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[Wrasse]

I have many coastal carpets here. They arrive and I just can't bring myself to get rid of them.

My first captive bred snake was a coastal carpet python and she, Cleo, is still the Grande Dame of my collection today. Other than a food response bite (or if you are Recharge), she is quiet and docile and I can happy tug her out of her enclosure to sit on the shoulders of a visiting child to give them a 'thrill'. Cleo is responsible for furthering the cause of 'snake' here in Brisbane and amongst many interstate visitors and many a new keeper has arrived on the scene thanks to her appeal, quiet nature and magnetism.

After Cleo there came many other coastal carpets, then other carpet species, other pythons, colubrids, and the list keeps climbing. Cleo was the reason for my addiction to reptiles, the reason I continued to gather them around me. My experiences with her were only positive and caused the passion to grow.

Likely if I had to choose a preferred species, the Coastal carpet wouldn't be it. The top spot would probably go to one of the colubrid species. But the beauty of the human heart is that there is plenty of space for many and the Brisbane carpet has a nice solid little place in mine.

Long live the common, variable, enigmatic coastal carpet python.