Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Took a bunch of the snakes out today and weighed/measured/photoed them.

Male Uni
1481g's
64"
2 years old

Female Uni
1396g's
58"
3 years old

Male CH Pseustes
420g's
58"
Almost 2 years

Female CH Pseustes
213g's
49"
Almost 2

Female CBB Spilotes
804g's
70"

Male CBB Spilotes
783g's
70"

That's it for the snakes

Here's a new Cambro Rack I built

and a few old school herp posters

I'm thinking of putting the Spilotes and Drymarchon together this year any thoughts?

Nate

Nate, great photos and thanks for posting, it has been so slow around here I thought maybe I was the only one left...

Put your Drys and Spilotes together? Surely you gest...you just want to stir up the forum, yes? I think a good size Dry would go right after them, my couperi really like snakes. Sounds real risky to me...but what do I know? Your Spilotes are impressive, I am finding myself more and more interested in them.

Best of luck, Vic H.

Niced collection of posters guy. The snakes are ok too. S.

2 nor'easters in a row. the beaches have mostly been toted out to sea. nate, i think you have 2 brown tails there, definitely not pure uni's.......

They started with Black Tails, went to Brown and now that's fading away. Indoors their tails appear darker brown while outdoors It's almost unnoticeable even more so in direct sun. I also don't see the clean belly I hear is associated with true black tails.

Who knows right? I still think their needs to be more studies done on them, to say anything for sure. I have seen some crazy locality pictures of both in the same area.

Did you ever dig up that range map? I spent the last couple hours reading all the Drymarchon papers I could find and nigh a rangemap.

Christmas is coming around so I have a good reason to buy more South and Central American snake books.

Mine definitely are not as nice as yours but they're still cool even if they could be an "intergrade"

Male outdoors

Female outdoors

Nate

nate, that map was originally produced by chris harrison, online name = chrish. i haven't seen him in here in quite awhile [a couple years?] but if you research all his replies [& there weren't that many] you should be able to find it pretty easily i would think.

Spilotes with Spilotes Drys with Drys I would hate to make my Spilotes into meals or mutt hybrids.

Nate

Putting them together will require cautious observation. To wit: a friend who had a breeding pair of D. couperi that always got along famously, one day in the fall he put them together while cleaning a cage, and to his surprise and horror, the male attacked her and made a 2" jagged laceration on her neck, down to the muscle tissue. He was shocked, never having witnessed agression prior. Fortunately she healed up nicely. He said the attack was so fast and savage he could do nothing to stop the damage, the mistake was made in the casual introduction... I could hardly believe the bad cut, I am amazed how well it healed without sutures, which I would have considered.

Frank Retes, a very experienced herp breeder believes many snakes can be kept together, that they do this in the wild, including ophiophagous kingsnakes, but they have to establish a sort of social bond. Easiest if you raise them together from hatchlings. A "stranger" kingsnake, not part of the social group, may be attacked and eaten. Otherwise, careful introduction, i.e. after hibernating together in some taxa, maybe after both are well fed and at night? Are others keeping multiple Drys in the same enclosure, year around, same sex? I had a friend back in the '70's who kept a pair of wild caught couperi together year'round and they bred and did great. Good luck, let us know how it goes if you try it. Vic H. Imperial Valley, Ca.

i've always kept my 1.1 dry pairs together year round w/ no problem. but back in the old days [when i didn't know better] i kept males together as well, not a good idea. they were fine all year until autumn, then they'd start chasing/fighting viciously. that was the end of cohabitating males........

Man I need to state what I'm doing a little better lol.

Put them together for breeding only, I do plan to keep the Spilotes and Pseustes together year round but I don't think I'd do it with Dry's. I have heard of people keeping them together year round with no problems, Dan can attest to that. I have also heard they horror stories so....?

This is not a uncommon phenomenon. I've seen it often in wild indigos when I lived in Florida...especially doing the fall/winter breeding season.

Dan

Put the "dark tailed uni's" together today and they were locked up in 15 minutes...nice!

Nate

Good luck with the breeding of the "Brown" or "Dark Tailed" Cribos