#rocza

My friend had two non-starter hatchlings from her last litter- babies that refused to eat, or refused to eat captive prey items. They want baby morning geckos or similar lizards, and at $40 a pop that's just not going to happen. Most of the litters will take fish instead and from there switch to scented mouse pinkies and then to unscented, and be fine. But every litter there are a couple of stubborn holdouts. Often non-starters get culled, either because they outright refuse all food and would just die slowly anyway, or because they're otherwise unfit for captive keeping (for instance, refusing common food sources). Since she's establishing a captive born and bred population, she's focused mainly on the animals that will take common prey items or switch easily. This is ultimately a good thing, as established CBB means less pressure to import wild caught animals.

This time, I took the two non-starters home to see if I could get them switched. I had plenty of guppies available, and plenty of mouse pinkies, after all.

I didn't succeed with the male. He took a couple of guppies when assist fed, but he never really showed any drive to eat at all- no food hunting activities, no ambush pose, no tongue flicking. Sometimes baby animals just fail to thrive.

The girl, however, has been doing great. She was taking fish on her own, every time I offered. Last week I assist fed her a chunk of a mouse tail - a hefty meal compared to a guppy! - by gently holding her up near the head and putting the raw tail end in front of her. It was my intention to put it in her mouth when she opened it to tag me, but she actually shot forward and grabbed it herself.

This week, I had a mouse doe dropping babies right as I was checking on the snake, and so I grabbed one and bapped the snake in the face with it. She wrapped it up to "kill" it (she is not strong enough to do this, had it been alive, but boy did she try), but ultimately she grabbed it by the butt and couldn't find the head, and so abandoned it.

I knew she was hungry though, and I really wanted to get a solid meal into her, so I pulled a baby guppy from my aquarium and euthanized it, then stuck the head into the pinkie's mouth and wrapped the tail up over the nose, so that the fish scent and taste and texture would be where the snake started eating and by the time she realized it was not a fish she'd have it halfway down her face and wouldn't want to stop.

And it worked! I came back an hour later to a fat little snek full of pinkie mouse. She looks so huge with it!! A few more meals like this and she may be able to go back to my friend, and then find a good home!

Day 5

Reread this scene from Athyra last night

There are no photos that can explain how tiny these snakes are when they are born. This is the male next to a dime:

He's 6 months old. They're so tiny.

My friend is attempting to establish a captive born and bred population of SIGBs (a goal she's been working on several years now), and part of that is establishing bloodlines that feed well upon birth. As it stands, they want to eat lizards, which is a problem when lizards that are small enough are expensive to buy or breed. She's been holding back snakes that readily feed on pinkie mice, or that switch off of fish easily. She sells the ones that don't make the cut genetically for breeding, and the ones that won't switch over usually are culled and used as part of the diet for their woma python, Clove (you may remember Clove from when she lived here!).

These two likely would have (and still might) ended up in the same boat, but I asked to give it a try; if I couldn't get them switched then they're no worse off. But if I can, then they can go out to new homes.

So far, they are eating guppies well. Actually, the girl is eating like a champ, the boy will eat if I put it in his mouth. Here she is looking for more fish:

Here's a lil fish bump in the boy's belly

And here's the two of them (male in 1st pic, female in 2nd pic)

I've been calling them Rocza and Loiosh. They are stained brown from the tannins in their bedding, but they should turn a very fetching white and black when they shed out next. I'm looking forward to it!