I feed all of my pythons F/T with exception to my Burm (for now) because he's only a few months old and Im giving him pinkies/fuzzies which arent capable of any harm. I fed him 4 pinkies today (store ran out of fuzzies). He constricted and ate the first two normally. The second two he swallowed ALIVE. It makes you wonder..had that been a live adult rat in its stomach thrashing around....I would hate to imagine what could happen, if anything. Obviously the prey would suffocate eventually but in the meantime you will have a scared panicking rat. Im not worried, just wondering if anyone has experienced this behavior?
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Weird feeding behavior
r3ptile
Nov 25, 2003 07:15 PM
Replies (1)
meretseger
Nov 25, 2003 09:51 PM
I've seen this in a variety of snakes. USUALLY they're smart enough to know that they're eating a pinkie and the pinkie can't hurt them, and that's why they don't bother killing it. They figure it's not worth the energy. However, the possibility of a snake having a 'duh' moment with a rat and trying to swallow it alive is a good reason to feed f/t if you can.
(I also have snakes who go whole hog constricting f/t prey, so go figure)
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Peter: It's OK, I'll handle it. I read a book about something like this.
Brian: Are you sure it was a book? Are you sure it wasn't NOTHING?
