Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi there. I am new to boids and have a young 4.5 foot female albino burm. I have had her for three months in a cage longer than she with hides at both warm and cool ends and keep the temp and humidity right. She is nice to handle, although during this time she has hissed at me a couple of times and bit me once. I think I touched her while she was asleep. Now I have learned not to mess with her after she has eaten for a couple of days.

I feed her a F/T rat once a week. I had dangled them by the tail to her at first, learned better, used tongs, learned better. Now I just drop it in for her to find and leave. My question is- should I be feeding her somewhere other than her cage? If one does this, does one remove the animal from the cage for feeding all their life when they are 20 feet long also? I want to raise her right.

You need to get a hook. We never reach in and grab any of our burms without first touching them with the hook.

There are differing opinions of feeding in the cage or in a seperate "feed" container. We prefer to feed in the cage, but we only use the hook when we are going to handle them, not when we feed. This way when they see the hook the feed response goes away pretty quickly.

We feel that taking your snake out of it's cage to feed it will condition it to expect food when it comes out. Also, what do you do with the snake once it's eaten? I wouldn't want to deal with our 15 foot burm after she has eaten, she might think she's getting seconds.
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Randy and Michelle
Art In Scales
(719) 439-4199
info@artinscales.com

Feed in the enclosure! Getting a feeding response from a corn snake during transfer is one thing, but a Burm? Not thanks.

Like Randy said, the hook training thing is the way to go...

Touch with the hook before handling, and only when handling. Never use the hook when feeding. I use really long tongs for feeding and avoid touching the snake.

I will aquire a proper snake hook.

I think I will continue the manna from heaven method of feeding. Chunk it in and run.

Hi there!
Randy and Laura have given you excellent advice. Listen to them.

There have been several discussions about this and a lot of good information has been mentioned in them. Here's the link to the most recent discussion: forums.kingsnake.com/view.php?id=1608262,1608262 There are a few links to other discussions within the posts so follow all links within that thread. You'll be glad you did.

Have a good one!
HH
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Due to political correctness run amuck,
this ol' hillbilly is now referred to as an:
Appalachian American

www.natures-signature.com

You are definitely asking for nothing but problems in several areas when you feed outside the cage, especially with a boid of any size. Best not to even start it with a young snake. Never have used a hook, but have always used a 4 ft. cardboard tube to gently tap their head and let them know food is not coming. It has worked with no issues on every boid I've ever had, even with the most aggressive feeders. Never could understand why you would want to condition a snake into the pattern of when you are pulling them out of the cage and handling them, they might be getting fed. Not a good combination, especially with a large aggressive feeder.

Kelly