Posted by:
mkraft
at Fri Dec 5 10:09:06 2003 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by mkraft ]
Excuse me if this gets posted twice, I think something went wrong the first time.
Thanks for sharing your experience with burning your pythons.
I've been really thinking about this issue a lot. From everything I've seen, there have been quite a few pythons burned. I've seen images and talked to others who have burned pythons.
I haven't heard of colubrids being burned. One person said colubrids don't have that problem.
I have one experience to report. I adopted a yearling corn snake, living in a ten gallon aquarium with an undertank heater. The glass bottom was too hot for me to touch for long. I'm sure I'd get burned! Yet, the top of the substrate wasn't too bad, and the snake had lived in that exact setup with the original owner, and with the experienced herper running the halfway house, for many, many months.
Because of these discussions, I got worried, and changed the tank so it no longer has the UTH. The same day, that corn snake changed its behavior. Before, it burrowed, but never stayed down long. It always ended up on the surface of the substrate in its hide box. Now, with the UTH gone, it tended to rest under the substrate, directly on the spot where the UTH had been. Nothing else was changed. If that corn snake had rested on that spot the day before, it would have been badly burned, I'm sure of it!
I know that pythons and boas are considered "primitive" snakes, and that colubrids evolved many millions of years later. What does it mean to be "more advanced"? I recently saw a talk by an expert on the most highly advanced of snakes, the venomous snakes. I knew they had a more elegant way of subduing prey animals. No more wrestling with a dangerous animal, they just nip it wiht some venom, and then withdraw to a safe distance for a few minutes. But it's more than just venom. This guy said these snakes are "aware" in ways that make pythons seem outright dumb! They watch, and can actually plan an escape plan around the handler's routine!
Colubrids aren't that smart, but I wonder if one of the benefits of being more "advanced" is that they know how to avoid environmental problems that pythons are oblivious to. Certainly, if that tank had held a python, rather than a corn snake, I'd be posting pictures of burns, too. But the corn snake avoided the hot spot, until the day it was removed, and then it spent its time actually in contact with the same are of the tank that had been dangerous the day before.
I know its easy to prove that a snake WILL get burned, but it's harder to prove that a snake WON'T get burned. What if the snake was just lucky all that time? What if it gets burned tomorrow? Still, it's hard to avoid drawing the conclusion that my corn snake avoided the hot spot, and knew immediately when it was safe to rest on that part of the tank.
Sorry that your pythons were burned. I'm sure you are a very caring owner, and it must have been a difficult time for you. Thanks for sharing with the rest of us.
Michael Kraft
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RE: burning a snake - mkraft, Fri Dec 5 10:09:06 2003