Hi, and thats exactly the point.

Now take a look at why. Of course you see your results, I will not argue that. What your not seeing(not addressing) is what is causing your results.



My questions in my original reply still stand, how about attempting to answer them.



Like why would any individual snake grow slow and not feed readily. I hope you understand in nature, they take prey when availible, they do not mope around or act finicky. If they did, they would be very dead, and very quickly. They attack prey, even very small hatchlings.



I am sure many here have field observations that would support that. Heres one of my favorites. I was walking up a creek, when I heard a leopard frog panic call from under a rock. I flipped the rock and a new born watersnake had an adult leopard frog by the foot. hahahahahahahahaha. There is no way that snake could take that frog, but it was up for an attempt. And your baby pyros are doing WHAT? Think about it.



This epiphany occurred to me about 45 years ago when I was out in the field. I saw a whiptailed lizard, running like crazy, zig zaging all over, then it ran up and bounced off my foot, then an adult California stripe whipsnake, crashed off my foot and continued to chase the lizard. All the while at home I had a california whipsnake that was a very reluctant feeder. Hmmmmmmmmmm I realized, it surely was not a reluctant feeder because it was a whipsnake. It was reluctant because I was not providing something a ecto therm needed. In this case, I provided more heat and the snake ate everything and anything and all the dang time. To a point I turned it loose because it ate toooooo much(compared to my other snakes)



The point was very clear to me. All these snakes consume as much as they can, grow as fast as they can and outgrow the dangerous baby stage where they are prey for many many predators. They cannot afford to hesitate or grow slow. Even if there were no predators, individuals that grew faster(better conditions, more food) would out compete the slower going individuals. This is nature at is most basic.



Why would they be different in captivity? This one is very simple. If offering water allows a snake to feed, its dehydrated. If offering water helps a snake eliminate waste, then the snake is dehydrated. That is plain and simple. If your pyro coils in the water bowl, its doing so because its dehydrated. I can keep going, but you get the point.







So instead of changing the way you keep your snakes, you say, the snakes the problem. Well it is, pyros dehydrate easier then a getula. But not faster then a baby milksnake. And both dehydrate much faster then a pit. or crot.



Once said pyro gains mass(in your case, slowly) the mass to surface area ratio changes drastically. A baby pyro has a huge surface area to mass ratio, as it grows, it reverses. As the snakes gains mass, it can overpower the degree of dehydration, but, its still not a good thing. As indicated above, pyros and many other species are a bit pourous skinned and dehydrate easily compared to other thick skinned snakes.



I could make some wild guesses, those with baby pyro problems, are those with open type cages and no moisture boxes, and/or tight hides. But then there is a million different combinations of conditions that will cause dehydration. But the symtoms are very consistant.



So what gets me, why I cannot take it anymore, hahahahahahaha is, the only thing wrong here is, confusing symtoms with character traits. Some are voicing symtoms and calling them species traits. In this case, pyros do indeed have thin skin and dehydrate must more readily then thicker skinned species. But they do not grow slower. Some of the fastest growing kings I ever had were pyros.



The solution is, instead of not recomend keeping or not keeping pyros because their problematic, how about making sure making sure all of your snakes are not dehydrated.



To be more clear, a pyro is akin to the canary in a coalmine. Its only the first to show outward signs, as the condition is effecting all your snakes.



Please do not feel bad, as most captive snakes have some degree of chronic dehydration. Good luck

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