Strangles started coiling!

[JeffDenver]

This is so cool...he just started doing this today. He's never coiled around food before.

Sorry for the image quality...it was bad lighting combined with the plastic feeding cage...so there is a lot of distortion.

I think it is because the food is so big he has to coil to swallow it. This is his third fuzzy though, so he doesnt seem to have a problem getting them down. This is the first time I have ever seen him coil though.

I weighed him today too. 19 grams! He was only 12 grams when I first got him.

 

[Blubb]

Very nice ! How old is he? Because mine doesn't coil around his prey.

 

[JeffDenver]

He is young. I weighed him before this picture and he was 19 grams. He is the same size as hatchlings sold at pet stores.

 

[SnakeAround]

I see it quite often that they start strangling when moved to fuzzy's, like in nature they would struggle too much to be eaten alive perhaps... I don't see many hatchlings coil a pinky, though some do.

 

[JeffDenver]

He didnt do it initially...I think he did it more to help him swallow it than because he thought it would struggle. The prey item is pretty big for his size, though it is still less than 1.5x his thickest part (in fact I think it is 1x his thicket part now).

 

[SnakeAround]

Not sure how coiling would help swallowing...

 

[JeffDenver]

Because he has to work his mouth around it, and coiling allows him to hold it in place.

 

[SnakeAround]

Ok, reasonable thought

 

[JeffDenver]

Every time he eats those things, I am convinced he cant swallow it. But he always does.