Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Tonight I was feeding my 4 foot ball a f/t rat, it has been longer tan usual sence his last feeding because he started shedding just as his feeding date came up, so he was pretty excited for food.

He struck at it and missed, he tried again and missed again. Then right away struck himself and coiled. I understand that sometimes they bite themselves when overly excited for food, but he coiled around himself. Not long after, he let go of himself.

My question is what if he didn't, how would I get him to let go without hearting him?

I don't think that you would ever have to worry about him really hurting or killing himself. It may take a second for them to realize what they've done but then they will release themselves from themselves. lol. I would bet that he's learned his lesson.

Excitement does this to them occasionally . Don't worry. I've seen a retic actually hit an wrap another retic over the smell of food on the other snake. It's scarey but they'll release when their brain kicks back in.

Quig
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Don't interupt me when I'm talkin' to myself

The other two people are absolutely correct. You really don't have to worry about a snake constricting itself....HOWEVER, IF it did happen, or if one snake was constricting another OR more likely, if the snake accidentally mistook your hand for food, the quickest way to get a snake to immediately uncoil is to bring them to the nearest sink or bath tub and stick them under a stream of warm-hot water (NOT hot enough to hurt them, but the kind of warm you might take a bath in). Some people say to rub alcohol in their mouth and eyes, but that is so much less convenient, and not a nice thing to do to a little ball python who simply made an honest mistake. Warm water has worked for me every time --kingsnakes, ribbon snakes, cornsnakes, ball pythons, burmese pythons, and boa constrictors---and it's totally harmless.

~kasey

As others said he will release once he realizes he is biting himself...

When snakes do this it definitely shows just how bad their vision is...I had a sub-adult yellow anaconda that I fed frozen/thawed, when I threw the rat in it would bounce off some part of her body and she would bite that part of her body...she would release and start looking for the rat, again biting any part of her skin that had rubbed on the rat...

I had to get a long pair of tongs to dangle the rat to keep her from doing this to herself.
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Heather Martin
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Never heard it happen to pythons but I have heard of colubrids actually eating themselves due to miss strikes or thinking a tail is a rat etc. and proceeding to swallow. At some point they may realize the mistake and spit themselves out, others don't and eventually reach a point they can't swallow anymore and end up dying.
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PHLdyPayne