Not a fan

Why can I not get myself to like any colubrid? I want to like them but it's like my mind won't let me, I want to add at least one to my collection but when i am at a reptile show and I see one I do like my mind tells me whats the point of getting it? Can anyone help me? I want one that is out of the ordinary and not to expensive maybe in the ball park of $175-200.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Masonic

Why can I not get myself to like any colubrid? I want to like them but it's like my mind won't let me, I want to add at least one to my collection but when i am at a reptile show and I see one I do like my mind tells me whats the point of getting it? Can anyone help me? I want one that is out of the ordinary and not to expensive maybe in the ball park of $175-200.

---

Personally,
I'd look at a nice, big Eastern King snake. It's the KING of snakes in North America! They are diurnal, fast and will eat damn near anything. If I were to add one more snake, I'd strongly consider one.

Other factors are that they keep easy, and are vastly different from boas and pythons. They eat more frequently, actively forage/hunt for food and are a favorite of many keepers and this applies to several of the colubrids not just kings.

I am not into morphs, and prefer natural "Mother Nature" colors and find fascination with the various snake species for what they are.

Sadly, I probably have all of the snakes I'm going to own.

If you add a king snake of any kind, chances are it will be the most active snake in your room at least during the day time hours. That goes for a lot of other colubrids, but I like kings because they'll eat those other ones in a snap or anything else they think they can swallow.

Eastern kings have size, and pound for pound are one the strongest snakes around.

I think that's pretty cool and reason enough to look into colubrids and that's coming from somebody who doesn't have one,,,,,,,,,,,, yet.

well, what do you like in a snake?

Attitude? - Bullsnake
Banded? - Milksnake
Stripes? - Garter snake
Morphs? - Cornsnake
small size? - Hognose
Large size? -Cribos
weird looking and mildly venomous? - Barrons Racer

The sky is pretty much the limit, you just have to figure out what interests you most in a snake.

I'd say go for Hognose. I am the same way, and I just can't like them for some reason. But a Hognose is an exception, I adore them.

What's the point of getting a colubrid? Well...
- They are fun to handle. Not quick like my boas, not a ball of unmoving snake like my BP's... they just cruise around and check you out. I've never had one bite, but two did musk a bit as babies until they learned that being handled was ok.
- They don't get too big, unlike my boas, so they're not intimidiating if I introduce the whole snakes-as-pets idea to a non-snake-owning friend.
- Many are quite pretty even if they don't come in "morphs".
- They're active during the day so they make good display snakes.
- They have great appetites so they act as the clean-up crew for my picky baby or juvenile ball pythons.
- They don't need super-expensive enclosures and it's easy to maintain their temperature and humidity requirements, so they don't have to be housed in my "herp room" with the boids.

Mark made some great points.

I would say that Hognose fit in several of his category (small size, morph and attitude)

What has always attracted me to colubrids coming from the BP world were 1/ Their inquisitive nature and attitude of colubrids vs the laziness and boring aspect of BP (don't get me wrong I love my BP but to me they are eye candy only) and 2/ Vibrant colors that you will never see in BP

I am a big fan of Red and High Orange, to me nothing beats a Extreme Red Bullsnake or a nice Extreme Hypo Tangerine Honduran Milksnake.

I want something that is maybe going to be the same length or a little longer that a ball and is easy to handle. I want something that is going to pop when it is in the enclosure. I mainly want something that you don't always see.

I keep corns along with my ball pythons and a few milksnakes. A nice gold dust or butter stripe or motley will pop. I guess its all in the eye of the beholder.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fraido

I'd say go for Hognose. I am the same way, and I just can't like them for some reason. But a Hognose is an exception, I adore them.

---

that's exactly how i felt so I added 2 little hoggies to my bp collection. Funny little buggahz.....

Put this on aspen, and it will "pop"! Black and cream against white aspen,, forget about it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUUThBiDuK0

Also, if you are looking for more length than a royal, these have potential to get to 6-7 feet, with some girth. Look at how effortless their movement is.


If all you own are royals, a nice colubrid will be something completely different!

The Cal Kings come in some very groovy colors and can get 4 feet long too.

There are speckled kings that almost have a diamond python look to them.

What's not to like?