Problematic Snake Feeding

Problematic Snake Feeding

Unfortunately, feeding any snake is not always as simple as putting a mouse in the tank to collect it gone the next morning. Occasionally the snake will refuse to feed and it may be tricky to gather going again. There are all sorts of feeding hints and tips; however there is always a reason why a snake is not eating. Below there is a checklist of reasons, and then solutions to the problems:

1) tainted vivarium / box

2) Insufficient heat

3) No veil or hiding area

4) imperfect food item

5) Recently Wild Caught animal

6) Other

1) irascible Vivarium / Box

Generally when a snake refuses to feed, the first thing you should think, especially if it has been recently purchased is if the environment is lawful. Is your vivarium too mammoth? It is possible to have something too cramped but this is rarely the case, as snakes often capture tighter surroundings. Many keepers are so keen to build their hatchling snake in a 3 or 4ft vivarium that they are unnerved to hear that this sort of treatment can eventually lead to the death of the snake. The vivarium / box should gradually derive larger as the snake grows. For a hatchling snake a tupperware box no larger than the length of the snake should be provided.

2) Insufficient Heat

All snakes should have a thermal gradient, meaning they can go to one raze of the enclosure to warm up, and depart to the opposite kill to frosty off again. If the snake is kept too warm, its metabolic rate will urge up which will generally not cause it to go off its food, but it will need more food to withhold it going. If the snake is kept too chilly, it may go off its food. Not only that, its metabolic rate will have slowed down causing the digestive system to function slower than usual, which may cause the snake to regurgitate any food which it may have swallowed.

3) No hide or hiding area

When keeping snakes in a tupperware box, a hiding plot may not be totally well-known, especially if you have a deep layer of substrate for the snake to conceal in. However, possibly the most crucial factor of keeping snakes is that they must feel gain. Whether you resolve to consume an ice cream tub, a cereal box or a naturalistic share of cork bark, the snake must have an status to retreat where it feels splendid.

The size of the hiding state is also essential. It must be substantial enough to fit the snake in, with very shrimp room for anything else. You may also expend artificial plants and branches which hide a higher station in the vivarium. Some snakes may feel more score among the leaves and branches.

If the snake refuses to feed with all these hiding places provided, it is worth placing the food in the hiding status itself, or in its entrance. The snake may feel regain, but not accumulate enough to venture out to feed. This technique often works with newly acquired specimens.

4) unfavorable food item

There are many ways of offering your snake a food item. Firstly you need to figure out the size food item it needs. A rule of thumb is that the size of food offered should be no wider than the girth of the snake. If the snake refuses the food, try something smaller.

Below are some bullet points that interpret different food items and your plan of feeding them:

o Try offering mice and rats of varying sizes. If these fail, try chicks, gerbils, hamsters or similar sized rodents or birds.

o Many keepers acquire distinct snakes will only seize particular coloured rodents. Try white, brown and sad rodents or any other colours you can accept.

o Scenting the food item with a lizard, frog, chick, fish, canned fish oil or a live mouse may stimulate its feeding response.

o Try using freshly killed mice, this will smell a lot more and should also tranquil be warm. This plot works in many cases and is worth considering.

o Try cutting the tip of the nose off the rodent to reveal the flesh slightly.

o Braining is another map - this works by using a pin or a enthralling knife and slicing the top of the rodent's head, exposing the brain. For some reason brain smells precise estimable to snakes!

o Do not touch the food item; occasionally if it smells the owner on the food, it will not go for it.

o Try heating up the rodent; establish it on a heat mat for a few minutes, or dipping the head in boiling water. Be careful not to overheat the food item, as it may be so hot it will literally split the stomach, which is not comely!

o Tease feeding is a design commonly frail by many keepers; this involves a pair of long forceps or tweezers, and literally wriggling the food around in front of the snake, acting as if it was alive. If this fails, try lightly tapping the snake on the nose with the food, sometimes they appear to strike out of enrage, then if it connects with the rodents head it will often coil round and constrict as a natural reaction.

o Live feeding is a device which should be the last resort. There are many keepers which are suited of getting almost any snake feeding without resorting to feeding live. However the more novice keepers may not be worthy of trying all the tricks of the trade. Before resorting to feeding live, phone around a few known herpetologists and ask for support. Any herpetologist who is a member of some type of club or organization is usually more than willing to lend a helping hand. Live feeding is not a unpleasant thing in its contain apt, but often a snake will seize to live food and commence to refuse anything else. Unless you have easy access to live mice, this should be avoided.

5) Recently Wild Caught Animal

This could possibly be the trickiest plight to solve in terms of feeding. A wild caught snake will have been feeding on live animals all of its life. So, to assume it out of its natural environment into unusual surroundings and offer it a dumb mouse is often unprejudiced asking too grand! Not only will it have only fed on live, but it will have approach across almost every animal which it naturally co-habitates with, such frogs, lizards, itsy-bitsy rodents, birds and bird eggs, plus other smaller snakes and many more potential food sources. The snake could have been feeding on a dozen or so food items throughout its life, so be certain to try as grand as possible.

6) Other

Breeding season is a popular time when snakes will go off their food. Males very often refuse to feed because they are thinking more about mating than anything else. This is well known with many snakes and generally starts from February through to May depending on the breeding cycle of the snake in ask. Females rarely go off their food when it comes to breeding, as they need all the plump reserves to effect the eggs. It is not peculiar however for the female to discontinuance feeding about a month or so before she lays her eggs. The reason for this is not quite definite, it could be because the eggs purchase up so remarkable room in the snake's body, it may become hard to digest and process the food. The only solution to this is to wait and hold trying, it should not last longer than 2-3 months and for a healthy snake, it will not be affected.

Stress is a ample killer in snakes, and it can be bought on by many reasons. One major factor is over handling. Many owners capture a pet snake and all they want to do is play with it. This is commonplace, but the snake needs its believe time objective like anyone else. I suggest for a newly acquired hatchling snake it should be handled for no more than 20 minutes per day. This can be spread out into 10 slight intervals if you wish, but the less you handle it the better. As it grows older and becomes more accustomed to you; you can gradually handle it more and more. If the snake refuses to feed, the first thing you should do is to cessation handling it as it objective adds more stress.

Other methods for non - feeders

1) Drying the snake out - This plot stimulates the snake to leer for moisture which can be in a food item. consume the water bowl out for about a week and go the temperature up objective a couple of degrees. After a week, soak an appropriate sized rodent in water to defrost, and offer it to the snake dripping wet. originate determined the snake is not offered the food item on a substrate such as wood chips or aspen. You should support your snake on newspaper for this whole process. If the snake begins to glance at all emaciated, location the water aid in immediately. This whole process should be monitored extremely carefully.

2) If the snake is very young or tiny, try offering the tails of rodents, or chick legs. These are easier to swallow and may stimulate them to feed. If it will only eat these food items instead of pinky mice, you must coat them in a vitamin and calcium supplement. A marvelous balanced vitamin supplement is Repton.

3) Try offering the food at different times of the day. Most snakes are primarily nocturnal; however they may remove to lift the food in the early hours of the morning rather than evening.

4) location the food in different areas of the vivarium. Try up higher in a branch or underneath the hiding site. Many keepers have had success by placing a rodent in the middle of a toilet roll. The snake will feel bag in this and is a perfect conceal plot to safely eat its prey.

5) The temperature of the food is sometimes a stimulant. sustain the food at normal room temperature to commence with, but if this fails, position it on a radiator or something similar until the food item is hot.

6) If your snake is a hatchling, try and gain a tiny, dismal pot with a procure lid. The tubs which wax moth larvae are offered in are perfect. residence a pinkie and the snake in this tub together and then location in a warm area; but not directly on a heat source. Leave it over night and with any luck the food will have disappeared. Try also to expend the braining contrivance and placing it in the tub.