not as protective of their babies as mother dogs are, since Jill was able to coax a piglet away from it's mom with a handful of petting zoo feed. Frankly, I'm surprised that she was not trampled by swine.

No tourist trap trip would be complete without a run through the gift shop; now we are complete with a 5' long stuffed snake named Queen Amadala, after her other new passion, Star Wars. That night, as I was putting her to bed, she started to giggle. I asked her what was so funny and she said, "Hee hee, I want to go live at The Snake Farm. Hee hee." I told her that we'd sure miss her; she countered with, "Hee hee. OK, then I want The Snake Farm to move to our house."

Thank God for deed restrictions.