Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a 6' 11 pound female bci that is 3 years old, and she is a screaming ^&*$#ch sometimes,(yesterday-open mouth, hissing.) Today, I was prepared for the worse case sceneario, yet I was able to bare hand handle her for 30 minutes. Totally different animal! I thought they were supposed to get MELLOW with age! Is this normal behavior? If so, I will deal with it. I was just wondering if this is normal for an adult female bci. I realise that there are many factors involved, but let me rule out right now husbandry factors, I have been a long time reader of this forum (3 years) and I assure you temps and humidity are correct, (always a one piece shed and never a regurge or fail to feed with this snake.)

i deffeinatly find that snakes have differnt moods just as people. some snakes are more moody then others. most times i find that there are certain things that set them off into these bad moods though. try to take notice to common occurances that happend during her bad moods and you might be able to find your source.
does it happen when it is near time for her to shed? near time for her to eat?
is she more likely to act that way at certain times of the day? depending on how you pick her up?
it is hard to determine the cause of behaviors like this when you dont work with the snake like you do.
if it is not husbantry then it has to be some sort of situational factor since it only happens some times.

Not, that I'm saying it's a female thing.....
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Delusions of Grandeur feed the EGO...

today I went in her cage early this morning and she started hissing at me, and she has never once done this before???? Things that make you go hmmmmm.

and if you can produce them you can be effected by them. Of course that is a simplified statement, but you get the idea.

On a side note: I even learned in college than men go through hormonal changes in cycles just like women...never thought about it before that. I wonder if we can use the same initials - PMS? Nah...but, maybe MHC? Male Hormonal Cycle? THC....Testosterone Hormonal Change? Never mind, THC is already taken. )
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Delusions of Grandeur feed the EGO...

deffinately could be hormonal also. problem is there is no true research on topics like this and problably wont ever be.
i would attribute it to mood before hormonal unless there are other boas in the area. reason being is i dont think human hormones would effect snakes .i know some animal scents are used for human attraction in perfumes and such, but i would think this strange behavior would be more common if our hormones effected our snakes.

I wasn't meaning our pheramones would effect a snake, I just meant since they produce hormones, and those hormones might well effect their moods, as the hormones we produce effect us. It's a consideration anyway.
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Delusions of Grandeur feed the EGO...

well i missunderstood about hormones interactign across species, but i agree with you about snake hormones effecting mood. its just not something that is easy to determine from simple observation, which is really the only means most of us will be able to use to determine cause of behaviors such as this. deffinately could be the cause though, especially if say a male was near and she was not diggin his signals haha.

Never thought about the hormonal thing. I do have a male in a Neodesha cage above hers-but what about all the people with snake rooms with 20-30 snakes all male/female in the same room? Wouldn't they all be berserk half the time? Funny thing I just noticed- I was posting my pic of the cages and I just realised that all of this started happening since my dog died (pictured.) She's been used to the smell of that dog her whole life, and now that's gone, and now-different behavior. Coincidence?

I'm no expert, but, It's not uncommon for animals to react differently after another pets death. I don't understand it myself, but,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, animals aren't stupid like most people think.

Marty