Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am a rescue rehabber, and was contacted by a guy who needed to rehome his CKS. It is 8-10 years old, sex undetermined.

About a year ago, according to the keeper, the snake started striking its own tail and trying to swallow itself. He took the snake to the vet, who GUESSED that it had mites and ordered treatment for them. The guy never saw mites, but treated anyway. The snake still self mutilated.

I saw this for myself. I picked up the snake today and transported it to a friend's education facility. It struck its tail and tried to curl around itself for over ten minutes, and I could hear it doing it in the bag on the way back. It has gnawed a very big, deep place on its tail before the vent.

The snake's general condition otherwise is okay. It is somewhat underweight, but not emaciated. The keeper has had this snake for 7 years, and it only started this a year ago. I have never seen or heard of a snake trying to eat its own tail because it was hungry. Also, the keeper tried increasing the amount of food, and that didn't work.

If anyone has a clue as to why this snake is doing this or has suggestions about how to deal with it, I and my friend would be grateful.

Forgot to mention that the snake was housed in a 75 long, so it had lots of room.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

>>Forgot to mention that the snake was housed in a 75 long, so it had lots of room.
>>
>>Any advice would be much appreciated.

Over the years of rescue, I have seen this on two occasions. One was a Colombian Boa that was confiscated from a drug house and housed with the drugs. The snake started attacking itself with in 12 hours of arriving and actually killed itself with in the day it was with me. The second snake was a juvie taiwanese blue beauty snake that was emaciated and on a fast feeding schedule. It actually ate itself one day.

I attribute the boa to drug exposure. I attribute the beauty to the emaciation. I had to feed smaller meals that it wouldnt regurge, but I strongly suspect it was still hungry. The animal was beyond skinny so, I do suspect it just saw the wiggle and attacked not thinking.
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Cindy
PHFaust

Email Cindy

Land of the Outcasts!

You know, I thought that might be the case. I don't know why it took 6 years to start this, but maybe the keeper started feeding less for whatever reason. The snake is not emaciated, but when my friend showed me a healthy CKS, it was obvious that this one is thin. As for drugs, I don't know that he is into them, but I do know that his beardie hates him! lol Its healthy otherwise.

The person who has the snake now is doing exactly as you describe! She started with a hopper yesterday, and is going to slowly feed it a few more over the next week. She knows tons more about snakes than I do. I mostly rehab lizards, and birds and mammals.

Thanks so much for the response. I will tell her about your two cases, and hopefully we got this poor thing in time!

I have seen this in two of my friend's rattlesnakes, a mitchelli, and a tigris. Both cases occurred at around the same time, and the vet concluded that it was some sort of internal infection that was causing them pain. Not knowing what was causing them such discomfort, the snakes were attacking the general direction that it came from.
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Diego

SWCHR

Well, a herp vet oversees her facility, so if the feeding doesn't do the trick, I'm sure the vet will want to run tests. I will pass this story on as well. Its just so sad and disturbing to watch!

...the rattlers weren't trying to consume themselves, they were simply striking at their lower abdomens. Left a bloody mess, too!
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Diego

SWCHR

Reminds me of a post in KS a while back where some guy had a cal king that wanted to eat itself.

This is not my snake in the photo.It belongs to a guy from this forum and I do not want to take credit away fron that guy for the pic.I dont remember who it was but I thought it would become usefull one day here.
If that snake is doing this because it wants a snake meal and isn't getting one I might try feeding it a feeder snake or two in the hope that it will learn to want a different scent and stop trying to feed on itself.Maybe this stake is hungry for snake and you want to feed it mice.Or like the other guy said maybe its on crack and needs a shrink.
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"You look like a guy caught smugling reptiles in his pants" John McCain to David Letterman
Doug L

I will tell her that, too, but this pic makes me realize just how thin this snake is! I still don't think it is emaciated, but is close.

I had a friend suggest a mental disorder yesterday. LOL! Know any good snake shrinks?

Okay, I talked to my friend, and she says that the snake has not chewed on itself today yet, which is good because it was doing it every few minutes yesterday. She also said that it is emaciated. We also suspect that if infection is not the root cause, then it might be a factor now that it has gnawed a large bloody spot on its side. She will take it to the vet today for blood work and an antibiotic shot, and continue to slowly offer feeders.

So, she will take pics of the injury, and I will post them and post what the vet says.

I have been working with snakes and around snakes and in zoos for many decades and have seen this and many other captive induced adverse conditions.

First you need to accept that captivity is not normal for animals. Then you have to understand there are mental and physical deleterious conditions caused by unsuitable captive conditions. In the zoo world we naively and simple called these things "cage crazies" Snakes sitting in a corner and never moving, nose rubbing, cats doing figure eights, elephants doing the little dance, are all similar captive induced crazies.

The most basic type for snakes is nose rubbing. This can be extreme to a point of rubbing the nose off. A normal snake feels pain and will not continue. But if conditions are so poor the individual snake goes insane, it will not care or feel the pain and rub its nose totally off. This was very common in the old days. Thankfully its not so common now.

To your problem. Its is another form of captive induced insanity. Consider, to consume ones self is not normal, therefore insane. The cause can be one or more or many captive reasons, but stravation is most likely the root cause. Consider, wild(normal) snakes feed at the first sign of hunger. Or they lower their metabolism. They do Not feed on a schedule, they feed based on physical need. For instance, at one zoo I worked at, they had a snake that would regularly attempt to consume itself, they fed everyother monday. hmmmmmmmm what does that have to do with any snakes needs??

In some cases it takes long term prolonged starvation to cause this. But as shown here, a apparently full bodied individual can still fall to this odd behavior.

In every case I was exposed to, the snake soon killed itself.

If there is no biological cause, then I would simply treat it normally and feed it up and hope it goes away. I do wish you luck. Cheers

FR, I do believe you are speaking about snakes and their MENTALITIES again!! Don't you know they don't have minds!?! Or personalities, for that matter...lol
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Diego

SWCHR

Well, I have to say that I have done critical care on a few snakes that were far more emaciated, and they did not do this to themselves, so what you are saying makes sense. The former keeper did admit that he stopped handling the snake around the time that it started this behavior. The good news is that it will be handled and stimulated daily as she does frequent education programs. It will not sit in the enclosure day in and day out any more IF it survives.

In these other cases that you have seen, were these wc, LTC, or cb? Did they do as this snake did, ie, behave normally for years and suddenly start doing this? Just curious.

The hard part about rescues and trying to come up with answers in a case such as this is a lack of history. We are given info from the person surrendering the animal, but anyone in rescue knows, and anyone who thinks about human nature knows that the histories we get from the former keepers are clearly constructs. For example, if you ask this keeper," when was the last time you fed this snake?" he will likely need to save face and fib. "Has this lizard been standing on its own?" "Oh yeah, sure." And the poor thing has a burn on the back of its neck because it is so crippled from MBD that it could not move itself away from the heat. As a rehabber, I learned a long time ago not to trust histories from keepers that hand me animals with issues.

Well, I do hope this snake is an exception. It is a really cool looking snake, and is very calm otherwise. It will make a great education snake if she can cure it both physically and mentally.