Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have 1.1 pair of adult Hogg Island's. '02 and '03, and I've raised them since babies. I have them in different tanks in the same room... Every November or December, they stop eating for a couple months and for two or three weeks they'll each scrape their snouts back and forth on the screen top's of the tanks. Usually I'll put the male in the female's tank for a week and that will cut down on the snout scraping. I've never seen any mating, but the scraping stops.

This year, they've been doing the scraping thing for months and I can't get them to stop. I've changed the substrate, increased and decreased the heat and humidity, put the animals together, separated them again, etc. And they still scrape their snouts on the screens. I need to get them to stop as their snout are rubbed raw and they haven't eaten since November.

Any thoughts? Suggestions?

You may want to sex them again, might be 2.0 since you have not seen courting or breeding. Sounds like two males wanting to roam. Just a thought.

Since you have adjusted temps and humidity and that did not stop them try providing hide spot on both the cool and hot sides of their enclosures.

Joel
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I have a pair of Hogs that were the same way. Seems to be a Hog thing. If temps and humidity are good then all I can recommend is giving them a good dark hide in their cage. Change of habitat, good or bad, can cause them to be restless. I would expect them to rub just settling in to a perfect cage. Good luck.

I assume you are treating them for the rub. I also assume you've ruled out other causes of the snakes trying to get out (wrong temps/mites/etc).

Is there any chance you can move the male into caging that does not have s screen top or perhaps a taller tank where he cannot reach the top so easily? (those have both worked for me in the past with other boas.) I am not aware of females rubbing to get out during breeding season, are you sure you have a pair and not 2 males?

My male hog isle is in a screen top reptarium and for almost 4 months now he has been going crazy in that tank trying to get out. He started acting like this when my females started their pre-ov swells. This is the first year he's done this (he's an '01). He completely trashes his tank, scrunches all the newspaper in one corner, turns his hides and water bowl upside down trying to get out. Lucky for me he hasn't gotten a rub. I am going to switch him to aspen bedding and hope that will keep him busy pushing it around the tank so he'll stop rubbing at the top.

My female hog is only an '07 so I've still got a few more years before I can try putting them together and giving the male a 'break' from his constant searching.

Good luck with yours!
-April
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'There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness."' -Rainshadow