Silly, silly royal!!!

[Silvermoon77]

I am not too sure I would have believed this if someone else had written this, but here goes the story...

Feeding time yesterday evening for Cookie, my three-year old royal. He is in his "dining room" and I dangle a warmed-up mouse. He strikes... and misses the mouse! He then proceeds to bite and coil himself, with his head at a bizarre angle, and the mouse trapped into his coil.

This is where I try to convince myself that he will SURELY release himself shortly. I try with the tweezers to move the mouse out of his coils so that I can dangle it in front of him again and divert him from his own body. There is of course no way that the mouse would come out of his tight and powerful grip. I stared in despair ... He did finally, after what seemed like an eternity, get onto the mouse.

He does not seem to have hurt himself - will keep a close eye on him and maybe check him gently tomorrow morning to see whether he has any self-inflicted bite. I thought that was quite a weird thing to happen!

Anyone with a similar experience?

[davecunnah]

Heh never had that, my royal was feeding for the first time in a few weeks last night and nearly took my hand off with her first strike...think i need bigger tongs!

[Ssthisto]

My Mexican Black Kingsnake is forever trying to consume his own backside.

Usually he works out that the ache in his flank is not unrelated to the fact that he's biting a snake pretty quickly...

[Silvermoon77]

His head was at such a weird angle, I thought that his neck would snap!!! The great thing with snakes is that they always manage to surprise you...

[Silvermoon77]

Originally Posted by davecunnah

Heh never had that, my royal was feeding for the first time in a few weeks last night and nearly took my hand off with her first strike...think i need bigger tongs!

Davecunnah, I know what you mean . Cookie's strikes are quite impressive, there is no way I would get into feeding him in his viv!

[jadeteacup]

hehe... fed my Royal for the 1st time a few days ago, he decided to do a nice flying strike, connected with the mouse, then took 15 mins trying to stuff it in sideways...
i was no way gonna convince him to turn it round.. so i just left him to it... i think took him another 15 mins to sort it out and get it down

[Silvermoon77]

TBH, I would have thought they would be more intelligent than that

[medusa0373]

Originally Posted by Silvermoon77

I am not too sure I would have believed this if someone else had written this, but here goes the story...

Feeding time yesterday evening for Cookie, my three-year old royal. He is in his "dining room" and I dangle a warmed-up mouse. He strikes... and misses the mouse! He then proceeds to bite and coil himself, with his head at a bizarre angle, and the mouse trapped into his coil.

This is where I try to convince myself that he will SURELY release himself shortly. I try with the tweezers to move the mouse out of his coils so that I can dangle it in front of him again and divert him from his own body. There is of course no way that the mouse would come out of his tight and powerful grip. I stared in despair ... He did finally, after what seemed like an eternity, get onto the mouse.

He does not seem to have hurt himself - will keep a close eye on him and maybe check him gently tomorrow morning to see whether he has any self-inflicted bite. I thought that was quite a weird thing to happen!

Anyone with a similar experience?

Yes, I had this with my BRB one Sunday evening. She had part of the mouse and part of herself in her mouth and was flailing round like a totally mental thing in her tank, trying to "subdue" the prey, but as it was herself, it didn't happen. She was rolling and coiling all over the place.

I have to confess that I went into hysterics and total panic mode, we eventually got her to release herself but she kept striking at her own body, so we had to dunk her in water to try and wash the smell of mouse off. She lost at least one tooth in the flailing round, and ripped the edge of some of her belly scales where her mouth was hooked.

Really not an experience I would like to go through again, especiallly as she's put on weight and is a bit bigger now!!!

Edit: sorry, meant to say "one Sunday evening" NOT "on Sunday evening"!! D'oh!!!!

[Silvermoon77]

Originally Posted by medusa0373

Yes, I had this with my BRB on Sunday evening. She had part of the mouse and part of herself in her mouth and was flailing round like a totally mental thing in her tank, trying to "subdue" the prey, but as it was herself, it didn't happen. She was rolling and coiling all over the place.

I have to confess that I went into hysterics and total panic mode, we eventually got her to release herself but she kept striking at her own body, so we had to dunk her in water to try and wash the smell of mouse off. She lost at least one tooth in the flailing round, and ripped the edge of some of her belly scales where her mouth was hooked.

Really not an experience I would like to go through again, especiallly as she's put on weight and is a bit bigger now!!!

Bloody hell, your story is worse than mine!!! I imagine your panic! Naughty snakey

[medusa0373]

Scared the bejesus out of me LOL especially as that day I'd read threads about snakes eating themselves!!!!!!!! And I've edited LOL, it was ages ago that this happened, NOT the Sunday just gone! I did put an emergency thread on here asking for help and got some good advice.

the funniest thing about it all is that when I was trying to get her to release, she kept blowing bubbles at me and hitting me with her tail!!