Pictures and more visits

10-26-2012

I forgot to mention a interesting tour we took. We found a reference for a teaching Zoo when we were staying at Payne's Prairie. We visited the Zoo, it was a small facility out in the middle of the country. We had to go down dirt roads to find it. They have students there working on associate degrees so they can maybe work in a zoo or other type facility. They had birds, monkeys, a porcupine, black leopard, hyaenas and Guinea pigs. But more interesting was the reptile farm located on the same site. The owner has been dealing with reptiles for 35 years and has been all over the world getting reptiles. The raise snakes, frogs, turtles and spiders which they sell to Universities, pet stores, laboratories and some for pets. The poisonous reptiles are sold to facilities which extract the venom to use for many times of medicines. There are pictures of a king cobra and a tarantula spider as well as many snakes and lizards. The people who conducted the tour of the farm were very knowledgeable. The boy that showed us all the reptiles except the venomous snakes and lizards  was only about 16. He had been dealing with  them since he was little. He had been to Peru and all over the country with his dad. He said he had caught over 200 rattle snakes.

Zoo and reptile farm

These pictures are from the pier in St Petersburg and the aquarium on the pier. The other pictures are from the historical museum  at he entrance to the pier

St. Petersburg

We also visited the Sunken Gardens in St. Petersburg.
Sunken Gardens

While we were at Breezy Oaks we found an old cemetery right around the corner.
Wild Cow Prairie Cemetery