• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

Feeding behaviour?

F

Fauna

New member
Hey all,
My new boy, Shiro-who's age I don't know- got fed today. I feed on Mondays, this is only the second time I've fed him.

With clean hands, I tried to reach in and grab him, making sure he knew I was there and such, he stuck. He didn't get me, because I pulled away, but I let him calm down and then got him out.
I put him in the clean sink-where I've been feeding him- and dropped in the pinkie I had thawed out for him. He hit as soon as the pinkie hit the sink. It only took him about two minutes to get the pinkie down, maybe less. After that he started sniffing the bit of blood that had come out of the pinkie and then got into a striking position and made a biting motion towards me-no lunge though-. I finally got him back in his tank and now he's hiding. Poor baby is stressed from the ordeal. :(

I was just wondering if he was testy because he's hungry and if I should go from pinkies to fuzzies? Any tips/suggestions?



x-Misty
 
6956f451d03e59d3829c25e24703d8d6.jpg


This is him shortly after eating.


x-Misty
 
Beautiful snake..
1. He is still settling in.
2. You do not have to take him out to feed him tbh. I feed all mine in the bins just less stressful for them. Put it in a deli cup and he will most likely find it there and can enjoy it instead.
3. Regarding the size of food, what does he weigh?
 
Thank you.

I thought that if you fed inside the enclosure they would associate an open door with food? Does putting the food in the deli cup cause him to associate the deli cup with feeding time and not just an open door and a hand?
I haven't gotten to weigh him yet, my fiancé has my scale at the moment and he won't be home for about another hour. I will weigh him once he gets in.


x-Misty
 
So, my fiancé came in and we peeked at Shiro to find him like this:
918cedf9570b1ea4834327fe7637992f.jpg


When I took the first photo, it disoriented him because flash was on(I feel so bad! I didn't even think to check to see if it was on because my bedroom is actually well lit) and he got so angry and he started biting at my fiancé through the tank. :( he hit his head pretty good off the glass, but slithered away to hide. [emoji20] No weighing today, I don't want to stress him out any more than he already is.


x-Misty
 
This seems totally normal behavior for a new snake. He is just settling in. As it seems, he got a little scared. And yes, if you can manage to feed them in a different enclosure that's great! It will teach them not to make a feeding mistake and tell them "Hey, you eat here not here" HAHA! Beautiful snake!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Haha! :) Thank you! He's my baby. He's in a bigger tank now too, so he's happier. He was in a pretty small tank but now he's in a ten gal.


x-Misty
 
Fauna said:
I thought that if you fed inside the enclosure they would associate an open door with food?
Click to expand...

I have been feeding all of my snakes in their viv/enclosures for over ten years. I started doing this after getting my first retic. (I no longer have retics) Feeding a retic outside the viv can be dangerous to the snake (not to mention the handler). I believe if a snake is fed in its enclosure it is less likely to bite outside the enclosure.
 
My snakes are all fed in their enclosure and none have any aggression. They do know when feeding day is and they seem to know when I'm preparing the rats. Then all bets are off.
 
I feed the babies inside their enclosures, they are in tubs so it's a bit different then my adult. But I fix up their fresh tubs, weigh out the pinkie, put it in there then weight the wiggling worm and put it inside. They eat and go to sleep. The one however seems to have to be fed inside a deli cup so that one works a bit different.

the adult and juveniles however get fed outside of their enclosure as I use that time for cleaning their larger enclosures. It also alleviates my concern about them ingesting the aspen bedding. But neither way have I had an feeding aggression toward me.
 
bhb_reptiles said:
This seems totally normal behavior for a new snake. He is just settling in. As it seems, he got a little scared. And yes, if you can manage to feed them in a different enclosure that's great! It will teach them not to make a feeding mistake and tell them "Hey, you eat here not here" HAHA! Beautiful snake!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

Welcome Brian & Lori Barczyk !!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top