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I remember first reading about indigo snakes in the reptile books I checked out over and over from my elementary school library. I saw Alabama listed as part of their range and hoped to find one someday. I eyed each blacksnake I came across with excitement hoping it was the mystical indigo. They never were. I eventually came to realize that they must only live in southern alabama and I was pinned way up in the northern part.

The years have gone buy. I got out of reptiles while I chased women through my college years. But now I'm back. I have a growing collection. I haven't thought of indigo snakes for a long long time, until I stumbled across this forum. I hadn't noticed it before. Now, don't get my wrong, I have absolutely no intentions of trying to purchase an indigo anytime in the near future. I don't have the money, knowledge, or space right now. But I AM curious. So, I have a few questions:

I know they're protected. How (or can) you legally get one?
How big do they get?
How do you house them?
What do you feed them?
What is their temperment like?

They have always seemed like the king of the american snakes to me. I'm no newbie to reptiles, and I tend to gravitate toward the rare (for example, my egyptian tortoise). But, I really know nothing about these snakes, except that I've always been attracted to them.

So, any tidbits of info would be greatly appreciated.
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Checkout indigosnakes.com for the answers. It's a very informative site.
Link

Thanks for the link.

I have another question though. Why such low temps? I understand that high temps cause them to regurgitate, but what do they do in the wild? I mean, they live down here in the sweat bowl of the southern south. Do they stay in dens except very early in the mornings and very late in the afternoon? Hell, in midsummer some nights don't get below 80 degrees.
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0.1.1 Leopard Geckos
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I for one do not subscribe to the low temperature following and I also do not keep Easterns. I do however keep Cribos the tropical version of Indigo. I have some preliminary findings that having access to real sun stimulates behavior that captives do not express due to the lack of sun. I have a couple of theories. In the wild most snakes have a routine. A routine might go something like this, an Indigo sits in the mouth of a burrow to catch morning sun and once heated up will forage for food. After a successful hunt and using energy “getting exercise” retreats to its burrow. If an indigo goes just four feet underground the temperature can get as low as 56F possibly lower. The Eastern Indigo might go underground to digest food which is the opposite of what most snakes do. It is quite possible that it is an adaptation that is unique to the Indigo. An indigo in captivity has nowhere to go. Accounts of captive Indigo suggest that once heated up they want to move, do something, go somewhere but with nowhere to go why heat up. There is no doubt that a wild Indigo will reach a body temperature 90F or so “would make a good study” but once they get a meal in them what do they do “ another good study”?

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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

Hmmm very interesting theory. So, there's not much scientific data to explain the regurgitation thing, huh? Your theory sounds plausible enough. I wonder if anyone has tried keeping them at more natural temps, but also having a much cooler "burrow" for them to retreat to?

Also, everything I've read says that they are "messy" and have very smelly feces. Is it really that bad? I mean, do they have diarrhea all the time or what? And, if it's that bad, could it be related to this apparent lack of knowledge of how their digestive system works?
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0.1.1 Leopard Geckos
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Not one of my Cribos is messy so I can't imagine that an Indigo is too bad. I think it is more a case of irritable bowel syndrome. I forwarded our discussion to a herpetologist that might be able to find some hard data backing up the theory.
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

>>Not one of my Cribos is messy so I can't imagine that an Indigo is too bad. I think it is more a case of irritable bowel syndrome. I forwarded our discussion to a herpetologist that might be able to find some hard data backing up the theory.
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>>"Life without risk is to merely exist."

Did you hear anything back yet? I'm curious about this.
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0.9.0 Ball Pythons
0.1.1 Leopard Geckos
0.0.1 Egyptian Tortoise
0.0.1 Bearded Dragons

Here is a link to the site. If you paste this into your browser it will take you to the thread. They are slow but involved in the academic aspect of our descussion.

http://webcat.fhsu.edu/ksfauna/herps/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=211
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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

INDIGOS ARE LARGE BEAUTIFUL SNAKES EASTERN INDIGO.COM IS WRE TO GO FOR INFO THEY NEED LARGE TANK SPACE AND FEED AT LEAST TWICE A WEEK AND DEFICATE MORE THAN OTHER TYPES OF SNAKES THIER METOBOLICS ARE FASTER THEY REQUIRE TO BE FED TWICE PER WEEK
GO TO EASTERN INDIGOS/ROBERT SEIB YOU MIGHT NEED A PERMIT BUT ITS WORTH IT