Reptile & Amphibian Forums

It is known that Kingsnakes eat Rattlesnakes, but i'm wondering about the specifics of this. Firstly, how does a king overcome a rattler? Due to their strong resistance to native snakes venom, do Kings just go in regardless of the bites, and squeeze the rattler? Also, are rattlers bigger than kings? If so, how do kings manage to swallow rattlers, do they just go for the younger ones?

Kings seem to be immune to North American viper venom. The king uses the same techniques on snakes that they use for rodents. They strike, wrap, and squeeze the rattler until dead then they eat. Nothing fits inside a snake as well as another snake. Go to the eastern kingsnake resource site (web site) to find a few pictures of kings injesting other snakes.
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Bob Bull
1.3 L.g.getula MD Locality
2.1 L.g.g GA locality
2.3 L.g.g albino
1.4 L.g.g het albino
1.2 L.g.g P-het albino
1.0 L.g.floridana peanutbutter
0.2 L.g.f. het peanutbutter
1.0 L.g.f. N.E. axanthic
1.0 L.g.nigrita
1.1 L.t.hondurensis het hypo-melanistic
0.1 L.t.hondurensis hypo-melanistic

Bob basically described a king in action already.

But yeah, besides what he said, a king could take another snake that is about 80% of it's size. There are some users here that have pics of rattlers being eaten by kings... Maybe they'll post. Often times a king will get bit while trying to eat a rattler, or any other snake for that matter. Doesn't do much unless a fang punctures an eye.

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Mike
KingPin Reptiles Inc.
www.freewebs.com/mikesnake
www.freewebs.com/badyear2005

That's a good looking Eastern Mike. Is that one of Will's Ga. easterns?

Steve

Nope...

Got her from a seller in TX. Assumed GA locality and quite a looker. Unfortunately was one of the snakes in my collection that first caught crypto and may have arrived with it.

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Mike
KingPin Reptiles Inc.
www.freewebs.com/mikesnake
www.freewebs.com/badyear2005

I once watched a video (make that 16mm film)of a wild encounter a friend had with a FL king he was watching and filming that hunted and ate an eastern diamondback rattlesnake back in the '70s.
The king was maybe 4' or so and the edb maybe a little over 3' but bigger and heavier than the more slender king.
One thing that was noticeable, at least in my observation, was the near total lack of ANY defensive movements/actions at all from the edb. He posed in classic form but never struck.
It was as if the edb maybe went into a "you can't see me" type pose hiding his head with the king simply quickly grabbing the rattler and hanging on and both wriggling until the king was coiled over the first 1/2 of the diamondback. Only movement from then on was the writhing of the edb's tail back and forth as the king took down his meal. I sure wish I had copies of that old film!
By no means take that as anything other than just a 2nd hand observation. I have no idea if that would be considered normal or not. I feel that each encounter has it's own set of circumstances.
I also know of a keeper that was intrigued by the whole event of a king eating a hot that he just had to feed a pigmy to a young king. The li'l pig did some damage as he was able to get a fang in one of the eyes of the king.
Needless to say, it was a hard lesson to learn for the guy (not to mention the poor king)let alone a needless and in my opinion stupid thing to do in a captive situation.

:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

www.crimsonking.funtigo.com

i have seen footage of some rattler,i think atrox or viridis,using what's called body bridging-rather than strike at the king and risk the king grabbing it's head/neck,the rattler(or other pit viper) arches up part of it's midsection,and sort of slaps the king on the face/head when it approaches closely-and thus presenting the king with just a less vulnerable portion of it's body than the head,etc....btw also in a book i have (don't remember the author/title,shows an x-ray photo of a longer snake in the gut of a shorter one-indeed the longer one is conveniently folded in half.but i'm sure that's not the norm,but certainly most if not all crotalids are a good deal fatter than kings of equal length.

Yes there is an old book I saw that had a black and white still photography sequence of the behavior you describe. The rattlesnake would make a loop with it's body and hit the kingsnake with it rather than bite. The kingsnake was still successful at eating the rattler though. I believe it was a C. viridis and a California King.