First King Ratsnake

[lmtrej]

I just received my first King Ratsnake or Elaphe c. carinata from Seth Rock at Rock Reptiles. Seth was very communicative throughout the process and even called me within five minutes of delivery to make sure every thing arrived ok. Definitely a good guy to do business with

This is a male 2012 hatchling that is 66% het. for hypo. The father is an extremely striking high yellow Kingrat and the mother has a good contrast of dark black with bright yellows. I can't wait to see this little guy color up. Fortunately there was no musking so I can't say if he'll live up to the other common name of Stinking Goddess. Here are a few quick cellphone pictures before I put him away to settle.

[Coleslaw007]

Very cool. I love his eyes. Props on getting a tongue-flick pic

[TheWinWizard]

Nice. Good luck with him.

[lmtrej]

Thanks Winwizard. For a baby colubrid he was relatively calm, we'll see if this changes though once he's warmed up. Although my leucistic texas rat is one of the calmest snakes I own and that doesent fit with their reputatuon.
Honestly though besides their looks their reputation of being agressive face biters is part of what interested me in them.

Are there any other carinata keepers on this site? They seem to be few and far between.

[carlson]

How big do these get as adults? I like how they look just haven't looked into anything about them much

[lmtrej]

How big do these get as adults? I like how they look just haven't looked into anything about them much

From what I've read it seems they get anywhere from 5.5'-8' so they are on the larger side. I'm keeping him just like I do nearly all of my colubrids, low to mid 70's on the cool side low to mid 80's on the warm side. Pretty straight forward as far as their husbandry goes.

[lmtrej]

Well tonight was feeding night so I decided to offer him some food. Within 10 seconds he had calmly taken the f/t fuzzy from the hemostats and even came back for seconds.

Couldn't have been a smoother switch from live to f/t

[AKA Reptiles]

That's awesome. Congrats on a successful switch. I'm really diggin his eyes. They look sick.

[kevinb]

I love love love king rats! I can't wait till I can get one. Mines going to be albino though .

Very nice looking king rat.

[lmtrej]

I love love love king rats! I can't wait till I can get one. Mines going to be albino though .

Very nice looking king rat.

Thanks Kevin, I'm happy to finally have mine and hope that your snake keeping situation changes soon. I like the normal King rats the best although I did stumble across pictures of a Chinese keepers axanthic and leucistic carinata which were mind blowing.