Posted by:
mfoux
at Tue Nov 3 21:48:20 2009 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by mfoux ]
Kevin and Doug,
I'm from the Lake Charles area and always caught and kept holbrooki. They're a sentimental subsp. for me, too. Up until a few of years ago, all my w/c specimens would take mice and did well.
Then, about two years ago my brother started catching some that would only take lizards. They would go absolutely psycho when any kind of rodent (live or thawed, regular, scented w/lizards, de-scented, rat or mouse) was offered. Even the tamest one we had, which was really puppy dog tame, would go into a rage and strike at the glass or anything, including our hands, cage furniture, etc. They weren't feeding strikes, either. I saw one of them strike a mouse repeatedly, again, not in a feeding manner. They would hiss and rattle their tails (in typical holbrooki fashion) the whole time. If we took out the rodent and gave the snake time to cool down (a few hours), he would go back to totally tame, and would readily eat the anoles we offered.
The other part of the problem, though, was that the ones we caught quickly developed grey blisters that spread within a few days over the entire body. We lost two of the snakes, which quickly lost all appetite and became emaciated. There are no herp vets in the LC area, and I no longer live there. I instructed my brother, who is trying to help me with this project, to release back into the same location any specimen that develops the grey blisters.
I know the blisters would normally be a sign of poor husbandry, but both of us keep several (or in my case over 20) other snakes and have never had this occur with any of ours except for the holbrooki.
I thought maybe the blisters could be stress related, especially since they've mostly appeared in the individuals who freak out over the rodents.
What do you guys think?
I'd really like to start this project, but as of right now I only have one holbrooki from the area that I was able to keep.
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RE: Locality Holbrooki - mfoux, Tue Nov 3 21:48:20 2009