Reptile & Amphibian Forums

First, I'll address the shed issue. Yes, she's in a bad shed. Im aware of it and will be soaking her soon. I have humidity issues in my snakeroom. It's a long story.

On to the question.
When I feed this NC copperhead, many times I drop the live mouse in and she bites and hangs on like a pitbull. The snake doesnt budge once the mouse is in it's grip, so I know it's not a "stuck fang" kind of thing. I have a really strong stomach, I mean, I've skinned and gutted otters while eating jelly donuts, but this makes my stomach turn a little. I REALLY feel bad for the mouse, even though its death may actually take less than time than a bite/release incident.
My question is, does anyone else have a venomous snake that feeds like this? I dropped the mouse in, saw this was happening, and had time to grab my camera, power it up, and nsap off about 6 shots casually since I knew the snake was gonna take it's time.

-----
Tom

"The more people I meet, the more I like my snakes"

I have noticed this same thing with my southern copperheads,FL cottonmouths and with my two new neonate Calloselasma rhodostoma. Most other terrestrial snakes I have (Crotalus,sistrurus,and Gloydius) hit and release.
Ryan,

Although I only feed F/T, most of my Coppers and my Florida Cotton male display the " pit bull " feeding response. You can actually feel the force of their strike when they hit the mouse in the hemostats. My most aggressive feeders are my Osage pair, following closely are the Southerns and Northerns.

Vampire

i have read that this technique is more determined by the prey type-used more on birds than rodents to prevent the bird from flying immediately after the tag,thus being too hard to track by the snake as opposed to a crawling prey item....that being said i have seen copperheads and different species of rattlers do the 'pitbull thing' also,all on live rodents.
-----
"with head raised regally,and gazing at me with lidless eyes,he seemed to question with flicks of his long forked tongue my right to trespass on his territory" Carl Kauffeld

...it seems to depend on the size of the rodent in many cases. Lachesis species, nearly always strike/hold their prey. Many Bothrops species (mostly juveniles and the more arboreal ones, like Bothrops venezuelensis) do the same, but if the prey is somewhat large relative to the snake, they'll strike/release. C. horridus will strike/hold, Porthidium lansbergi spp. do it, Atropoides do it, Crotalus durissus/simus will do it frequently, Bothriechis nigroviridis and Bothriechis lateralis typically do it....and so on and so

MH
www.matabuey.com

.
-----
1.0 het albino ball
1.0 norm ball
0.4 norm ball
0.1 snow corn
1.0 butter corn
0.1 norm corn
1.0 southern plains rat
1.0 striped Cali king
1.0 western hog