Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My female western hognose does not appear to be drinking water normally that is provided in her enclosure. She only seems to drink water when I hold her and let the water from the sink run into my other hand (kind of like a puddle in a spring). She immediately takes her fill of water and looks at me like she is saying she is ready to go back to her tank and why we are not moving.

Of course she is also my picky eater. She will only eat if I am the one feeding her and has to have the thawed mouse presented in a specific way or she just stares at it asking what am I supposed to do with that?

My male hog is an excellent eater and seems to drink his water just fine. They have identical enclosures.

Any ideas would be helpful but I guess this isn't the worst that could happen. It just means she gets a lot more attention. (Ahh her motives become clear...)
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Thomas M. Marcy
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Madison, AL
Computer Scientist
Hognose Enthusiast

Whats normal to most snakes is no need to drink water, they normally get their moisture needs in their food, then limit dehydration.

They live in neutral humidity areas, avoid dehydration, then only seek wet, when dehydrated. In other words, when its dry out, the avoid the surface or only come out early or late when ground level humidity is highest.

In captivity, there are lots of ways to attend to this problem, a box with moist, not wet, soil, is often all thats needed, that and limited air lose.

Why that female and not others, good question. Lots of could be's, anywhere from, shes different, thinner skin. Hey they are all individuals and slightly different from eachother. To she could have damaged her kidneys at some point(extreme dehydration event) I really cannot say why her.

Give her a moisture box. See how that works. Good luck

In captivity, this is one of the most overlooked and attended to areas of husbandry and its one of the most important.

Thanks for the tip!! I will definitely provide her with a new place to explore and make me search through every time I get her to come out for food. She will enjoy the challenge haha...

Since she has never been noticeably dehydrated I would lean away from any physical/organ damage. I do think the humidity may be the main issue since even I am affected by the lack of humidity of our new location.

I would prefer to have both of my worms in tip top condition before attempting to have them produce minis. I will be back with more questions for the more experienced keepers for optimal weight, age, time, etc for breeding. I can only learn so much from books and you guys have many threads on the subject.

Thanks again!
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Thomas M. Marcy
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Madison, AL
Computer Scientist
Hognose Enthusiast

all the other forums are totally dead....and I gotta learn to stay out of this one...really...

OK....female does NOT drink....so she needs a moist box, because she isn't getting water....wait...taking water....

...MY idea...water bowls are stale and water has no smell fater it gets to room temp....renew her water everyday and see if she likes fresher water more?

maybe she drinks when you aren't looking..?

if she is not drinking...she'd be dead...

I prefer fresh ,cold water....or at least cool...

and....maybe...the water bowl stinks or smells funny???....check bowl?...what is used to clean them?...dish soap? bleach?....

...good luck....snakes in boxes are retty good at drinking what they need...and yes...they drink new water better...and drink while the head is held under water...usually...

plus...you get to interact with her by allowing her to drink from your hand...and eat while you talk to her...no whining...!.

is your hand clean?...LOL...just kidding....
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........JY

When I was learning how to work with venomous reptiles, it was part of my job to always sink the heads of the baby gaboon and rhino vipers heads in the clean water bowl. When I asked my teacher "who is a great friend and mentor" why we did this his reply was "because they are water bowl stupid" and as a 19 year old at the time I took it as another part of keeping animals in captivity.

But now I understand better as too why and how to work around that.

Now I look back at dipping there heads and water bowls and think how much I stressed those baby snakes, when their are so many better ways of going about to prevent dehydration.

I am so glad I learned that I don't need to do that anymore.