How long can a ball python stay constricted around prey?

5 minutes, 10? Before they tire out. Do they ever tire out before the prey is dead?

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Originally Posted by Gary P

5 minutes, 10? Before they tire out. Do they ever tire out before the prey is dead?

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Probably depends on what they are used to being fed. Mine is on f/t and she gets lazy and doesn't rly constrict it. If they were used to live, they may go for a long time.

One of mine just had a poor strike and coil on a rat. It's taking it a while for the rat to die. I was just worried he might run out of strength or something and was wondering if anyone knew what the max amount of time they can stay constricted around something before giving up.

I was hoping for some quick answers, he's done. Took a little over 20 minutes of non stop constricting. Poor rat, I hate when they don't get a proper strike and coil :(. Should have only taken a couple of minutes like normal.

Sorry, Gary, missed the earlier post. I've never had a snake take 20 minutes! Can you describe the wrap he had on the rat? When I think of a bad hold I think of a rodent free enough to get tooth or claw on the snake - which usually triggers a reposition/tightening on the snake's end. The only reason I can think for it taking that long to kill once wrapped is if they prey item is too young to do anything other than a bit of mild squirming so they basically get stuck in this stalemate because the snake is receiving no physical cues(biting, scratching, excessive movement) that the hold is less than ideal. A simple thump on the head of the rodent next time will end it's life and the struggle.

He was only wrapped around the lower half of the rodent. He's an adult snake, but somehow he managed to kinda wrap around himself as well. It tried to bite him at first but I kept him from doing that. It quickly lost the strength to try biting, but kept breathing weakly for a long time :( :(. I think I might go back to frozen. Handling dead rodents is not something I particularly enjoy. And having dead rodents in our freezer isn't something my wife particularly enjoys either lol. I might though, cause it was awful. Thanks for the response.

I think it depends on what they are used to being fed and in which part of the rodent they were wrapped around, i saw many Youtube videos about live feeding in order to understand better the mechanics of wrapping even if i don't enjoy mouse/rat/rabbit etc. death i am fascinated by mechanics and muscular control of constriction. As you know the snake initially strikes at its prey and holds on, pulling the prey into its coils and holding it on with its teeth, the snake will then wrap one or two coils around the prey. The snake will monitor the prey's heartbeat to ascertain when it is dead (this is the case of boas but i don't rule out it is applied to all constrictors, i hope scientists extend their studies on royal pythons, burmese pythons retics etc).

http://rsbl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/8/3/473


Constriction can interrupt blood flow and overwhelm the prey's usual blood pressure and circulation, artery pressure drops, vein pressure increases and blood vessels begin to close. The heart does not have enough strength to pump against the pressure and blood flow stops. If a constrictor strikes a ectotherm like a lizard or a snake, it will take more time to kill it for example a boa was observed attacking a spinytail iguana for an hour and the iguana survived: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2...-science-kill/


Watch this video of a royal python killing a mouse: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXq7tURvrHo
Note how the snake wraps around the mouse, note mouse movements and death reflexes in the final part of killing and how after ~ 30 second the mouse was dead, the snake monitors the prey's heartbeat to make sure of its death. This is a quick death but sometimes the snake could take more time depending where it struck, i remeber a video of a live feeding where a royal python wrapped around lower half of a rat and he took ~ +7 minutes to completely kill it. Of course if the prey is very large, and i am talking about big constrictors, the time of killing will be more long.

Fun fact: i've noticed that certain groups of snakes have characteristic patterns of constriction, including the number of coils they use and the orientation of the coils, infact the way of a royal python constriction is different from a kingsnake constriction, retic etc. and i personally thing that even among indivduals of same species (i.e. royal pythons) there are differences between patterns of killing and number of coils.


Sorry for the looong post :)

Not BP related but yesterday at feeding time (and maybe this could have happened because I fed early in the day which I never do), my 6 month old boa struck and wrapped her frozen thawed rat fuzzy and remained in that position for 45 motionless minutes or more! Typically she swallows within minutes of strike and coil. I honestly thought she either knocked herself unconscious, broke her neck or fell asleep. I never saw anything like it. She remained motionless in that position. I was nervous so gave her a nudge with my hand and blew my breath into the enclosure. With that she sprung to life, and struck towards my hand - it was now obviously way warmer than the prey item. She then sniffed and nosed around at the fuzzy but retreated to her hide. So, I picked up the fuzzy with the tongs and offered it to her again in which she promptly struck wrapped and devoured in all of a few minutes. Really weird!

Lou