Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This is about keeping snakes in groups. Since I started keeping monitors, I have completely changed my snake husbandry, and I have a kingsnake pair that I keep in a monitor type cage with deep dirt and boards. Them male is smaller than the female, and I rarely see him. The female frequently patrols the cage, and sometimes she will kill many mice, but not eat them. However she will still watch the entrance of the cage waiting and quickly kill any rodent that I put in like she is hungry. Is this a display of territory? Have you experienced this?

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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

I'm not FR, but if you are keeping a big FL king female with a smaller male you are asking for a disaster. She will eat him when the urge hits her, if she hasn't yet.The only time I put my kings together is in the spring after I have fed them both heavily, then I watch them for signs of breeding or hunger.Buddy.

I'm sorry, but NO she will not eat him unless I starve her. That pair has been together over an entire year, and the male is an 06' the female an 03'. If she was going to eat him she would have done it long ago. I have been keeping snakes of many species in sexual pairs or groups of three for 15 years. They are fine in groups as long as you give them enough space and you are feeding them enough, but thank you for your concern.
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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

It is always a risk.
I've kept Cal Kings together, and many people have successfully, but there always is a risk - especially if you do not separate them for feeding.
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Arrrggg!
It's like Shalom, but for pirates.
- iCarly

No offense, but keepers always face risks. If you read these forums, more snakes are lost to escaping then eating eachother. or by egg binding, or many other deleterious events. Yes, there is a risk. In fact, most snakes are sold to keepers who flat neglect them to death. Yea, thats snakes from very good keepers, after they get tired of them.

With snakes escaping, keepers make better cages or are more diligent about closing their cages. With egg binding, keepers can provide better nesting and make sure their females are healthy, etc.

With groups or pairs living together, all you have to do is NOT STARVE THEM. Wow, is that so hard??

Again no offense to that(yours) limited way of thinking, but I do feed my pairs together, In fact, I simply throw in a handful of mice. And I have done this for decades. Guess what, I have lost fewer snakes to eating eachother, then most OTHER ACCIDENTS.

Sometimes I wonder what the heck you folks are thinking. Do you think snakes(reptiles) are stupid? Do you think they know nothing? My field partner says that, even biologists think reptiles are stupid. But then, these snakes have exsisted much longer then people. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm need I say the more?

The key to groups IS, let the individuals LEARN. They will you know. They are NOT stupid.

Can accidents happen, YES, but they can happen in many ways. Life is a risky business, LET THEM LIVE! Let them live I say, picture my fist in the air, I'am naked with a Human skin head band(fake of course).

God you folks do get silly, you remind me of our government, control our every move, otherwise we may hurt ourselves. In australia a friend of mine got a ticket for having his window open and his elbow was hanging out the window. hahahahahahahahahaha Yup, its true. There you cannot have any part of your body hanging outside the car, who knows, the car could roll over and smash your elbow. True story.

OK, most likely some of you have control issues, if you are not in control, you feel naked(like me with my headband). Cheers

Even I saw this storm coming. "Ladies and Gentleman, in this corner.........................."

Actually I really like FunkyRes, and I do think hes really trying hard, thats why I keep offering him something to think about.(more doors to open)

Remember, all these forums do is allow us to think. No one can force anyone to do anything. Hopefully some of this will open a few minds and allow some thinking to occur.

I feel FunkyRes is thinking himself into a corner. Its not that he doesn't care, I bet he cares a lot. In fact, maybe too much.

All I can do is open a few doors and hope he picks an option that will serve his understanding in a productive way.

Also remember, the only thing that benefits is the animals.

So yes, I am purposely shaking his head up. But then I fully realize its his head and he can do and think what he wants. Cheers

I do not have a problem with cohab.
The primary reason I no longer do it with kings is because one day I saw one of my kings regurge. I went to get a paper towel and by the time I got back, the other was eating the regurge.

I simply was stating that in fact there is a risk of cannibalism, because there is. It is probably very low if they are well fed and fed separately, but it is still there.

It is just silly to think it is never going to happen because it hasn't happened so far. It may happen.

[url]http://forums.kingsnake.com/view.php?id=1622859,1622986[/url
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Arrrggg!
It's like Shalom, but for pirates.
- iCarly

I have keept snakes for many years also and I'm open to learning more.
I had a breeder trade me a clutch of eastern kings for a clutch of Fl kings they were sent in a group box. When I recieved them
I opened the box and they were fine. I closed the box to go buy some rubbermaid containers so each could have their own cage.When I got back one had eaten its sibling. Only an inch of tail was showing. Another time I had a big Fl female that tried to eat every male that I attempted to breed her with. Even though I feed my kings heavily before attempting to breed them. So although some may live together for years and work out great I won't risk a snake to try to save buying another cage. I have lost snakes due to carelessness such as forgetting to secure the lid. When I do I beat myself up over it because I know better.
If I have a snake eat another snake I feel it would be my fault for giving them the chance. Buddy.

...what do you feed those tiny Scarlet King hatchlings!?! They are gorgeous! 8-D
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Diego

SWCHR

Baby anoles and ground skinks.

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Diego

SWCHR

Buddy,
Your post is perfect in this scenario recently of debating back and forth on here about whether or not kings should be kept together. You provided a great illustration of the reasons AND RISK involved in doing so, and I am very sorry to hear about what happened. They are called kingsnakes for a reason, and they should be respected as such.

Take care! Great post!
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Genesis 1:1

No sweat. we are good.

is lets give Peas a chance.... Sorry. Had to LOL Have a good day.

"In fact, most snakes are sold to keepers who flat neglect them to death."

A very sad truth!
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Darwin Rocks!

Its been beat to death
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Darwin Rocks!

I try to respond with personal experience on matters of snake keeping. I also rely on advice from other keepers. As far as risks sure life has risks but informed thoughtful people try to reduce the risks while enjoying life.
I can site an example I see daily on the interstate highways.
People drive 80 mph 15 ft away from the car ahead of them and do it all the time, are they taking risks? All it takes is one unanticipated factor to turn that daily risk taking into a big problem. People are free to take the risk if they want to. I prefer to play it on the safe side. I don't keep a lot of snakes, by many peoples standards, usually only four of five breeding pairs, so to me losing one valuable snake is not worth the risk.
To those that do I hope your luck holds up. Buddy.

I see Buddys point. I have done it and know it CAN be done but...I kept some large Leucistic Black rats for years in large 6' Neodeshas and at feeding time (Thawed rats) they got so crazy they would even bite themselves. I fed them in seperate containers and risked my fingers even when putting them back after feeding them ALOT of rats.They were not even "King"snakes and it could be a pain keeping an eye on them during feeding if I didn't seperate them in the large cage. All it took was for one of the other snakes to move after constricting a dead rat and have another notice and lunge at it and it was game on.Keeping singly makes feeding less srtessful and you can walk away and do other things instead of having to spend 20 minutes watching that everything goes well. Just my opinion.

Nice looking, well fed snake.

Thanks! She eats a TON, several mice per week and sometimes even in the blue!
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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

Hi, Yes, I have, but I am not so sure what it means. The next step my partner and I want to investigate is these odd misunderstood behaviors.

As you know, I not only pioneered many snake species, but many varanid species as well. I did this by addressing behavior.

In nature, reptiles have many series of behaviors, and they have an order. Like counting, 1, 2, 3, etc. on occasion, a number may not be in proper order, but in nature is very close.

In captivity, these behaviors can be completely out of order. Like, 10, 29, 1, 2, 9. Which causes havoc with our understanding. You know, like them eating eachother.

To make it functional in captivity, we take away most natural behaviors and only allow the basics, feeding, growing, put them together to mate, egg deposition, etc. Yet in reality, there are hundreds, thousands of behaviors that make the life of a snake. Again, these behaviors ARE THE LIFE OF THE SNAKE.

The problem is, we do not understand them, like the one you mentioned. So we throw them out. But we actually have no right to throw them out. After all, the snakes ARE doing these non understood things.

With snakes, its very basic, ABC so to speak, with varanids, they do not like ABC's, they perform better with a more complex set of basic behaviors.

Back to ME, so all I did to breed these animals that have not been bred is, break them down, allow them to behave in a productive order, then allow as much as I can to allow them be THEM.

As you know from doing this, once they, the reptiles, are in successful groups, THEY DO NOT WANT TO BE ALONE AGAIN. Hmmmmmmmm how very human of them.

So back to you, what happens when you leave those dead mice in the cage??????

Waiting for your answer to that one. Cheers

Hi Frank,
Funny that you ask, it really depends. Sometimes the male eats them, and I think she is killing them for him. He will sneak out and take them, then quickly go to another part of the cage or down a hole to eat. Sometimes they just rot. What is interesting is sometimes when I try to remove them, she takes them back away from me and moves them around the cage, putting them under the boards and such. I have seen this behavior with other species as well, very odd I tell ya! Are you getting excited about college hoops? GO COUGS!

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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

Just been reading these posts and I have to tell you that is some pretty COOL behavior if you ask me. She takes them away from you and hides them ?? She sounds like my friends pet ferret.

My one Cal King hides his mice instead of eating them this time of year... In fact the last time I fed him I thought he ate until I walked by his cage and caught a nasty smell...
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~Maggie~

"Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious."
1.1 Cal Kings (Spot and Fry)
1.0 Florida King
1.0 Ball Python (Mitch)
0.1 Red Belly Piranha (Fluffy)
1.0 Australian Shepherd (Spooky)
1.0 Springer Spaniel/Beagle mix (Snoopy)
0.1 German Shep mix (Shadow)
0.1 Cat (Echo)

Hiding uneaten mice may be an attempt to keep other predators (IE foxes) etc. away that might be interested not only in the mouse, but the snake as well.

That's just a guess of course, I can't figure out what other reason they would have, as I don't ever recall any information about them eating a several day old carcass.
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Arrrggg!
It's like Shalom, but for pirates.
- iCarly

I don't know why he does it, but it's really gross and I wish he'd stop it... Regardless, I just have to be extra diligent with him at feeding time
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~Maggie~

"Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious."
1.1 Cal Kings (Spot and Fry)
1.0 Florida King
1.0 Ball Python (Mitch)
0.1 Red Belly Piranha (Fluffy)
1.0 Australian Shepherd (Spooky)
1.0 Springer Spaniel/Beagle mix (Snoopy)
0.1 German Shep mix (Shadow)
0.1 Cat (Echo)

Interesting about them keeping the rotten ones.
I feed my Florida in a separate cage. Once, I needed to clean its cage and so I put him in his feeding cage while I cleaned his cage. I had thought he had eaten all of his mice the last feeding, and when I went to put him back in his cage he had taken a rotting mouse. I freaked! Tried to get the mouse from him, and that was impossible! So, he ate it and I waited and waited for him to regurge it. He didn't, and seemed fine.

Don't think I'll make that mistake again, not would I feed him a rotten one on purpose, but I found it interesting that he ate it. Believe me, this is not an underfed snake, so he wasn't starving.

I have a few questions on this thread.
If you are keeping kings or any snake in a large group for long periods of time what do you do when one gets a spreadable illness?
How do you know which snake gave what to whom and do you treat the whole lot?

I am trying to understand how group keeping of snakes over long periods of time benefits a snake or is it that certain species of snakes are more social then others?

If you are breeding and the female is ready to drop a clutch do you remove her, why?

That female that laid that clutch of eggs do you keep the neonates together or remove them in separate cages, why?

Thanks for any input,
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Jason A.
"Long time Herper, first year Breeder `07."
My 2008 Care Sheet & The BRB Stats. Username: brb@kingsnake.com

I do not worry so much about health issues, I rarely have problems with that. If there is something obviously wrong I will separate an individual and try and figure out what is wrong. My wife is currently in her third year of vet school, so I have an in house doc! My experience has been with proper husbandry health problems are rare, also my husbandry is always evolving and sometimes I make a mistake. I try to learn from those and correct the problem. Keeping snakes in groups is definitely more challenging and there is a new learning curve, but I think they overall do better in groups.
I raise hatchlings in groups too. I think that the competition helps with feeding response. I will through in entire litters of pinkies and typically two to three snakes will eat them all. I will then remove those and keep them together and repeat the process with the ones who haven't eaten yet. Baby snakes want to eat as much as possible, so you have to stay on top of it. I usually have everyone eating within a week from first shed. And once they are all eating I will then keep them in the groups of two or three that ate together. Here's a pic of my badA$$ wife helping me with some field work!

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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

I am still uncertain as to how group keeping benefits the snake any more so then 1 snake 1 cage until breeding season. If you have a snake that breeds every year, drops her clutch and the neonates are all healthy and eating wouldnt you say that the snake's husbandry needs are met?

Some species of snake may very well do better in social groups but what exactly is better then the above scenario?

A in house vet that would be nice indeed...
Does she have any experience with skin issues on a hondo?

This may not be an issues but it does concern me as it just changed in a 24hr period of time.

Any Ideas?

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Jason A.
"Long time Herper, first year Breeder `07."
My 2008 Care Sheet & The BRB Stats. Username: brb@kingsnake.com

I've seen skin discoloration like that in a snake that got stuck trying to get through the little holes in a plastic flower pot and got stuck. That's what it looks like to me, it happens from lack of proper circulation.
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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

>>I've seen skin discoloration like that in a snake that got stuck trying to get through the little holes in a plastic flower pot and got stuck. That's what it looks like to me, it happens from lack of proper circulation.
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>>"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

I know its the oddest thing, there is nothing that the snake could get stuck on, he has a water bowl and newspaper substrate and that's it.. Unless somehow he managed to cut off his circulation with some wet news paper and his water bowl..

~Did it dissipate with each shed?

Should I try some antibiotic cream? He is in the blue right now so I hope its gone after he sheds, I suppose only time will tell.
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Jason A.
"Long time Herper, first year Breeder `07."
My 2008 Care Sheet & The BRB Stats. Username: brb@kingsnake.com

Yes it has gone away with time. In my case it was worse than yours and I had to cut the snake out of the pot. It was stuck there for a couple days I think. I would just wait and see how it looks after shedding. I'm not a vet, so I cannot recommend anything there. I personally would just take care of the snake and see how it progresses. If it worsens then you might want to see a vet.
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"Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew!" Charlie Papazian

Something very similar happened to my male water python. Nothing inside his enclosure to have caused it, but it was all completely gone after 1-2 molts...

//Todd

Try to understand this, these snakes, kings and milks, live in colonies, up to very dense colonies. This is normal for them. This is what makes them what they are. This encorporates all manner of interesting behaviors.

In captivity you take away all things that make them, Hmmmm THEM, and call that normal. Why would you do that?

In nature, these snakes either spend the entire year together or in poor years, half the year together. Yet breeding only takes a few days. I wonder why they do this.

Of course in nature there are solitary individuals and group individuals. The groups stay groups, the solitary individuals are seeking to be in groups. Hmmmmmmmmmmm

Of course some species are more solitary then others. But even with those groups its very difficult to say. Like rattlesnakes. They can group up for three or four months or more, then spread out. These are species that are considered denning species. These often copulate in the fall, then stay together. hmmmmmmmm why. They spend fall, winter, then stay together until the females cycle(ovulate) in the spring.

Or other rattlesnake species like the montane species that stay is smaller groups year around.

With the kings I have field experience with, they stay in tight groups year around and can number in the hundreds in a very small area. Of course these areas expand and contract at different times of the year.

yes, thats more then you asked for, but its to make a point, They do not live in a box in nature, NONE OF THEM. They are not withheld from others of their own species in nature.

That you put them together only to copulate, is only about you and not the snakes. Which is fine if that is what you want. Personally, I like to see them do what they are designed to do. But then, thats what I like.

After all, its my experience that only to make babies gets rather boring after a few decades. Or less. Cheers