hog island boa turned nasty

[recycling goddess]

as i've shared... our hog island struck someone when he was out about a month ago... and since then, we can't handle him at all. as soon as we go into his enclosure he gets into strike pose, begins to hiss and since my hubby isn't at all afraid of him, he still reaches in and drake hits his hand. he doesn't open his mouth but he hits him.

i'm so upset... we can't even take him out anymore so how can i continue to care for him? i can't clean his enclosure, it's really hard to change his water unless he's in his hide asleep (which is when i'm doing it now).

so at this point... what do we do?

[JimiSnakes]

That's a Hog for ya, some of them have some nasty tempers! I'll post a pic of mine while I was cleaning her just tonight, little brats.

You'll just to have to take the punches and let him know who's boss. It'll wear off, more than likely it's just a phase.

[JimiSnakes]

[jglass38]

Is your husbandry dead on? If so, its possible that its just a phase. It seems odd that he is out and calm and then just starts biting.

[recycling goddess]

i'm going to go double check jamie... but i believe my temps are right.

*runs from the room to check*

[qiksilver]

try taking him out of the cage with a hook, then handling him... dunno anything helps i guess, my females a beast all the time, and i just sit there and take the bites and hope sometime she'll calm down

[recycling goddess]

well honestly, i have kids in the house and if he doesn't smarten up i'll be rehoming him. i don't want they to get tagged.

that said... i checked the temps and it's reading 87 and 76.

so i thought about what's changed and we had our rtb's enclosure on top of his... so he had heat from above as well and now that she's gone (we sold her) his cool side temp has dropped 4 degrees. so i've just added a heating pad on top of his enclosure to get his cool side temps up a bit.

but he bit before his temps went down... so i wonder... is this a phase and how long will it last. we are in the process of building a tank stand with an enclosure in it for him... but i don't want to put all that money into a new enclosure if i'm going to rehome him...

arrgghh silly snake!

(and... the temps here in the last week have been shorts and t-shirts weather... today was cooler... so his cool side temps haven't been stable like they were before)

[Shelby]

Hoggies can be temperamental.. my big girl is usually ok (she always hisses though) but just two weeks ago she bit the inside of my arm when I set her in her holding tub while I cleaned her cage. She's 6' but the bite didn't even hurt (honestly)

My baby male hog island has only struck once, closed mouth. He's really laid back (so far)

Try not to let him freak you out.. if you jerk your hand away when he strikes at you, you're just going to scare him more. Put gloves on if it makes you feel better, but get him out for some handling time. I wouldn't put it past a snake to learn to act pissy in order to be left alone.

[recycling goddess]

my hubby isn't the least bit intimidated by him... and he does all the handling. drake normally really likes my hubby and seems to prefer him. (if someone else is holding him and my hubby walks by drake reaches to go back to him) - that said, i know it's generally accepted here that snakes don't have those type of feelings.

we'll get him out for another holding session in two days (as my hubby fed him tonight) - and see if we can't get him to be social again.

[frankykeno]

Aleesha what's the hoggie like once he's actually out? Does he calm down then or still try to strike once he's out and away from his enclosure? The reason I ask is that Brannagh during the worst of her striking/biting time was far worse when we were in her "space" but calmer as we moved her away from it.

I'd say check the husbandry first, double check you are feeding an appropriate prey amount so the snake isn't hungry and then get a set of leather gauntlet style gloves and just have at it. We calmed Brannagh down by simply removing her, holding her firmly and under control and just letting her fight it out, once she calmed down she was allowed to go back in her enclosure. Eventually she got it through her snakey mind that her games wouldn't work, she couldn't drive us away, if she was calm life was better and nothing was hurting her. They may not do higher math but they aren't dumb about this stuff if it's done over and over and over again.

Remember too that if the snake intimidates you, it will know this. I firmly believe Brannagh could sense my fear of her aggression and when I was calm, she was less reactive to me. The kids were never allowed around Brannagh back then, now all 5 feet of her is flopped over anyone that wants to hold her (well except feeding day...she's still not a snake to mess about with on feeding day LOL).