Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was working in my monitor building and I came out to do something and I almost tripped over this gophersnake. Its a skinny adult. So skinny, I offered it a mouse.

It was so hungry, I gave it another.

Well the darn thing stayed there looking for more for about 2 hours.

So, its mid dec. it rained or at least what we call rain, last night, was cool and cloudy all day and this darn thing is out and about and feeding. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm OK, that part is for Terry.

Now for Phil, Hi Phil, hehehehehehehe. in some recent posts, you dicussed how this type of snake and that type stopped feeding at a particular time of year, etc and tried to compare that to nature.

What bothers me is some lack of understanding of what snakes do(hmmmmmmm sorry, but I do not know how to say this) Snakes do not feed when its not necessary to feed, if they are "in condition" they have no need to consume food for no reason. This is for both Wild living=WL, and captive snakes.

In many cases, captive snakes feed far more then their wild relatives, simply because we do not allow them to conserve energy.

How this relates, the wild snakes that have no reason to feed, are not feeding this time of year, But, others are, as in this fine(skinny) example of Pituophis. hahahahahahahaha. What a hungry bugger. This fella has a definite need to feed, so as you can see, its not confined to certain months or seasons. There are other individuals with other reasons to be feeding or active.

Now I am sure you will rationalize this in all sorts of ways to fit your needs. But one thing is for sure. Its dec. 13, 2005, and this fella is feeding on its own accord. The reason is, it needs to.

Now if you apply that, "need", to other areas, you may start to understand more about what snakes are really doing. Good luck and its all for fun. FR

What where the temps??? Also do think that snake and most others were feeding in July??

Interesting to have a snake in the wild come up looking for handouts. LOL

later Jason

Very cool. Do you also think that IT IS BECAUSE he is a bit thin that he has forgone "hibernating" as he would maybe not be able to go on for an extended down time? Seems right.
Maybe he's able to find food now if his fatter, more successful hunting cohorts are down....???
Thanks for the pics. About what age/size would you say he or she is?
Geeze, gophers at your doorstep.....
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

www.crimsonking.funtigo.com

I think it stuck around waiting for more lol... Interesting nonetheless.

Hey FR... was it your birthday the other day?
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Mike
KingPin Reptiles Inc.
www.freewebs.com/mikesnake
www.freewebs.com/badyear2005

It sure appeared that way, it would smell all around where the mice touched the ground and then lift his head up and look around. hahahahahahaha FR

Neat series of pics Frank. I love that kind of stuff. You know what though. Thats exactly what I would expect a snake there to be doing this time of year. Here's why. I don't know where you live in Arizona so I did a quick search of the weather in Phoenix. Guess what, looks like sunny and upper 60's is the forecast for the next three days. Not too bad. Snakes here feed too when they get those types of conditions. You guys have it good this time of year! Next I did a search for the temps in the northern sand prairie and discovered there it is a balmy 22F. I would certainly like to hear from anyone that has seen snakes feeding up there in mid Dec haha!

On the flip side I have seen thin snakes with large meals late in the season here in Ky, as in late Oct or so. But this is before the bottom drops out on the temps. Makes for good discussion Frank but comparing what your gopher snakes are doing in mid Dec with what bulls are doing in the northern plains is like comparing apples to oranges. All for fun and thanks for the conversation. What part of Ariz do you live in? Phil

Actually Phil, Phoenix is lower 1100 feet, I am at 2800 feet. We have already had nights in the low twenties. It did not freeze last night(cloudy skies prevent that) But after fronts pass thru(clear skys) we radiate heat like crazy and it really drops quick. Sir, if your going to study, study the right things.

I am confused, Wasn't it you that insinuated that Fla kings in southern fla. went down and stopped feeding in the winter and used your captives to confirm that? as they stopped feeding for you in winter.

You see, snakes respond to conditions. Consider, I keep and breed reptiles from the other side of the equator. I can get them to breed any time of year, as well as any of our snakes. Its all about understanding what causes their behaviors. That yours don't is a direct reflection of the conditions you present them with. You see, if you changed your conditions and caused them to respond, say, backwards, breed in fall/winter, etc. Then you may have a different understanding then you do now. Cheers FR

You have covered your low temps. No surprise there. Now what about your high temps? You see, this is even more important. Even if your temps are around freezing at night, day time highs in the 60's allows for thermoregulation that allows digestion, just like here. I see snakes with full bellies often in the early spring when there are extremes of temps between night and day. I realize Ariz is a big state and all, but another quick web search stated that Ariz has on average around 325 sunny days a year. Man, that sure is a boat load more than we get up here! Lets see. Lots of sun, high temps in the 60's (maybe even 70's on some days?), sparse vegetation and lots of rocks. Yeah, I would say those are good enough conditions for snakes to be feeding in. The snow fall we had last week here is gone but the cold temps are still hanging around. So, what do we have? Cloudy skies, cold temps (both night and day) and frozen ground. This goes back to my apples and oranges analogy.

The Florida king comment (going off food in the summer)was really no more than an idea. In others words a possibility to explore. I have visited this area a few times but I am far from an expert at knowing what is going on there. I was hoping some of the Florida herpers would chime in with some insights on that one. Actually any Florida king I have kept up in the winter has fed fine. Its during the summer that some specimens I have had would go off food. I wondered if anyone else had experienced this with field collected floridana or if perhaps my experience with a few snakes was simply the exception. My rationale was, do these snakes have a tendency to become dormant for the hottest part of the summer? If so, could this explain the lack of appetite. Again, just something for conversation. I have no firm convictions on this but would like to hear from others. Snakes in Ky is another matter and like I believe I mentioned in an earlier post, no amoumt of external manipulation (choices as you call them) will keep them on a regular feeding schedule in the winter months.

Which exotic herps do you reproduce? Tropical or temperate? This all makes a difference. As I'm sure you know winter and summer is different in the two hemisperes. Cheers, Phil

Actually Phil, this was only a small exercise.

Its only a gophersnake, here feeding in mid dec.

The question it answered was way back at the begining when Terry, not sure about you, and some others "knew" our snakes did not feed in the winter. So, its winter and it was active and fed.

In the past, we mentioned this occurs, now I showed it and confirmed those statements. The rest of the words were to show how easy it is to throw you off the point. The point is only this snake.

This is a huge problem with taking data, you have to keep it clean and not interpit it or compare it, just take it. At this point, all we should be doing is gathering data. How about gathering data on what your snakes are doing? Cheers FR

Must have been Terry I guess? My position was that snakes are not necessarily doing the same things at the same time in all places. I would not be surprised at all to see some snakes feeding down your way about now and have been actually waiting for the pics to show up. Thanks again for posting the pics. Very nice series. Phil

Sorry I'm late. Had a X-mas party to go to.

I'd say that gopher is in desperate need of nutrition and in way too sad of state to go dormant for any length of time. Now he has to digest that food. Hopefully he'll find a place warm enough to process his meal. What gets me is why he's so skinny to begin with. Have you guys been having a drought, or was he just unprepared for the winter months, do ya think? I hope there aren't a lot of snakes like that.

Good info, Frank. I'm learning more about winter there. Have you seen any montane critters this month? Thanks...TC

BTW, Phil and I both said black kings probably have a winter dormant period. There's reasons for that

would that snake have been able to feed, (as in, is there sufficient suitable prey above or below ground this time of year) if there were no subsidies made available?

well Dave...maybe.
And while there's NO chance I'll ever look underfed, perhaps if we showed up at FR's looking a bit weary and ragged, he'd slip us some food too?? Maybe a cool one??
hahaha!
Still waiting to see my babies....
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

www.crimsonking.funtigo.com