G'day Shady,
We have five courses that we offer. They are as follows -
Basic Reptile Husbandry
Covers all the basic knowledge needed to keep your first reptile. Choosing the correct animal, enclosure design, handling, feeding etc.
Advanced Python Keeping and Breeding
This is a fairly advanced course designed for those who have kept pythons for a couple of years. It is co-hosted by Matt Bonnett (
http://www.users.on.net/~jbonnett/) and covers all the "nitty gritty" information on successfully breeding your pythons. Matt has bred nearly every Australia python that is in captivity - most of them several times over.
Gecko and Small Lizard Husbandry Course
This course is co-hosted by Danny Brown (
www.geckodan.com) and covers everything you need to know to successfully keep and breed geckos, skinks, pygopods, dragons and small monitors. Danny maintains the largest collection of lizards in Australia.
Venomous Snake Relocation Course
Probably one of our most famous courses that over 100 APS members have attended. It is designed to assist in obtaining your "snake catcher" permit wherever you are in Australia (whether it be your Wildlife Controllers Permit in Victoria or your Damage Mitigation Permit in QLD etc). It starts with a couple of hours of basic theory, followed by approximately 10 hours of working with various venomous snakes such as Eastern Browns, Tiger Snakes, Mulga Snakes, Death Adders, Spotted Blacks and Western Brown Snakes. We have a 100% safety record, and a background in working professionally with venomous snakes prior to conducting courses.
Venomous Snake Husbandry Course
This course is probably the most "hands on" course available in Australia. We limit it to those who have previous experience with venomous snakes (either in the form of conducting our Relocation course or already holding their venomous snake permit/endorsement). There is a basic theory component on housing, feeding etc but the main part is learning how to properly handle real venomous snake. Correct tailing techniques are taught (not grab their tail and hang on for dear life while trying to get it into a hoop bag), as are head restraints and some other fairly intensive techniques.
One of the most important points to consider when choosing which course you attend is what previous experience, apart from running courses, the person conducting the course has. There are a couple of course providers out there, other than ERD, that are highly experienced, like Geoff Coombe from Living With Wildlife.
We are able to assist in accommodation and transport for interstate participants, and all of our courses are fully catered with both morning tea and lunch, with a range of snacks and drinks on hand throughout the day.
Unfortunately there is absolutely no course providers who are
endorsed to conduct these courses anywhere in Australia, but most of us (including ERD) have permission to do so. As we are not the ones who issue the permits that you apply for, we can make no guarantees that you will obtain your permit. However, we have NEVER had a person who has completed one of our courses be denied their permit, including interstate participants.
If you are interested, you can register through our website -
www.educationalreptiledisplays.com.au
Cheers
