Update on Loki

I am happy to report that Loki's health has greatly improved. :) Unfortunately, her attitude has not :( She still hates to be held and hisses at even the slightest touch on her body. She tollerates being petted now, but hisses and squeaks the whole time. It's been a great way for me to monitor her respiratory infection without disturbing her too much. I just listen to how raspy her hiss sounds. The real test came at feeding time. I gave her a 2 pound f/t bunny last night. At first she didn't recognize it as food. She literally laid on top of it for an hour without even looking at it. So plan B- I fished it out and warmed the belly by the heater for a bit, and then dangled the front end of the bunny over the door and gave it a shake or two. She came up and looked at it and thumped it and held on kinda like she was tasting it. I gave it another shake to convince her and she took it. She then proceeded to eat it from the wrong end. It took her forever to get her mouth around the butt and back legs! I dare say it's been quite a while since she has been fed something that was the appropriate size! lol I was planning on giving her antibiotics at the advice of a friend, but now I don't think I'll need to. As she ate, I listened for her to gasp and strain like she did at her last meal of 3 rats (which was all I had at the time). This was a full size meal and she ate it without a single gasp, whistle, or raspy breath. Her breathing was smooth and even. I was thrilled. :)
Now... maybe since she has a full belly she won't be quite so grouchy! :) I'll give her a couple of days alone to digest this bunny and then we will see how she feels. Personally I think she just needs a boyfriend! I'll report more later... I should film our social session!
Here's the video of her eating her bunny, butt-end first. (Silly snake! try from the nose next time! It'll be much easier!) It took her so long to get the rear in her mouth I was worried that she would get tired and spit it out and give up. (I've seen that happen) But she kept at it. Once she got her mouth around it, it went quick and I missed most of her swallowing it as I had gone upstairs to eat a snack myself.

Snake Beeding Season! YAY!

We're off to a great start this year! Our star boy, Kye, a Mystic male has already bred 3 girls- Mala, a bumblebee; Vanya, a Mojave; and Bambi, a spider.





Also we have Pete, a cinny pewter, who has bred with Bana, our other bumblebee; >

and Spot is breeding with Fern (below) - this is our het pied pair!



So we could possibly have any of the following:
mystics, mystic potions, cinnabee, bumblebee, mystic bee(?!),... and pieds! :)

Loki the Burmese Python

Well I have acquired a snake I'm going to call a rescue. She is a 7 foot Burmese Python with a bad attitude. I've had her for about a week and a half. When I first got her home, she did not want to be held or even touched. After working with her over the past few days, she has calmed down quite a lot and will already let me hold her. We still have a long way to go though, because she is used to getting her way, and when she wants down, she won't take no for an answer! Suddenly a 20 pound snake feels like she weighs 40 pounds! She is still hissy and fussy, but I think a lot of that noise may be due to her stuffy nose. Poor thing has a respiratory infection- no wonder she's so cranky! I'm keeping her kennel (more on that in a second) right in front of the heater, so she can crawl to the front and get really warm. I hope she will start feeling better soon.
So I brought her home immediately when I met her, leaving her cage behind to fetch at a later date. I put her in a large dog airline crate which she took to like a fish to water. She hid in the far corner and stayed there for several days. Then she moved up into her water tub and stayed there for another few days until she shed. After shedding she felt much better and came to the front of the kennel to greet me when I came int the snake room.
We then took her crate and all upstairs to the bathroom for a nice warm bath. She happily got into the warm water and then refused to come out! Determined not to handle her roughly, I suffered a lesson in patience and persistence to coax her back into her kennel. As soon as her nose was in the door she went straight to the back and coiled up again. So much for a first outing!
We repeated this process the last couple of days, and today she was quite social. She came out of her kennel on her own when I opened the door, and she let me carry her up the stairs to the living room. She sat with me on the couch for about an hour, and then we went to the bathroom to the tub for dinner where she ate 2 big rats quick as a wink.
So I started running some warm water into the tub for her to sit for a bit and get out of "hunt" mode, but she suddenly struck the water coming out of the faucet banging her nose hard on the metal. I felt so bad! I reached for her to pull her away so she would not hit her nose again, but as I started to tug her, the brat bit me! Then, thinking my arm must be a nice big bunny, she spun around my arm. The bite didn't hurt a bit. Her wrapping tight around my arm didn't hurt a bit. But her teeth pulling on my hand hurt like Hell!!! I wish I had gotten a picture of her twisted around my arm, but I was kinda focused on getting her OFF! First I poked her tail, but that made her spin tighter and her teeth pulled even more. OUCH!!! So I held as still as I possibly could until she started loosening up a little. Then I poked her belly under a coil on my arm. She loosened up a bit and I poked her again and she unwound and let go. I did get a nice picture of the bite, look at all those teeth!


Sadly, I know I won't be able to keep her. (Mom, I know this is good news to you ;) )
I just can't invest so much space to just one snake. I would love to breed half dwarf Burmese. Their size is much more manageable and much better pet quality. I will be keeping Loki long enough to get her sociable, and to get her respiratory infection all better. But then I think I will try to find her a home with one of my breeder friends.

Lory laid 7 eggs!

This was a few days ago on the 6th. So they should hatch between... Aug 30 to Sept 3 or so. I can't wait! Pete was the father, so babies could be Pastel, Cinnamon, or maybe pewter like daddy if I'm really lucky! Or who knows? Maybe they are both het for something... there's always a chance.

Tumors in African Soft Furred Rats

I have been breeding African soft furred rats for a couple years now. I find them to be less smelly than Norway rats, and they are prolific breeders....
However, in addition to being nasty biters (ouch) they are prone to developing nasty rapid growing tumors. Within a week an affected rat can go from having rough-looking fur (tumors developing underneath) or a sore on the eye, ear, or under the jaw; to numerous bumpy, sometimes bleeding, lumps all over their body. I did a bit of research and found a bit more info on this problem:
http://www.metalmonkeyexotics.com/blog/?page_id=333

"Tumors

"ASF's are prone to spontaneous, fast growing warty tumors. From my readings in various papers, the warty and ulcer like tumors known as keratoacanthomas and squamous carcinomas, are associated with a papillomavirus (MnPV). The tumors can be seen in the vaginal region as a clustered mass, along the tail as bumps, on the back and hind quarters as warty black growths, or on the face of the animal. (Pictures can be found here)

"They will develop warty tumors, patchy hairloss, and osteoarthritis as they age past approx 9 months, although it can be younger, or delayed as much as 14 months, or not at all.

"So far, it would seem that the tumors develop after 9 -12months of age, although not all will get this condition.I have at least one Amber colored female well over 14 months of age that still has not developed any skin tumors or growths.

"The tumor development can be very fast and spontaneous. I've had one female just recently (6/1) who within days developed fast growing tumors all over her body, under the skin and on the skin surface. I should have taken a picture, but I didn't remember to before she was euthanized and destroyed. It was disturbing to see the alarming rate that the tumors grew, she had just reached approximately 8-9 months of age when these tumors developed."

Though I try to cull affected animals as soon as I notice them, I haven't been able to make a noticeable improvement since I have a colony-style environment. I am seriously thinking about trying to do some strict selective breeding to see if this problem could be at least reduced or delayed if not irradiated (I could work on the aggressiveness and biting too) .
Also, ... is there something in captivity that is causing this? Are they missing something in their diet? Do they need a different bedding? Do they need some light exposure?
I need to do more research. ....

Pete and Jewel

Pete is a busy boy! Jewel is just over 1300g. She's small yet, but maybe we'll get 3 or 4 eggs from her this year. Hopefully she'll eat a few more times and get her weight up. She's an African import, so who knows? She might throw something new :)

A Good Lock!

This is Pete and Tika! Tika has some insanely bright yellow on her lower half; it will be interesting to see if pastel babies will pick up some of this yellow. Other than that I suppose she is a normal. Pete is a pewter, so I could have baby pastels, cinnies, or maybe a pewter if I'm really lucky! I can't wait!! :)

Since I had the camera, I filmed the rats munching their veggies. Aren't they cute?