Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Today I fed my (trouble eating) female western a small hopper. As she was eating it, I noticed several peices of aspen bedding stuck to the mouse. Being cautious I attempted to remove the aspen bedding while the mouse was halfway in her mouth. She didn't like that, she regurgitated her half swallowed mouse.

The mouse was covered in a yellowish wet, sort of sticky, substance; I am thinking the hogs mildish venom. Since I knew she wasn't going to re-eat the mouse, I picked it up to throw it away. For the next hour or two the fingers I used to pick up the mouse went numb. It felt like novicane when its about to wear off.

Do you think that was the effects of the hogs venom?
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1.1 100% het albino W. Hognose
0.1 66% het albino "red" W. Hognose
1.0 Pastel Ball Python
1.0 Common Snapping Turtle
1.1 Bearded Dragon

I would think it is more in your head than anything. But I don't have any experience with hoggie "venom". I have seen people suddenly have symptoms after telling them the red eft they just held produces a toxin.

I would recommend against messing with a poor feeder while its eating. Nothing like a little stress to turn them off of food for a while.

its probably the digestive saliva digesting your fingers,also please feed your hog in another box or encloser that has no substrate to avoid this problem.regurgitating is very stressful on the animal.dont try to feed for at least a week

The problem is, this hog will NOT eat in any enclosure but her own. She will only eat when she doesn't see me put the food in her cage.

The only reason I messed with her was because there was literally alot of Aspen bedding stuck to the mouse. I have a part of the enclosure where there is no aspen bedding (this is where I feed), but she dragged the mouse to the other side of the tank.
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1.1 100% het albino W. Hognose
0.1 66% het albino "red" W. Hognose
1.0 Pastel Ball Python
1.0 Common Snapping Turtle
1.1 Bearded Dragon

ok then sorry,just Be Careful and keep up the good work

Interesting one this - I also suspect it was digestive secretions not venom,mainly because hogs dont produce much at all and you say it was coating the mouse.
Having said that my partner often hand feeds one of my hogs and says he once has something drop onto his finger whilst feeding that left it tingling slightly. Paul was unaware they were able to produce a "toxin" when he mentioned it to me, so I dont think it was psychosomatic in this case.