my mice are in love... too bad i gotta feed 'em to my snake in a couple days

[budburner]

Here's a closer one......

[dirtydingusus]

fuck dudes...


i used to bread rats mice rabbits ..and feed them all to my snakes


i had \\

3 types of corn snake

3 sinlon milks

a cupple cal kings..banna faze

2 pair of red tails

and 3 big fucking burmise pythons....

albino and het for green...



i was taught alot by a friend who was reptile currator at the bronx zoo for 14 yrs...


the reason your ball is not wanting to eat those mice....

most likely is becose they are very very picky eaters and some times will get a fav meal and not eat anything elts for a long time....i had a ball once that dident eat for 2 yrs....thought she would die for sure ...

then one day she just started eating again ...


if you want to bread your own food for your snakes ...try rats alot easyer than mice

but i can give you all the info you need to raise and sucsessfully bread ither...





hey woody


i keep tarintulas too!!!!

have been keeping them for about 10 yrs...i like the ones you can hold...


i used to let the kids play with the roase hairs alot!



i love snakes

and spiders

right now i have a fire tarantula
and a roseie boa


if you want to freze mice ...i dont remember if someone elts posted this or not yet ...use dry ice....


frezses them and kills them instantly just about....


happy hunting...




btw......big snakes love birds!!!!


go to the feed store and get chicks for growing boas...


and full size chickens for large pythons.....




they will love them!

[budburner]

Originally posted by dirtydingusus
fuck dudes...


i used to bread rats mice rabbits ..and feed them all to my snakes


i had \\

3 types of corn snake

3 sinlon milks

a cupple cal kings..banna faze

2 pair of red tails

and 3 big fucking burmise pythons....

albino and het for green...

sweet! I'm chicken shit enough of my rosie boa though.... whole chickens? **shudder**

the reason your ball is not wanting to eat those mice....

most likely is becose they are very very picky eaters and some times will get a fav meal and not eat anything elts for a long time....i had a ball once that dident eat for 2 yrs....thought she would die for sure ...

What is a ball? My snake chows down on them when she's hungry. I'll have to go back through for somebody with a ball... More than 2 years? Holy shit! I really must not know what a ball is. lol


Thanks for the advice. It's good to know I can come here with questions. I found a couple of forums on reptiles that were helpful, but not very active.

BTW, medusa decided to move some. (A kid with his new toy... if all these pics are taking too long to load I will delete some... I tried to make them small)

[budburner]

Then I didn't even post the picture!

[IGotTheCottons]

a ball is short for a ball python (the snake i have). thanks for the info. dirty D. i guess he liked that rat so much he wouldn't even look at the mice. lol. i'd be interested in learning how to breed rats so i don't always gotta go to the store to buy 'em. if you'd be kind enough to PM me the info. i'd appreciate it. i'm not looking for a lot, but enough so i could give him 1 a week and not have to worry about being overrun by 'em, and having to keep too many rats alive.

i used to have a big ass burmese (9') and a retic. (7') that my dad kept in his bedroom closet. the retic. was mean as hell though... and the burmese didn't eat for 10 months. had us pretty scared for a while. we knew she could go that long without food, but we didn't know why she wouldn't eat.

if you don't feel like buying chickens or the like you can try brushing a little chicken stock onto the mouse (or whatever) to give it the scent of poultry. this will kinda trick the snake into thinking it's eating a bird.

i love snakes and spiders as well. my parents wont let me get a tarantula though. back in the day my dad used to have all kinds of snakes (poisonous and non). he was even bitten by a western diamond back once before i was born (he used to milk snakes for some place he used to work).

some info. for budburner... once your snake has the mouse you don't really need to tug on it. she can feel her food's heart beat and won't let go until it's stopped beating.

once you get a pair of gloves (ones her teeth wont penetrate) you should hold her a lot. let her crawl around your hands and arms. this is what will get her used to being held without her feeling threatened and trying to bite you. just be sure to keep her away from your face until this happens.

also, maybe a couple artificial branches for your tank, 'cause the plant in the pics looks a little flimsy. it'll give her more to climb on, and it'd be more like a real tree.

[dirtydingusus]

btw....holding the food by the tail and leting the snake take it from you is fine for good eaters....


but big snakes can be very dangerous....birmese and retics get very aggresive when they are hungry....


and sometimes balls wont eat for a cupple mounths just becouse you put them in a new home....they need time to acclimate...



and with snakes food is mostly about smell...clean your hands before you handle them so you dont accidentaly smell like dinner

[budburner]

Originally posted by IGotTheCottons
also, maybe a couple artificial branches for your tank, 'cause the plant in the pics looks a little flimsy. it'll give her more to climb on, and it'd be more like a real tree. [/b]

Great info! I think I'm going to get gloves ASAP!

And as for the plant.. I was beginning to think that myself. She was much smaller when we first got her. She used to have a log of sorts in there, but she started getting stuck while trying to slither under it after eating... so it's outta there.

I really want a bigger tank too, but the previous owners said that's as big as she'll ever need.

So some branches? Can they be from the yard or should I buy one?

(Don't want a sick snake!)

[budburner]

I don't tug on the mouse because I think it's necessary. I just think it's cool when she squeezes it and coils around it more.

So they feel the heartbeat? **shudder**

I guess that's one great natural sphygomonometer! lol

[IGotTheCottons]

Originally posted by budburner
I really want a bigger tank too, but the previous owners said that's as big as she'll ever need.

So some branches? Can they be from the yard or should I buy one?

(Don't want a sick snake!)

branches from the yard or outdoors are infested with parasites that could cause some damage to your snake. the ones at the store are a bit expensive, but well worth it. they're specially treated to kill anything that mighta been living in 'em.

as for the tank... the general rule of thumb with this is the tank should be 2/3 the length of the snake. (so if you have a 6' snake, you need a 4' long tank, etc.).

[budburner]

Cool! Man thanks so much for the help!

2/3 ey'... she'll be fine then. (At least so far.)

I've searched for pictures of other rosie boa's and they don't seem to get too big. (perfect for me)

I read that they are endangered species... is this true? Wouldn't it be illegal to have them for pets if that were the case?

What a cool snake though. I can't believe I think a snake is beautiful... but she really is. Neat creature indeed!

I think she'll like a bigger branch in her tank.... I hear her thinking "thank you Cottons.. Thank you!"

I can't believe how big of a mouse she can eat. When I first switched her to fuzzies I was hoping she'd spit it out if it was too big. She stretched her head around it and chowed it down without a problem. What a sight!

That's when she first got stuck under her old "log" because of the fat spot the fuzzie made. Poor thing.

[dirtydingusus]

rosoe boas...unlike all other boas......are burrowing snakes....

they need to be able to get under ground....


give him about 3-4 inches of pine bedding....and she will love you for it ...


she should still come out and climb arround on your sticks...(mine does)but they realy are burrowers and without someplace to hide from time to time they can get stressed.....

some people use sand...wich is what they borrow in in the wild.....

[dirtydingusus]

make sure you use pine!!!!!


ceder is bad...very bad for small animuls and snakes....becouse it produces a dust that will colect in there lungs....

[budburner]

Yeah, I was warned about cedar....

Borrowing snake? Very interesting! I have seen her try what looks like burrowing.. but of course she doesn't get anywhere with the matting I have in there for her.


OH yeah..... I don't even know if she is a her... Her name was medusa when we got her and we've just been calling it a her since.

Is there a way to tell?

How fuckin' cool... Now I want to go get some pine bedding.

Sand too.... That sounds interesting. Would I be able to just scoop out her shit or would I have to replace the sand every time I clean her tank?

This tank is going to undergo some major redecorating... they probably won't recognize it if they ever come back to get her.

It'll be cool if it mellows her out to be able to burrow.

One question.... There is a heat pad duct taped to the under side of her tank under that ceramic hiding place you can see in the picture. It keeps the padding pretty warm and the ceramic thing pretty warm.

If I were to put sand in the tank, would that pad heat the sand up too far in that area? If so... would the pine shavings hold the heat like sand would? (I don't think it would)

There is a heat radiator over the plant that she basks in some times. It's on a timer so it's not on all the time.. but the under-tank heater is on all the time.

[dirtydingusus]

two things right off the top of my head.....


one being under tank heat pads and in the tank heat pads ...altho made for reptiles...are very bad!they can burn your snake...or lizzard!...the best way to heat your cage is with a light ....you boa would like it arround 80 or so but not much under....heat lights are the way to go ....a heat pad can also cause there food to go bad in there bellys....they are equiped to regulate there heat from abuve!iguannas are realy bad about this...the fresh fruit and veggies they eat will spoil in there bellys in no time laying on a heat pad...

number two ....to sex a snake it is nessasary to "probe"the sex glands.....dont even try this with anything other than a "snake probing kit" you can rupture your snakes organs...if you fuck up.....and it is nice to have someone with expeeriance show you one time before you try it your self...some pet shops will do it for you...but not all can be trusted...on a male the "properly "inserted probe will go an inch or more into the inverted hemipenis...on a femail snake it will only just barly enter....a 1/4 inch or so ...the hemipenis is located inside the anus...at the far sides...there are two....one on the left and one on the right....

and as for her (or him )likeing to borrow...it is a definit...most boas are all about living in the trees...but the roasie is deffinitly a digger...chech out the shape of its head and you can see it was shaped that way to dig ...in nature they live in sand....but the pine works great becouse of the ease of cleaning....like you mentioned it would suck to try and get all the poo...and urin out of sand....


i have a roaie right now...and she is about the same size as yours...and loves to dig in her pine bedding she spends about half her time digging arround down there...and the other half climbing the tree branck she has...
of all the snakes i have kept...other than the corn snakes ...the rosie boa is the best small snake to keep as a pet i preferr the corns becouse of the varriety you can find in there color and the relitive ease with wich they can be bread
but they get twice the size of a rosie with ease...

[budburner]

Wow! Good info about the under tank heat. One thing, though. I have about 1/4" thick matting on the bottom of the tank. It is pretty warm if you press on the green matt. (My guess is probably around 100 F. )

That ceramic hiding place that's in there used to plug in (I found a spot where a power cord plugged in) The person who gave "her" to me said he was using that, but was advised against it and was advised to use an under-tank heater.

So... that's no good either?

I have a heat "radiator" over the tank on a timer. It has a ceramic element that screws into a light socket. It's in a light fixture and radiates down towards the plant. I was told at another forum to not have that radiator on at all times or I could cause heat stress.

I was told that the dessert cools of significantly at night, and her body needs that cool time to regulate it's self. So I put the heat radiator on a timer and have the heater under the tank on the left side so she can go over there if she wants at any time.

I don't really like the idea of a light being her heat source... is the radiator sufficient? And if I remove the under tank heater won't the tank get dangerously cold at night? (How cold can it get safely?)

And..... without a heat source to keep the ceramic hiding spot warmed should I remove it? And I should clear up that I really can't feel that it's warmed.. the heater isn't that strong. You can really only feel the heat right on the green mat (which is right where she rests, of course).

Of course I don't want her to be uncomfortable (any more than a life in prison can be). Rotting food in the belly does not sound very nice.

And I will certainly not try to sex my snake. Poor thing... I think I'd bite if somebody tried that to me. (Well...... at least without permission....unless they wanted me to... ok I'll stop)

Thanks so much (from Medusa and myself) for the help. You are going to make her life better.