EMERGENCY HERPETOCULTURE:

Eighty-day occupation with one thousand reptiles.

By Nelli Kuzmenko

From the first day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24th February 2022, the Reptiles Breeding Centre, owned by Sergei Prokopiev and Nelli Kuzmenko, was in the front shelling zone. Nelli lived that nightmare for 80 days; she refused to leave through the green corridor, a safe escape route for civilians, so as not to leave the animals she was caring for. Sergei, her husband, returned to Kharkiv from abroad on the first day of the war, but could not reach their home due to daily shelling. Martial law and a curfew were also established in this area and, sadly, the Reptiles Breeding Centre building was eventually destroyed completely.

Fortunately, many of the people and a considerable number of animals inside survived, and in addition to commercial, conservational, and scientific herpetoculture, a new direction emerged: emergency herpetoculture.

Nelli’s story

My name is Nelli Kuzmenko. I spent 80 days in occupation, alone with a dog and 1,000 reptiles. I know that many of you empathised and worried about our fate. Thank you all for your kind words! Today I am going to tell you my story. How it was, how we saved the animals and what happened to them next.

Everyone was talking about the possibility of war, however we continued not to believe it until we saw it for ourselves. On the night of 24th February, I woke up to a terrible roar. The war had begun.

Our village, Russkii Tishki, is located only 30 km away from the Russian border. I wanted to turn on the light but there was no electricity. My daughter Olia and I rushed around the dark rooms packing clothes, money, and documents. In the morning, it became clear that it was an occupation. There were Russian soldiers, tanks, and military equipment all around. They set up their terrible guns near our house, shelling the city of Kharkiv day and night. Stands with terrariums were shaking and the windows were shaking in their frames.

My husband Sergei Prokopiev has been engaged in herpetoculture for more than 30 years, mostly in largescale keeping and breeding of lizards. At the beginning of the war, he was in Turkey on business. Our employees, of course, were not able to come to work. The responsibility for thousands of small creatures’ lives fell on my shoulders. This was not supposed to happen!

There was no electricity, heating, or water. The house cooled down quickly and I was panicked and confused. Fortunately, there was some gas in two of the six rooms where the animals were kept, so we had gas stoves for cooking. When I turned them on, the temperature started to rise. From that moment, they were burning around the clock.

We had to act quickly. All animals were transferred into those two rooms, which was difficult as there wasn't enough space. We moved terrariums from other laboratories and filled every possible location, placing them on the floor and in the aisles. In some places it was necessary to squeeze sideways to get through the room. Animals that had lived individually had to be placed together. Meanwhile, there was constant firing of bombs, shells, mines and rockets. One evening, my daughter and I were walking down the stairs when we heard a deafening explosion and saw a bright flash right outside the window. The house shook. In horror, we ran to the basement, huddled in a corner and prayed. It was a bomb and it had fallen on our site. In the morning, a few meters from our house, we found a huge crater about six meters in diameter and about 3 meters deep. The bomb tore out several trees and the whole house was covered with soil. Shrapnel pierced our roof and our neighbour’s house was burnt down.

26th February 2022

We pulled the mattress and all the blankets we had down to the basement. We spent the night there, hiding from the intense shelling. Shells and mines destroyed the fence, filled the iron gates full of holes, and damaged the roof. Shrapnel knocked out most of the windows. I prayed all the time that the windows in the rooms where the animals were kept wouldn’t be damaged. Suddenly I remembered that we had a gasoline generator! My happiness knew no bounds but the generator turned out to be underpowered. It was only able to provide a small amount of heat and light for the animals. I had to make a schedule and switch on the terrariums in turn for very short periods of time. Also, there was very little gas and nowhere to get more. First, I turned on the generator for 4 hours a day, then for 3 hours, for two, for one... In the end, I had to turn it on once every few days to get water and charge the phone.

I spent a significant amount of time heating water, pouring it into different plastic and glass bottles and containers (Fig. 4). I put them in the terrariums so that the animals could get warmth from sitting on the bottles, as they would on warm stones. This allowed many of them to survive, including agamids, skinks, geckos, lacertids, but it failed with chameleons, for no obvious reason. No matter how hard I tried, the animals died. There was not enough space, warmth, food, or enough of my time for all the animals. The number of insects had dropped dramatically. I had to choose which of the animals to give warmth or food to. These were terrible choices to have to make. I was running all day like a hamster in a wheel, but still there was not enough time. Daylight hours were very short, with the onset of night-time and Russian soldiers forbade even turning on flashlights. I sent every animal possible to brumation.

Breeding in a warzone

After a while, many babies began to be born, including skinks, bearded dragons, crested geckos and chameleons. In the beginning, I allowed everyone to be born. I didn't know what was going to happen or when this madness would be over. I felt that I had to save everyone. This turned out to be a mistake.

Babies were dying and it was painful to watch. Every day I collected dozens of small corpses. Now, I had to choose who was born and who was not. It was a little easier with animals that, in addition to insects, could eat other food. I gave them berries and fruit and made purees for the geckos from cherries, currants, apricots and apples.

In the spring, when the grass began to grow, I picked up dandelions, nettles, and clovers. A woman used to live on the street next to us who had three cows. I visited her to get some milk to make cottage cheese and milk porridge for the skinks. One morning I visited her but a shell had hit her house and she had died. Her cows were gone too. The next day she was laid to rest and I wept all day. I still could not believe what had happened. Thank God my grandparents didn't live to see this!

When the war began, Sergei had immediately returned to Kharkiv but we couldn’t reach each other. Mobile connection was very poor and there was no internet. I managed to get some signal and called Sergei and asked him what the latest news was on the war. Every time Sergei insisted on my departure but I couldn't leave the animals

After 2 weeks of this nightmare, I decided that my daughter had to leave. She had really helped me a lot, worked all day along with me but now she is in Germany and is doing well.

Additional challenges

Day and night, there was a terrible roaring. Our dog was terrified and I had to look after another injured dog whose owners had gone.

The food was almost gone. I cooked the same porridge for myself, the dogs and the skinks, but the porridge was running out too and it was impossible to buy anything anywhere. All shops were looted on the first days of the war. We only survived thanks to other people.

When the war started, yesterday’s strangers became family. They shared what they could equally, but no one knew how long this madness would last.

One day, I went to the centre of the village. An unfamiliar man was walking towards me, carrying a sack of grain. At that time, I had nothing to feed the crickets and asked if I could buy some grain. He said he didn't need money and gave me his bag. He asked if I had a safe shelter to hide and showed me a house with a secure basement where he and his neighbours spend the night and hide during shelling. He said: “If you come to us, there will be a place for everyone!”

At this time, I always carried a knife on my belt and was glad that I had a big dog because I felt safer. There were only 4 people left on our street, and one was my neighbour who mended the generator that kept breaking down. He saw that I was caring for the animals all day, and I ate almost nothing. He began to prepare food for the two of us and for my dog. When windows blew out from the explosions, he covered them and repaired the roof, all surrounded by incessant shelling.

One day, I was caring for the animals, as usual, when we heard the volley of a mortar. Me and the dog ran to hide in the basement and, after the explosion, I went back up to see that a bomb had exploded right in front of our fence. Everything outside was destroyed and all the windows blown out. Just a few minutes before I had been taking out the rubbish. The glass rattled; the windows swung open from the blast. After waiting a few minutes, I went out to see what had happened. A mine had exploded right in front of our fence. There was no fence anymore, the iron gates looked like a colander, almost all the windows were blown out on this side of the building. A few minutes later Sasha came running, he always ran after shelling to check whether I was alive.

2nd May 2022

At this point, our gas line was destroyed by a shell, and I could no longer maintain the ambient temperature in the lab or warm the bottles for animal. I couldn’t feed them because without warming up they would not be able to digest food. I couldn't even cook food for myself and the dogs. As it got colder outside, the animals were forced into wintering. Then I found a wood-burning stove and firewood in a neighbour's barn firewood

The shelling intensified and it was very dangerous to go outside. Every day, shells flew into our street and we spent most of our time in the basement.

Then a miracle happened! We were released and Sergei arrived.

We quickly grabbed the dog and as many animals as we could fit into the car and left for Kharkiv. Most of the animals and all our things remained in our house as we would need three more trips there to pick up everything. When we went to the checkpoint the next day, they didn't let us through as the situation had escalated and it was dangerous there. “Try it in a couple of days” they said. This was the case for more than two weeks. We didn't know if our house was intact or whether any of the animals were left to save. We tried to negotiate with the military and volunteers. They shrugged helplessly and sympathized.

Finally, we were given the contact of the Ukrainian military who agreed to go back for the animals, but we weren’t allowed to go with them.

They left the same day, 30th May, and brought the animals out. When they realised that there were still many hibernating animals in the house, they returned the next day and brought back all the animals that were alive. They came under fire during the evacuation and risked their lives to save the animals.

On 20th June, the centre was razed to the ground. We were alive and had hundreds of animals with us, which urgently need to be warmed, fed and watered. We had no premises, equipment, or terrariums, or even personal belongings! Without hesitation, we were taken in at Kyiv by our close friend and partner of over 30 years - Dmitri Tkachev.

Our animals were hosted in the BION Terrarium Center and we were living in Dmitri's apartment, but still faced difficulties. We still can’t accommodate all the animals properly and we have had to temporarily place 80 skinks in small plastic boxes. The animals were uncomfortable and cramped and there was no heating. In addition, we were faced with the task of restoring the number of chameleons. Since the beginning of the war, BION has been fighting for survival and continues to care for thousands of animals and their employees. We continue rescuing animals every day.

Support international herpetoculture

Nelli and Sergei were lucky to survive and evacuate the animals that survived during the occupation. The evacuation of reptiles was possible due to the assistance of brave soldiers of the Ukrainian army, who are ready to save not only the lives of humans, but animals as well. To learn more about the struggles faced in Ukraine and the dedication of herpetoculturists around the globe, please support the Responsible Herpetoculture Project by visiting www.responsibleherpetoculture.com.ua.