Are some BP's smarter than others (feeding)?

[MasonC2K]

So my female has been an absolute accurate and efficient eater since she came of her fast. She always strikes the head and after killing it dirrectly transition into swallowing.

My newest addition (a big pastel male), is a very good killer with a fantastic feeding responce. However, after the kill, he always drops the prey and sniffs the entire body as if he's looking for the head and can't find it. He'll pick up the body and drag it around. He will even turn away from the prey entirely and sniff various parts of the cage before finally coming back to the body and evetually finding the head and starts eating. This usually take 5 minutes. I am always worried he may give up on finding the head and just not eat it.

Anyone else have snakes like this?

[Bundu Boy]

How old are these BP's

From what I can tell it takes a while for each BP to become more experienced in constricting and swallowing....

My male BP is maybe 8 months or so old and he tend to have a few goes at finding the head of the mouse. My female is about 12 months and she tends to find the head a lot quicker...

[Sonya610]

It seems lots of the babies have this problem. Ya have to wonder if it is worse in captivity, in the wild if they wandered away from their hard earned mouse only to watch something else carry it off maybe they would be more attentive to it. : )

[MasonC2K]

They are both from 04, but I have only had the pastel for a month now. And so far his feeding pattern is consistent.

There are some other interesting things about him. Like he almost never uses his tail to hold on to anything. 9 time out of 10, if I didn't hold on to him, he'd fall to the ground from my shoulders.

So I am thinking he's just quirky.

[littleindiangirl]

Snakes nose around the prey because often they don't strike at the head. They nose the prey looking for resistance and warmth, indicating the head. (They smell it too, I'm not sure what they are smelling for? Rat breath? LOL) Then they can start to swallow with less resistance from the legs folding next to the body nicely.

Sometimes snakes mistake the hip or butt bone as the head and start to eat backwards.

Some snakes don't care and just eat whatever right away. Some snakes take a long time making up their minds where they want to start at.

Hope that clears some things.

Also, BP's are terrestrial, and aren't really great at climbing. Best to ALWAYS hold your BP to ensure they don't fall.

[donley]

My roommate and I picked up snakes at the same time. They are both juveniles, the same age (not sure what age that is). My snake strikes the head and begins to swallow right away every time. My roommates snake tends to strike where ever he can and always drags it around a bit searching for the head before he starts to swallow. So seems to me like every snake is just different!