Why 30 Reptiles Died During Shipping - the Bad Side of Unboxings

more positive videos on the way shortly... until then, do you have any stories of animals being shipped to or from you? speaking of, I've reopened the intake kits, so if you're looking to rehome you can get in line at emeraldscales.com/rehome

This is heartbreaking, it seems like most of your customers really don't care about their animal, I had assumed it wasnt about getting the animals off their hands but more about getting the animal to you for their betterment of their lives :( the fact less than 5% ask for updates is so sad

it hurts me when i see one die

Ily

Important video 💚

This is an insane business model. I guess 99% of your income comes from youtube

watching this while i’m waiting on receiving an african fat tail is really helping

I know it's more than likely to ship okay overall, but I think I'll be takin a drive if I get a new reptile :'¹ I like road trips anyway

can make podcast? Or no?🤠🤑🤠🤑🤑🤑🤑🤑🤕🤑🤠🤑🤑🤑🤑🤑🤑🤠🤠🤠🤠🤠🤠🤠🤠🤑🤑🤠🤑🤠🤠🤑🤤🤕😐👹😸👻👿🤠😮🤤🤭🤤🤔😴🤫😬🤩☹️😨😁🙂😄🇧🇴👨👨🇦🇴🇦🇼🇧🇪🇦🇷🇦🇷😄🇦🇴🇦🇴

It'd be cool to hear in a video what these people said to put them into the blacklist

Sad

I've never had a problem with my live animal packages. Typically I pick them up at the post office rather than be delivered to my house. I am mostly getting birds this way. Actually have had better results with USPS than Fedex.

I see calsifer in the back

yooo. what is that on the rock in the tank behind him.i need ansers

Is there a reason you put the heatpack on top? (Heat rises so I always secure them to the bottom.) I'm in Canada, so we put heatpacks between the styrofoam & cardboard box, the heatpacks between boxes prevent the ones in the box from dying. (I haven't shipped as many animals, but I've had zero deaths so far.) Also: You can have FedEx require a signature and they won't leave the package unattended.

I'm sorry but this is why I unsubbed from you and many other reptile channels. It's sickening that you parade around with all these "unboxing" when we're dealing with live animals. There's no dignity in it. These are real animals, the feel pain and fear and the reality is we don't know what they're experiencing when they're travelling this way. They're not your toys or your play things (or your views, but clearly they are to you), these are real breathing animals that deserve respect and care. You can't account for what a delivery driver does or doesn't do, for how that package is handled, so why are you taking the risk at all? It just feels like this is another gimmick for you to receive views while pretending to be a good person when there's nothing good nor fair shipping animals out like this.

I wish many of you would stop buying reptiles you're awful humans. And stop shipping during the winter.

Have you heard about USPS putting restrictions on the shipping of reptiles and poultry?!?

great vid dawg. this needs to be the standard!!

What kind of snake should I buy a corn snake, a king snake, a Kenyan sand boa, a hog nose snake, or a ball python

Can i ship myself over to EmeraldScales?. .. I don't have a stove in my apartment and i haven't had pizza in months, which basically constitutes malnourishment! . Just need to borrow that stove yo.

Goddam!, Adventure Time is the shit bro, my 26yo ass watching that shit like it was Avengers Endgame.

Have them take a picture of the animal with like a newspaper or add or something with the date on it.

Wow amazing video that shows about new idea

goherping please make a crested gecko guide im planning to get one and i dont know what to do. please pleasae plaeqse palesae please plaese apapalsea plsea plseas ppplease please

Have you thought about making a video talking about popular breeders online and where there are reliably good, ethical, safe, and captive bred or adopted reptiles to purchase or adopt? It’s hard to find an information on a lot of the bigger sites that sell reptiles, like back water or underground.

I used to work as a package handler at UPS and honestly with the belt & how roughly people handle boxes/bags that hold the boxes, I’m surprised there’s not more shipping problems. These losses make me sad but I’m glad it’s only 1/100 for your outgoing!

hey GoHerping just wondering if you are going to do another review video, i sent in one on insta for my juvenile corn snake and was wondering if you could review it, so i know what to add or take out. also im a huge fan of you and always watch your videos. i even named my corn snake Gobi after yours.

why do you tax so hard for ur reptiles

Very important conversation to have, so sorry to hear abt all these hard deaths

I have always despised the very thought of shipping live animals. People are often just too careless for me to trust shipping animals. I worked in a pet shop in the live stock section ( Literally anything that is alive) when I was a teen. Most animals that are stocked in pet shops are not bred locally, typically. They have huge breeding facilities that stock pet shops. Hamsters, budgies, rabbits etc. Fish are often shipped in from Asia. There's so many times there would be dead animals from shipping, crappy couriers, accidents at the airports. More would die soon after arrival during quarantine, just due to the stress. Crappy couriers and airport accidents had the highest body counts.

When will you get more tortoises?

I know this isn’t really relevant to the video but I have a beardie who has pretty long nails and I’m really worried about it. I clip them as often as I can but they aren’t really growing past the quick and the quick is not receding so I have no idea what to do. If anyone has any ideas I would seriously appreciate it

You seem to be such a tender-hearted young man. Don't beat yourself up about the occasional accident. We've raised mini goats for well over a decade, and often bought kids from a man who had raised goats for 30 years. Once we went to pick up a new young, well-bred doeling. The man called us, apologetic, just before we left. The little goat was dead. He'd seen her that morning, out running around. Then he saw her at lunch time, again, out running around. By mid-afternoon she was dead, with no apparent symptoms or trauma. It could have been she had some type of asymptomatic pneumonia; the cause was never determined. Of course on the farm we've had many animal die; three that stand out were 1) my daughter's donkey from a rare neurological condition and 2) a female goat developed a chemical imbalance that the vet simply couldn't explain or correct and 3) a foster puppy that turned out to have an inoperable intestinal abnormality. Again, these were animals from species that have been studied a good deal, yet even so issues can go undetected. Again, consider how many "healthy" humans, even young people, die of sudden aneurysms or cardiac events. Certainly in such small animals such as lizards there may be an underlying, asymptomatic condition, imbalance, or weakness that only appears when the animal is shipped, OR as you say, an event (a radical temperature change, being dropped, or even exposure to some type of chemical vapor) that could undermine the animal's health. You do a good work in helping these reptiles find new homes, and shipping is just a necessary evil.

Here the couriers are specifically for the animals, so they go straight from breeder to new home

I would say if people are spending money to send you their animal that they do in fact care about it because if they didn’t they wouldn’t spend any money on it and would just let it die

How old was the confusing death leopard gecko? Possibly old?

I'm sorry but this is the first time I've heard that people just ship them by FedEx????? Granted, I am a first time owner (In the UK) so I'm probably just inexperienced, but the site I bought my Milk Snake from had a Reptile Courier who they hired every few weeks for a 'run' to deliver their animals... I just assumed that was the norm??? (Edit, forgot to mention) - I was given a specific time to collect him, plus they had my contact information in case I didn't answer the door or there were any issues

I really want a beardie but right now isn’t the time. A I just got a new puppy B I don’t have the right resources/I don’t feel ready and C current weather in New England. Honestly I’ll probably apply in a few years to adopt one from you. 10000% know now is not time time as much as I want one. I couldn’t do that to a little fella

"I hate the US postal service." Careful now. Saying that in current year makes you a republican.

Where did u learn your math 5 out of 250 is 98% successful that's 2 out of a hundred or 2% not 1% have died for no reason other than being shipped as u say!

I'm gonna to buy a jackson chameleon I've done over 2 weeks of research but if you have any suggestions plz tell me

You should make a video about WandaVision Why? No idea, just seems like it would be interesting

This is a good information for people who is going to be shipping a animal good video Alex

You should add a before and after or transformation for the reptiles on your website

I used to work for PetSmart and surprisingly the places we got reptiles from did a pretty good job with shipping. We got lots of animals in a single box but they were all in individual, secured and labeled deli cups. Lids on cups were usually taped and rubber banded down, I never saw an escaped animal. Boxes were lined with Styrofoam and usually had a bit of paper padding (there were so many cups though that there wasn't a ton of room for that.) Boxes were also shipped with terrifyingly well secured heat or cool packs. Not advocating you buy animals from big stores but I was always pretty surprised at how well they shipped.

Maintaining a blacklist is a great measure to be taking to help ensure the well-being of your animals. Well wishes. Love your honesty in these videos.

The flukes might be explained by pre-existing heart conditions. Especially if they were treated well before shipping since you wouldn’t really know.

My mom works for the usps bro-.

My baby 3 month old ball python was sent in the mail during the winter at 40 degrees, with no heating pack and the box was damaged, luckily he was a tank

Lep Gecko 1: "Dude, I swear, I was in my cage, then all of a sudden, everything went black" Lep Gecko 2: "Uh, sure, whatever you say" Lep Gecko 1: "No, really. I could hear muffled voices and couldn't move" Lep Gecko 2: "Alien abduction, right? Lep Gecko 1: "YES! I was on several space ships for hours and ended up here" Lep Gecko 2: "Look. Just stay on your side of the cage and don't talk to me anymore"

The "BLACK" list...😒🤔

Amazing video 😀😀

I just want to say thank you for doing this because so many people online especially breeders and stuff like who have their USmuchs channels and they're all look at what I'm making. want you to buy their creatures and this really made me second think the safety precautions. taken when shipping creatures and I would like to be getting an animal from a trusted Source .There's so many things that lots of people don't think about when you go to ship an animal and your video doesn't just show us The Good it shows us there are things to know and ways to mess up and you telling us the bad and some of the ugly on like malnutrition and the bad well the deaths right well that makes it so much easier for people like first-time shippers to be able to be like is it really the safest thing or should I just drive there and go get or drop off the pet

I think I fell in love 😖 you are generally so intelligent on what you do and it really is just adorable 💗 thank you for informing us love!

How the heck did Stan survive then

The flukes could've been package handler mishaps. Either being put on the wrong plane(not pressurized) or just plain mishandling the package.

In the UK the only animals that you can send through the post are invertebrates and aquatic creatures. Anything else - reptiles, poultry, etc - can only be delivered by a licensed animal courier. And yes, it is expensive. Which prevents people from just grabbing themselves a fun new pet online like you'd pick up a video game. The UK has a lot of problems as a country but I'm very thankful that we got this one thing right at least.

And this is why I always pick up

Animals cant be shipped in the uk. Its really unfair for the animals 🙁

Do any of them travel by air? Cargo holds are not oxygenated. Sometimes live animals are accidentally placed in the wrong hold and die.

Maybe add illustrations to the written instructions on how to "package" them to send? I know dealing with the general public is... a lot. Good luck. Hopefully you figure it out.

It actually makes me trust more in the shipping how openly you talk about those who sadly didn't survive. Is this strange? 🤔😊

I've five animals shipped to me so far (not from you). 1. Ball python, ordered from XYZReptiles, arrived perfectly. 2. Emperor scorpion, ordered from Paladin Exotics, arrived perfectly. 3. Feeder dubia roaches, 50, from AB Dragons, arrived perfectly. 4. Curly-hair tarantula, ordered from Paladin Exotics, arrived dead due to weather and uncontrollable FedEx delay. 5. Curly-hair tarantula, replacement, sent by Paladin Exotics, arrived perfectly. The python and two tarantulas all had heat packs that were at least partially warm when they arrived.

Can you make a 2021 update on how to setup your leopard gecko tank

You know Snake Discovery had an animal shipped to them and caught the Fed Ex guy shaking the box and spinning it around in his hands even when the box said LIVE ANIMAL on it. Maybe that could have been what killed the reptiles you shipped?

Could you actually show us how to do The packaging ?

Im sorry but 0:44 Tate's cookies!!! Fr tho, it's sad how some shippers/delivery people don't even care.

As a ups preloader, sometimes box labels get overlooked and boxes get thrown around and slid around a bit. Especially during peak season. Idk if fed ex is the same but stuff happens and many of the workers are seasonal and work very early in the morning.

Lemme cut ur hair

People suck!

Hey! Love your concern about reptiles. I also noticed your spirited away dolls. One of my favorite directors/writers ever! I went as no-face for the last two Halloweens. Going as dream from the sandman comics this year

I watched a USPS mail man try to carry like 10 packages and they all fell all over the place and I was like... Hope nothing was breakable. 😒

Imagine asking people to send you $100 so you can receive their animals and sell it for 3x the retail price. Whack.

We had a fedex guy toss a baby leopard gecko box into the air with a twirl one time, I will never forget that day because of just how ridiculous it was. He realized what he did wrong immediately after he had done it but it was already too late...thankfully she was still alive and seemingly healthy, but I can't say for certain that her "weirdness" wasn't the result of being tossed in the air like a pre-game basketball...

I agree, I don't agree with shipping any animal, reptiles..its cruel..

congrats, now i'm worried that i'm on the blacklist... I've never interacted with emeraldscales aside from joining the email list, but damn my anxiety is S P I K I N G

i work at fedex and to be honest its terrible. When i see a box that even says live animal i try my best to put it in a secure spot. But sometimes, i would confirm with a manager and they would even say just throw it in.

I honestly see you as a super trustworthy person to ship out animals despite the 5 deaths. Even in your own mistake you owned up to it, shitty large company owners will never do that. Seeing this though did make me realize the dangers due to how the workers at certain companies treat boxes. So glad i got my BTS in safe through usps.

I like the vibe of your videos

I try to avoid having animals shipped to places. Not that I don't trust the seller, I don't trust the people who do the shipping and handling. I've seen FedEx and UPS mishandle packages that say live animals.

You are also saying at the beginning that these animals are for rehabilitation when you get them You really shouldn’t ship or suggest shipping sick animals period that’s just common sense

As someone who worked in a shipping and mailing facility, I can tell you that shipping animals is NOT safe. Package handlers typically have have little to zero regard for the contents of the boxes they move and are just concerned with getting them on and off the truck as quick as possible.

I love how you tackle the unsavory topics of reptile husbandry as well as the fun ones. I'm proud of you, Alex.. :) I personally have had 3 reptiles shipped to me, 2 in one box and 1 in another, and all three were perfect on arrival. It makes me sad how many people don't care about their pets and follow up on their well being with their new homes.

the leopard gecko that died couldve died from heart attack or stress if the box got shaken

I've had multiple animals shipped to me and had 2 DOA's over the years. One was a praying mantis who was packaged horribly- the box was way too big with no paper insulation and I could tell the poor thing was bouncing all around the box in his deli cup. The second was a leech who was properly packaged so I'm not sure why he was DOA. But overall I've been impressed with the packaging companies use to assure their animals are shipped safely, and have received many healthy happy reptiles, inverts, and aquatics by mail.

At 1:01 was I the only one looking at Stan

If packaging instructions are an issue why not just make a video guide?

Omg :(

Does anyone know what happened to that paralyzed baby turtle he made a lego prosthetic for

Okay, 15 in one box??? What animal and how I’m intrigued.

You gotta put a little product in that hair mannnnn

I had a columbian rainbow boa mailed to me, a young male- doorbell rang, the FUCKING DELIVERY GUY WAS STANDING THERE SPINNING THE BOX IN ALL WAYS. Needless to say I screamed at him "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING THERE'S AN ANIMAL IN THERE!!!!" He tried to say he didn't know and I pointed at, you know- the stickers on it saying live animal, this side up and such. It was ages ago so I don't think it had to have a specific reptile label then. Or maybe it was supposed and the breeder didn't do that- but it did say animal, handle with care and such. I've never came so close to decking someone's bridge of the nose who hadn't hit me first. I told the breeder what happened, and the poor boy was dead inside of a week. He had seemed fine until he wasn't alive anymore. If I hadn't have seen that I would have thought the breeder did something wrong on his end.

When u ship these animals like when u put them in the dixie cup or the cotton bag an then into the styrofoam an the box an all that with the heater pad do u take ur fuzzy head an tickle the animal with ur hairs before they go in the box

Okay so I woke up and somehow this was the first thing I was thinking about today, and now I see this video on my timeline

Im glad this topic came up and iv had one of my friends was getting a new ball python and the delivery driver was spinning the box despite the labeling snakes are hardy and good at servicing but it was just to much for it to take.

you gotta be something different when u manage to starve a leopard gecko .. those things are hardy , man .

I love how transparent you are with everything and it’s refreshing to have an honest pet channel that shows cons with the pros of even the dark side

Alex: Fuck the USPS Me: so I see you've chosen death 🔪🔪🔪 The USPS is so so very understaffed and under paid and so very under supported that that's exactly why they suck

I mean sometimes animals just die. Heart attack, aneurysm, stroke, congenital issues you can’t see, sometimes stuff just happens. Happens to humans too.