Posted by:
slithering_serpents
at Wed Sep 13 14:49:29 2006 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by slithering_serpents ]
Wow, you need to learn about boas fast because you need the whole set up working before you get this snake. I personally have never even seen a pic of a Cuban boas either, and I would consider it rare. A 4' boa eating one mouse a week is starving, man.
There are many good care sheets online for boas. Here's one most of us like:
http://www.riobravoreptiles.com/care_raisingboas.htm
Bear in mine that we all raise boas differently but there are some basics. For now get this boa a regular set up because it might grow. Get a 4' X 2' X whatever height cage. Get two hide boxes one for each side of the cage that should have a warm side and a cool side. You might remove those later but for now get them. You can heat you cage a lot of ways, and my recommendation is boaphile.com cages and radiant heat panel if you can afford that, or regular flexwatt heat tape is OK. Any cage even an aquarium has to have a warm and a cool side.
This boas is emaciated no doubt, so start slowly with everything you do. Try a rat pup first then the next time feed it a larger prey item (rats are way better than mice), until you get to the right sized food item. It will take a while for the boa to put on weight, so don't be impatient. You should see no evidence of the spine on a boa of the correct weight. So that could be your guide. The prey should be the same size around as the widest part of the boa. Don't feed it bigger than that. If it has been starved for years it might grow some, at least a little. The main difference you will see is the gaining of weight. Carefully ook at other boas pictures so you can train your eye to see what a normal weight is for a boa. My 4' boas eat a large rat each meal, once a week. They are a nice weight.
I would love to see a pic of this Cuban boa too, would you post some pics when you get this boa, please? A Cuban boa would be of the subspecies BCI or Boa Constrictor Imperitor, the same subspecies as the common Colombias you see everywhere.
Good luck,
Caden
"I'm hopefully going to be getting a 4' cuban boa from a fellow employee at the petstore I work at soon. He's had it for a few years and appearantly it hasn't grown hardly at all on a diet of one mouse per week. From my research, they seem to usually get much larger. On one occasion, he said it ate 8 mice. I'm wondering if it might be stunted from going so long on such a diet. Do you think it would start growing again if I fed it more?
Also, if anyone has any experience with this species, do you have any tips for them in particular? I've kept colombian redtails before, so I've dealt with larger snakes before."
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1 mouse a week, for a 4' boa? - slithering_serpents, Wed Sep 13 14:49:29 2006