The cobra is large and obviously agitated. Up in strike posture, weaving and bobbing, its flared hood is the size of a grown man's cupped hands. It's not the type of animal many people waould want to tangle with, but Mr Lai, a keeper at Taipei掇 HERP Rescue Center, is undaunted.
"We have ways of tricking them,"he says casually as he positions himself at the right side of the cage, face-to-face with the swaying hood and diamond black eyes. Maintaining eye contact, he reaches up and opens the sliding glass door at the far left side of the cage, where the food would be inserted during a real feeding.
The snake strikes at Mr Lai's face but its lunge is cut short by the thin layer of aquarium glass. Mr Lai blinks. There's a glistening splatter of venom streaking the glass in front of his face. He slides the glass at the opposite side of the cage back shut.
"That's how we feed the poisonous snakes," he says matter-of-factly, batting a hand down the row of glass aquariums that stretch out into the gloom. "It's when there's more than one snake in the cage that things start to get exciting."
Along with this cobra and hundreds of other poisonous snakes, the HERP center is home to more than 190 different species of reptiles from every corner of the globe. Blue skinks, bearded dragons, crocodiles, alien-looking veiled chameleons, reticulated pythons, leopard tortoises, and tiny glistening frogs and toads of every color.
Located on the grounds of the Taipei Zoo, the center is run by the city's Ministry of Agriculture, which founded it three years ago to fight a little-known problem in Taiwan -stray and homeless reptiles. It is a problem that stems mainly from the government's effort to crack down on the growing worldwide trade in exotic reptile species. When reptiles become caught up in this conflict, they often end up without a home, and sometimes they end up in the Taiwan wilderness, where they pose a serious threat to native species. That's when the HERP Center steps in.
Lin Hua-ching, a herpetologist who runs the center and oversees the team of keepers, explains that the increased demand for exotic pets since the mid-1990's is the main force behind the center's existence.
"When they started checking more closely, custom officials at places like CKS airport, Keelung Harbor and mail centers around the island were finding more and more boxes, crates and luggage stuffed full of exotic reptiles,"Lin says. "After they are discovered, the animals can't be returned to the sender so they are sent to us and we take care of them. Many of those reptiles that make it through customs eventually find themselves at the HERP Center.
"People buy these turtles, frogs and snakes as pets in night markets and pet stores throughout Taiwan,"explains Jessie Chi, the center's chief of education. "But after awhile they get tired of them and - 'plop' - they dump them in the nearest river."
For that reason, the center maintains a don't-ask, don't-tell policy when it comes to receiving new animals, and it welcomes submissions from private citizens. "Basically, we don't turn a reptile away unless it is sick or we are not equipped to care for it, "Lin says.
The fire department also adds to the center's collection of poisonous snakes when called on to remove them from the homes of Taipei residents. But Lin is not worried that the center will one day be overrun by the constant influx of crocodiles, snakes, turtles and frogs. Instead, Lin says not enough reptiles are making it to the center, where he and his team can keep track of them.
RSS