Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi, my Rosy is exhibiting some strange behavior today. He's very jumpy and won't let me touch his head anymore, which he normally doesn't have a problem with. When I touch his head, he jumps, and eventually curls into a tight ball. He's never done this before, as usually he is very mellow. He seems to be very sensitive with the top 1/3rd of his body now.

He had just ate 3 days ago, and shed yesterday. It has also been pretty hot the past couple days. He is about 1.5 years old. It's kind of like he's scared and recognize me anymore.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Some snakes can be a bit touchy after they shed. In general, though, it is best not to even touch the snake's head at all... When confronted by a predator, they usually go for the snake's head first so it often frightens snakes to be touched around their heads (even by familiar people). It's actually a lot more unusual for a snake not to jerk its head back when touched than to behave in the manner you're describing... Sounds like you have a pretty tame boa. Hope this helps.
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- Natalie
(San Francisco Bay Area)

Maybe you're right and he's being touchy from the shed. His scales do look a little "ruffled" on the top 1/3 of his body. I'll continue monitoring the situation.

Thanks for the feedback.

So he ended up taking a gi-normous bowel movement (on my bed) and his behavior is back to normal. I don't know if I can correlate one with the other, because the solution doesn't seem to relate to the symptoms, but whatever the case, all is happy in rosy land.

I don't know if he was constipated, but I do keep a small elbow PCV pipe in his cage which he loves to curl up in. It's a bit of a tight squeeze for him now, maybe that affected his digestion process. I removed it for now.

He's probably a bit more comfortable now. Don't worry about the pipe causing constipation... Rosies are designed to cram themselves in tiny places in the wild, so it isn't of any detriment to them.

I've heard of people soaking their rosies in lukewarm water to encourage them to defecate if it's been longer than it should have been. I've never tried this though, so I can't say if it works or not.

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- Natalie
(San Francisco Bay Area)

Thanks for the info!

In a burrow, rosies will instinctively pull their head to one side, bite and push prey against the burrow with their neck. So the neck region to a rosy or sand boa is sensitive to touch in that a touch there can trigger a feed response.

I've had rosies that, if I wanted to get bitten, all I had to do was touch their neck with my hand.

Rosies also detest high ambient temps. They have no problem with a very warm heat pad, but when the air temps get high, rosies can get very uncomfortable.

Rosies are different from kingsnakes and such and have behavior peculiarities all their own.
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Mark

Ya, the temperature has been pretty high the last few days, he probably was agitated. Actually our rosy is consistently peculiar in that he loves the cold side of his tank (usually like 65-70 degrees). He actually got a cold from it, so I had to keep the heater running for a few days straight. He's fine now though.

I think we got lucky with this rosy, I can manhandle his head all day (not that I do it) and he remains passive. He's a really mellow snake.