Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am a new snake owner.

I have a wild caught gopher snake that is about 3 feet long. We are feeding it fuzzy rats and it doesn’t constrict the rat and kill it before it eats it. It will strike it and eat it while it is still alive. You can still here the rat squeaking after it is about 1/4 of the way down the snakes body. Is this normal?????

The snake is also digging out corners of the tank. We have it in a 40 gal. tall aquarium with sand on half of it and a jungle mix in the other half with a long branch to climb on. There is also one of those half log things in the bottom. Any ideas on why it may be doing this?? the hole is not always in the same area.

its not constricting the rat because it knows it doesn't need to since the rats are young. if you put a full grown mouse in there it would be constricted in a heart beat (most likely). but since its a wild caught snake i wouldn't suggest it unless you are confident in the snake's feeding response while being watched. my bull used to do the same thing when i switched him from full grown mice to young rats. he also once ate an adult mouse whole that didn't put up a fight when i put it in there (i think it was really sick, i SHOULDN'T have fed it to the snake but i didn't know it was sick). i would suggest switching over to prekilled food though once the snake gets big enough to eat small rats. one little mistake by your snake during constriction and the rat can take a nice chunk of scale or eye with its sharp teeth. its a bloody mess and really scary once it does happen!

also gophers and bull love to dig. don't worry its normal. just don't expect to ever be able to put a live plant in with it! one of my gophers got out the other day and first thing she did was dig up one of my house plants in the other room!