Whether you call it intelligence, instinct, personality, its hard to deny reticulated pythons are something special.
Wallace shed over the night and he was ready to eat today. I feed ALL of my snakes conservatively and as close to "Mother Nature" level as I can.
I tend to look at body size, their shape, tone and check for signs of hunger or overly content and lethargic behavior.
Back to the topic. Very few snakes species will greet you like a retic. King Cobras come to mind when I think of how Wallace checked me out today. The immediate response he had today was fantastic. When I got into the room this morning he was looking at me, and as I approached his cage he came out quickly and then stood up straight and looked at me eye to eye the best he could while being confined to a 2 foot tall cage.
No posturing, no glass striking or anything that would lead me to believe he was starving. It was just his basic routine/behavior that has evolved over our time together.
I'm very happy with this guy and the progressive interactions we've shared.
Here are the feed pictures.
1 large F/T rat, perfect!
This particular retic is highly arboreal.
I can't avoid telling people how much I like my caging and setup. It makes the whole experience outstanding.
This is standard for a green tree python or an emerald tree boa, guess what? It appears retics love to hunt from the trees too.
I'm not sure he's an 8 footer yet, but he is slowly increasing in size.
Some things never change, as he made quick work of his prey. My carpet python goes through some type of long examination period before eating. She sniffs around and seems to gloat over her accomplishment after constricting. Wallace is all business. Strike, constrict and eat.
The retic mouth is so wide, a proper strike will get the prey 1/4 of the way down LOL!
I used outer lights, a flash and no flash when I took these. This is obviously no flash.
Wallace is really becoming a great captive. I still keep on my toes, as anybody should be with any decent sized snake, however we are becoming pretty predictable during our interactions.
Thanks for looking!