Reptile & Amphibian Forums

What is the shortest amount of time any of you hibernate your snakes? I'm talking about for North American snakes in general. I live in Texas and 60-62 degrees is about as cool as I can get my room. I usually keep mine down about 3 months.

You don't need to cool them if they're eating. Are you looking for a time frame for breeding? If so, 3 weeks is the shortest I've cooled snakes for breeding. I generally cool for three months though.

Tim

I'm asking about time frame for breeding. Just 3 weeks? Wow, what all do you breed? I've cooled everything down for close to 3 months every year, but I'm trying to see if I can go for shorter.

Colubrids do not require forced hibernation to reproduce. Not in the least.

They do require a range of temps. If they can get to the temps you mentioned, they will be fine. Just keep taking care of them. cheers

I second this.

I keep all my florida kings in a cold room and keep the ehat on all winter. They choose to sit on the cold side until I offer them food. then they go to the warm side to digest. After a couple days they are back on the cold side again.

What are they doing? They know what is best for them. that is what they are doing! They are conserving calories. Using this method and not a forced cooling or a forced heating..ie..set room temp where they are all the same temps. The snake knows which temps to pick! Go figure they know exactly what they need for themselves without our ideas on what WE think they need. They will pick the right temps to cycle themseleves, digest ect. The broader range of choices you can give you snake collection in temps and humidty the better they will do without our guesswork.

Also there are very practical applications to all this as well. Like in the summer i turn on the two airconditining units and it is cool in the snake room making it comfortable for me and cuts down on any mold and insects, flies, knata ect. which can be a pain with a larger collection of animals.
-----

Hello and I hope your doing great.

I think people do not like that system because they somehow need or require control.(just a guess)
a. they may not understand reptiles, so they have to follow a recipe
b. they feel snakes are brainless and cannot make decisions on their own.
c. Have a need to mother(????) actually to husband=to support. Which then gets mixed up with A&b above.

On another note, its odd how the recipe system(telling them what to do) gets tied or associated with natural or nature. When in nature, they never live at one temp. They are always moving from one temp to another to suit specific needs.

Oh well, by limiting what they do, the keepers are limiting what they could learn. But then, I am under some false sense that people keep them to learn from an appreciate them. See, I am wrong again. Cheers

Thank you to all who responded. I have actually been breeding colubrids for more than 20 years, keeping my room about 60 degrees from late November to early February, and 80 degrees the rest of the year, with good success. I wanted to hear how some of you guys cycled your animals. FR and Bluerosy, ya'll gave me a different perspective on the subject. Thank you all.

Your welcome, At least with kings, there are many ways to skin a cat. You have options and so do the snakes.

Did someone's post get deleted you were responding to or are you just getting proactive now?
-----
Gerard

"Sleep my friend and you will see, your dreams are my reality. "

www.livebaitclip.com

GONE FISHING!!!

i'm not sure if this is a troll post, because he was clearly responding to rainer's earlier post.

did you read it at all before posting?

>>i'm not sure if this is a troll post, because he was clearly responding to rainer's earlier post.
>>
>>did you read it at all before posting?

don't worry, this is just how they communicate, share ideas and inspire new threads/posts.
-----
alcohol, tobacco and firearms should be a convenience store, not a government agency

Okay, another topic turned into about people again.

Do you think Gerard was really serious? Even if he was why would he pose such a question without it be trolling? He has just been more sneaky about his trolling now. Basically being dishonest.

Thing that i see is a handful of regulars here don't add anything but trolling posts to a subject. What they try to do is derail any info and posts that are actually very informative and beg for honest discussion. The immaturity of these individuals is something that KS cannot control.
-----

I was just curious if I missed something. I didn't say anything about the subject!
-----
Gerard

"Sleep my friend and you will see, your dreams are my reality. "

www.livebaitclip.com

GONE FISHING!!!

"I was just curious if I missed something. I didn't say anything about the subject!"

Yes, but you are a high-ranking member of the horrible "Handful of Regulars" gang...LOL!

I saw how "informative" a couple of the replies were just a few posts down.....
LINK

-----
"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Doug,
Are you sure you don't work for THF publishers?

-----

I didn't say anything about the subject!

Exactly right! And I wish i was a regular with my digestion and elimination process as you.
-----

What more was there to say? You guys answered the question without a single negative response. I was wondering why you were defending your idea against nothing? No one said anything and yet you bashed the people that usually disagree with you? What is the difference between that and what you call trolling? It's still fishing!
-----
Gerard

"Sleep my friend and you will see, your dreams are my reality. "

www.livebaitclip.com

GONE FISHING!!!

-----
i work with tri-colored west mexican lampropeltis. some morph, some hobby, and some locale.

everyone is entitled to their options, but no one's opinion will ever change how i feel about the snakes i keep and breed.

Nice hair cut!
-----
Gerard

"Sleep my friend and you will see, your dreams are my reality. "

www.livebaitclip.com

GONE FISHING!!!

http://www.kingsnake.com/blog/archives/1036-US-buying-Iranian-antivenom-to-treat-troops-in-Afghanistan.html
-----
alcohol, tobacco and firearms should be a convenience store, not a government agency

-----

He was talking about people, not Rainer! I was just curious if I missed anything, it seemed like a typical response from them when someone post against their method.
-----
Gerard

"Sleep my friend and you will see, your dreams are my reality. "

www.livebaitclip.com

GONE FISHING!!!

Hi G, it was directly in reponse to Bluerosy. and its funny how you take things.

We do not have a method, the snakes do. I know I have and do hibernate, not hibernate, keep them in groups, not keep them in groups. Do one, the other or both.

ITs funny, your from S.Fla?????? if so, many folks are now going snake hunting as winter is the best time of year in Fla. So are the snakes there hibernating???????? Its just a question.

I actually liked Rainers post and was only curious if I missed something because of your defensive response, that's all. I have the visions separated from each other and my new Siatkowski Stacks for basking and hiding.
Yes, everything is moving now. I just caught and moved a cottonmouth off the exit lane of the dump a couple minutes ago.
Stay thirsty!
-----
Gerard

"Sleep my friend and you will see, your dreams are my reality. "

www.livebaitclip.com

GONE FISHING!!!

Cool, my reply was only based on Bluerosy and how some folks think about husbandry. I did not think of you at all when I wrote it. Your a frog guy right?

Also, Ski stacks, cool. I did not name them, others did. I did not name myself goannaman either, others did. Boards have been used for a very long time. Someone just tied a name to a purpose. Instead of just boards in a cage, now they have meaning.

So what are the temps in your ski racks? Its those temps that make choices important. Have a great day.

Will temps of 60-62 work for making males fertile in montane kings, ie pyro, zonata and Mexican kings, ie alterna, mexicana, thayeri, greeri and ruthven's? Or do montanes need access to temps in the 50's or lower to induce fertility?

I have no doubts these will eat during winter in the wild if they can find appropriate temps but I was under the impression that these regularly experience unavoidable drops into at least the low 50's and they need these to produce fertile sperm.
-----
www.hcu-tx.org/

As far as I know, its heat that inhibits healthy sperm in males, like longterm exposure to temps steadily over 80F

As long as my montanes had a range of temps they were fertile. Its when I went to hot or to cold without giving them a choice that I ran into problems.

In fact, in the early years when i hibernated them. we ran into infertility on the first clutches out of hibernation but were fertile on second clutches.

I cured that by not hibernating males, then had no problems.

Comparing them to what they do in nature can be very misleading.

I live near pyros and specialized in them for many years. I watched many populations in the field including nesting areas.

In nature, some individuals, particularly the breeders, seek areas with high mass temps. While the surface is cold, in the ground is not.

I have used this example before. The Santa Ritas has pyros. On the east side there is a cave in cave creek canyon(gardner canyon) ITs at aprox 6000 ft. inside the cave its 72 degrees year around. The sunny aspect is much hotter.

On the west side of the mountains there is another cave, only a bit lower. I think about 5000 ft, maybe a little less. Its 80F your around inside that cave.

So, anything past three feet in, has a choice of fairly high temps. Even at higher elevation. They actually need to get closer to the surface to find cool temps, In the winter.

And yes it snows there, only it quickly melts on the south sides and stays on the north sides. Hardly ever lasting more then a day.

What I am attempting to point out is, they indeed have the ability to obtain temps above 50 or even 60F anytime they want. If they choose. In nature. And they do choose.

What we do in captivity is limit choices. But we do not have to. Cheers