Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My Est. Milk was wild caught over a month ago since then its been nothing but trouble. It will not eat anything. I tried every method, live pinky, live fuzzy,I've cut little bloddy spots on the pinky so it will eat, I put it in a deli cup over night with a pinky, nothing, I've tried for weeks so I've decided its either the snake dies, or I force feed it. The problem is I dont really know how. If anyone has any ideas please let me know. A.S.A.P

If this snake has been quarantined from other reptiles in your collection, I would consider releasing it where it was found. If you're intent on keeping it, I would try scenting with or offering other prey items such as lizards or baby snakes. If the snake was in good health when you found it, it should be premature to consider force feeding after only a month.
Good luck,
Chris

i did try scenting with a baby garter snake and i also tried feeding the little garter snake itself to the milksnake sense milksnakes eat other snakes.

Don't get me wrong, milks do eat snakes, but not nearly as often as getula. Lizard scenting would probably be much more effective than snake scenting. However, releasing might be a good idea too.

Van

and even some snake eating snakes seem to turn their nose up at Thamnophis and Nerodia. (maybe they're too stinky?)
Chris

especially a milksnake. They don't really seem the type to be found in semi-aquatic habitats. I'd imagine a wormsnake or a ringneck would work really well.

Van

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release it where you found it, but as Gila pointed out, only if it has been kept away from the rest of your collection.

There is no need to put a W/C snake through that kind of stress if you can simply take it back and let it go. Get a CB Eastern Milk if you want to keep one.

n/p

Let it go, you can get a nice CB one for peanuts ~ and you will save this snake in the process!

A persons first thought may be to release it, but that may not be the best thing for the snake. Most wild caught snakes have a heavy parasite load. This may not affect them while in the wild, but once they are under the stress of being captured the parasites can go wild. Any wild caught snake that a person plans on keeping should be wormed. Releasing this snake at this time may be a death sentence. I would treat it for worms and protozoans. There's a good chance it will eat then. IMHO

Tim

He would be releasing it with the same parasites it came with.

It's not the stress that causes parasites to overwhelm a snake in captivity, although that doesn't help. It's the fact that they tend to reinfect with direct life-cycle parasites because the are confined to such a small space. There hasn't been time for this to happen in this case anyway.

Stress CAN cause (because of stress-related immune system depression) viral infection to manifest, but once again, unless this snake has been in close proximity to virus-infected animals, it will be released with the same viruses it came with.

Since this snake is not a long-term captive, there should be no issues with releasing it.