Red tailed green ratsnake

[Bugmom]

I'm considering buying a captive hatched baby. There's not a lot of information online about them, aside from general care sheets. I'm not going to shy away from a high maintenance snake, but I'm curious about temperament. I know this isn't a species that's particularly interested in being handled, especially when young, and every animal is different, just curious what I could expect during feeding and enclosure maintenance, and any health or other issues I should look out for. I plan to build a custom enclosure so any suggestions on what your snake(s) seem to do best with (an elaborate vivarium setup vs. the standby "cheap" way with PVC pipes and a plastic tub) would be great too. Thanks!

[Neal]

Even docile species can be temperamental their whole lives. So while you may get some that will calm down once they're adults, that doesn't always mean they will so take all that with a grain of salt.

I look at it this way if you were to get an aggressive one that would be like that its whole life would you still want it? If not then I wouldn't recommend getting one, if so then I don't see a problem.

Rat snakes can climb and I've had them before so I can attest to this from experience but this doesn't mean you have to provide climbing spaces. A terrestrial cage would be fine, just make sure to provide some hides. They can be elaborate or simple as far as setup goes so it's more or less how difficult you want to make it on yourself.

Also keep in mind that I've never had a Red tailed rat but I've had rat snakes in the past so I'm giving you my general information with my experiences with them.

[AdamL8]

The only part that I want to comment on is their temperament. I haven't heard of a single one that wasn't a bitey little ball of fury. It's possible that you could get one as a baby and raise it well enough that it grows out of the biting but as a general rule they are mean SOBs. They are certainly gorgeous animals though and I would love to have one in a nice display enclosure.

[Libby]

I don't know the first thing about these guys, but this blogger writes about them pretty extensively:

http://alltailnolegs.tumblr.com/

[Bugmom]

Thanks everyone. I'm a bit wary of the seller after doing a bit of research, so I'm going to pass this time. I do think I'll still get one of these, just not today It's okay if it's bitey, I've dealt with that before.

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[Skiploder]

I'm considering buying a captive hatched baby. There's not a lot of information online about them, aside from general care sheets. I'm not going to shy away from a high maintenance snake, but I'm curious about temperament. I know this isn't a species that's particularly interested in being handled, especially when young, and every animal is different, just curious what I could expect during feeding and enclosure maintenance, and any health or other issues I should look out for. I plan to build a custom enclosure so any suggestions on what your snake(s) seem to do best with (an elaborate vivarium setup vs. the standby "cheap" way with PVC pipes and a plastic tub) would be great too. Thanks!

I've still got a male gonyosoma left over from a group I had several years ago. I gotta tell you, I've never really thought of them as any more bitey than a lot of other colubrids, but I guess for whatever reason that's the word on them today. Whatever. I find thrasops, spilotes and pseustes much more tempermental than gonyos.....................

As far as maintenance goes - I've never really considered them high maintenance. Treat them like you would any other large, arboreal colubrid and you should be fine - namely space, room to climb, areas to thermoregulate, and proper husbandry parameters. Not too wet and not too dry. It can be a bit tricky at first, but once you get things in the sweet spot, husbandry should consist of feeding and cleaning.

If you are coming from the world of commonly kept boids, gonyos may seem high maintenance - but they really aren't. There are ways to set up their enclosures that limit stress due to routine maintenance and you need to keep in mind that these aren't animals that should be handled more than absolutely necessary.

True captive hatched animals are rare - so unless a propsective seller can prove this to you somehow - assume that they are wild caught. The high maintenance reputatation of these animals has more to do with the less than healthy specimens that dominate the market than actual tricky husbandry.

[Roman]

Rat snakes can climb and I've had them before so I can attest to this from experience but this doesn't mean you have to provide climbing spaces. A terrestrial cage would be fine, just make sure to provide some hides. They can be elaborate or simple as far as setup goes so it's more or less how difficult you want to make it on yourself.

Also keep in mind that I've never had a Red tailed rat but I've had rat snakes in the past so I'm giving you my general information with my experiences with them.

Dear Neal, are you seriously suggesting to keep an arboreal colubrid in a terrestical setup? Obviously I am new here, but I am keeping snakes since 1984 and I kept Gonyosoma oxycephalum for more than 15 years. If they have the opportunity they will stay in the highest branches of your enclosure and will seldom come to the ground. So providing them no branches to climb on is against their nature and is in my opinion a cruelty against this snake.

@Bugmom: Gonyosoma is an active snake which likes to climb, so you should provide it with a tall enclosure. If you give it lot of room (like as much space as you can afford) it will repay you with an active behavior during daytime which will be much more interesting as any TV program. An enclosure of 4 x 2 x 5 ft would be good for a pair, if you add another foot in depth ( 4 x 3 x 5) your snakes might even be calmer because they can keep their distance to you during maintenance etc.

Use some substrate which keeps moisture like some soil or something like “ReptiBark”, I would not use aspen. Add some large branches which the snakes can use to climb and rest. You can also add life plants for climbing like Ficus benjamina or Ficus elastic and they will also help to keep the moisture up. You don’t need any UTH, your snakes will not stay on the ground for long. I use some different lights for heating (HCI or Halogen) and with horizontal branches in different heights you get a nice temperature gradient. Spray some water at least twice a day, because most of the snakes drink the water droplets but might not drink from a water bowl.

I don’t know about the situation in the US, but here in Germany (or in Europe) Gonyosoma is bred on a regular basis, so it is no problem to get CB younglings. I would not buy WC, they have a high mortality rate due to parasites and bad handling during transport.

Gonyosoma is curious and will watch you during maintenance. If you come to close to it, it might bite you, but most of them will just watch you. If you have to handle them, some might bite you but even here most will just try to escape. This is not a snake to play with, but is always fun to watch in a large enclosure. It’s usually not as bad as AdamL8 said it is, most of them are no “balls of fury”, at least if you get CB snakes. WC might be another matter, but as I said before I would not get any WC Gonyosoma in the first place.

Feeding might be a problem for very young snakes because they won’t accept young mice at first, but most of them will get used to mice after a short while. After that, feeding them with mice of appropriate size is no problem.

Roman

[Bugmom]

Aa general rule, I don't buy any animal I don't know to be captive hatched, and I definitely prefer captive bred.

I'm planning on an enclosure that is about 5' high by 3' wide by 2' deep. Lots of branches throughout. Two hides. Appropriate heating via lights. The idea is to create a visually appealing enclosure that meets all of the snake's needs and allows enough room for me to do maintenance without the snake feeling like I'm imposing too much. I am perfectly fine with it being a display animal; I have plenty of pettable pets already.

I'm going to build the enclosure then shop around for the animal. I could set one up in a temp home now, but figure I can wait and less stress if it can go straight into permanent home.

Thank you all for the advice!

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[Neal]

@Roman

Not all rat snakes are arboreal. Also juvenile retics are arboreal and often yearlings and larger can be found in branches and stuff, but do you see people providing climbing space? NO.

It's not cruelty because you provide them with other means of hiding versus climbing. Especially when using artificial heat and lighting, this is because if a thermostat gets knocked loose or something like that it can get hot enough to do some damage to the rat snake, so for the new keeper yes I would easily recommend a terrestrial setup versus an arboreal for that simple fact.

While yes, I kept mine in a terrestrial cage but gave them branches to climb on which they did. I also clearly stated that I never had this species so if you're going to quote me, then quote the whole post. Rat snakes are highly variable with localities and such.

Providing no climbing for a Green Tree Python would be cruelty though.

[Skiploder]

@Roman

Not all rat snakes are arboreal. Also juvenile retics are arboreal and often yearlings and larger can be found in branches and stuff, but do you see people providing climbing space? NO.

It's not cruelty because you provide them with other means of hiding versus climbing. Especially when using artificial heat and lighting, this is because if a thermostat gets knocked loose or something like that it can get hot enough to do some damage to the rat snake, so for the new keeper yes I would easily recommend a terrestrial setup versus an arboreal for that simple fact.

While yes, I kept mine in a terrestrial cage but gave them branches to climb on which they did. I also clearly stated that I never had this species so if you're going to quote me, then quote the whole post. Rat snakes are highly variable with localities and such.

Providing no climbing for a Green Tree Python would be cruelty though.

Keeping a gonyosoma in a terrestrial setup would be just as cruel. Gonyosoma should be kept as a purely arboreal species with lots of branches and foliage, etc. They are much more active that a GTP and make much better use of an arboreal environment.

We use the term ratsnake too loosely. Spilotes are a world apart from pantherophis who are a world apart from many old world elaphe which bear little in common with gonyosoma which have different needs than coelognathus.. They are all referred to as ratsnakes, yet they are very different animals with unique husbandry requirements. What applies to one, does not necessarily apply to another.