how to get african house snakes eating frozen thawed that's what we'll be talking about today
and to join me is jet jasmine this is not jasmine you're not jasmine today joining
me is delilah and delilah is a black african house snake i really really love this species
of snake they are really cool they're really interactive they're really small
they're really really really lots of wonderful things the really great thing about these
african house snakes is this is a full-size adult and she's given birth to two clutches
given birth she's laid she's laid two clutches of african house snakes both of them about 10
babies and they've done well and they're here with us today to talk about the the issue that
we have with them even though these are wonderful snakes they are the most difficult snakes to get
on frozen thought and my buddy charlie breeds mice say goodbye to delilah because we're gonna
put her away and look at some babies goodbye i'm showing you here how i keep the uh the babies i
start them off in little groups and i do this now with most of my snakes that don't eat other snakes
this is my second time filming this i i did it and now i knocked over the water and stuff i got
to clean everything but uh it didn't record so here we are round two they never seem to
go under the hide so i give it anyways they're always kind of under the paper towel hanging out
there you can see they're beautiful and shiny and cute little busters they'll never
in the past decade i have messed around with co-habilitating animals in certain ways
and it's not about what you do but how you do it that creates all the problems and many
people cohabit to save space but they don't do it to benefit the animal i on the other hand
do it to benefit the animals and if you don't believe me you gotta watch the video at the end
of this one because it'll explain everything how i do it and why it works and why i think in the next
10 years people are going to realize that snakes actually do a little bit better when they're
together they don't stress each other out they don't piss each other off they help interact with
each other and make them better for us to enjoy but that doesn't mean to just go and co-habilitate
your snakes co-habilitate your it means don't do that because most of the time it's bad
and if you don't do things properly you're gonna have a big mess and you'll have snakes biting each
other eating each other and all sorts of crazy things have i had any of those issues no because
i have a system if you want success for anything you need to have a system so my system is at the
end of this video so watch the whole thing before you come bothering me or talking nonsense because
you got to gather information before you can come to conclusions and i've had breeders that have
changed their mind about the way that they feel about animals after seeing the way that i keep
behind but let's get back to this though so what it what do we what do i do i grow them in these
groups together when they're babies they're in larger groups so maybe like five and then as they
get bigger i separate them to two and then as they get older i put them kind of by themselves
for a while it's a whole system it's a little bit complex it's a whole 30 minute video explaining
it with with the african house snakes what i do is i have the five of them together and none of them
really want to eat they're not super eager eaters so i have them together i put in the baby mouse
uh frozen thawed one i stick it in like the corner of the home that's away from the heat and then if
one of them are hungry that one will probably go and eat it but most of the time they're
not really hungry they're kind of like these animals that are more shy and timid so they
avoid food i never try to dangle food for them because they'll never come and take it they'll
always run away because they're scared later on when they're adults you can and they might but
there's different systems for different animals what works with these is i have them in groups
i offer the group food and then if one of them ends up eating i take that snake and i separate
it from the others and now that's a good snake this is a snake that eats frozen thought so that
makes me happy and then i'll keep it eating frozen thought on its own until it's really a good eater
then i might put it with another one that's also eating frozen thought some of them will eat some
of them won't the ones that won't i will then give baby mice because my buddy charlie breeds mice so
it's easy so i have access to live mice i'll feed them live mice for a while till they get
kind of in that pattern of eating and then i'll do the same thing i'll try and offer them them
frozen thought but at that point i won't do it to them in a group anymore because they're a little
bit older they might be more like food responsive and stuff so at that point i will totally separate
them and feed them and all the snakes that i do keep together are never fed together that's one
little takeaway that i can give you for now when they're juveniles like over here they're set up
like this and these snakes are very shy so they do very well in a small environment where they feel
comfortable even though i give them a hide they never use it they're always under the hide in the
paper towel hiding and that's that's what they do this one has to be cleaned sorry but that's that's
how it is that's the condition they're kept in i didn't clean them even before they're in
good condition i keep them really clean and nice and then anyone that buys one i suggest you know
you can slowly work your way to a bigger home so you can see here this one didn't eat but this is
what i do i take the uh food and i put it in the back of the bin next to the heat so that the bin
heats it up and then i cover it with the hide so that it's extra safe
it's warm and usually they'll eat it this one ate and this one ate two and you can see
so they're chilling having a nice time looking all nice and wonderful
so if you have one that's not eating and you want or it's just eating live and you want to switch
it over to frozen thawed what i would do is same kind of thing make sure it's in a small container
you don't want it to be in a really big container because it's it has it it's better where it can
find the food and where everything's nice simple and clean there's a craze with bioactive going on
and i love bio active i have a crazy bioactive video on on the way so subscribe so that you can
see that these snakes are perfect for bioactive enclosures once they're adults but when they're
babies you see lots of new keepers have issues and those issues almost always are with like the
conditions not being right either the temperature the humidity or that they have substrate
because when you stick food in with substrate the snake that's young and weak it can end up
swallowing some it can end up getting some in the eye it can get some stuck in its butt they can get
blisters they can get all sorts of weird things happen where something gets lodged under a scale
and in paper towel that will never happen but it can happen on substrate so for me i like to keep
everything really clean sanitary compact make them feel safe but not squish them so much they
do go to bigger homes eventually and when people buy them i suggest you know start off same thing
something simple clean something you can do and then slowly work your way up to something bigger
and i really love bins they they do well in bins even if you do bioactive bins what you can do is
wait for christmas and buy one of those christmas tree bins and build yourself a beautiful bioactive
home in there just because in glass the heat transfer it like it's just picture this you're
leaning up against a wood door you don't get the cold from that wood door because it insulates
when you lean up against a piece of glass if the room is cold that glass is cold and
then your snake touches it touches it and it makes your snake cold but we got sidetracked
so add at its finest if you want to get a snake that's only eating live to switch over to frozen
thawed lots of time you gotta starve it a little bit and that's okay like snakes can go a long time
without eating we're not like doing anything really terrible let's say you get it eaten
every two weeks so don't feed it for two weeks then leave the mouse in the back of its home
uh try mice yeah well they're so tiny you don't ever need to feed them rats
but yeah i was gonna say try rats try mice because that's what you do kind of with boas if you have
to but with these guys yeah little mice in the back where it's heat leave it overnight see if
they eat if they don't feed it to something else or toss it out and then try again two days later
and every two days try again let a month go by and just try every two days and after a month goes by
if it doesn't eat feed it something so that it eats and then start the process over again
eventually you will get the animal to switch over to frozen thawed and then you'll be a happy camper
these snakes breed so easily and they're so kind of like easy to care for once you get them going
i used to be kind of surprised why we didn't see them as much and why not as many breeders are
working with them and it makes sense now because they aren't the easiest to get eating they are
literally like a pain in the butt to get these guys to eat uh especially when they get started
today someone messaged me and said they're gonna buy one off a breeder maybe that has it on live
and that's that's something that i i like to never do i always want to sell someone
an animal that's eating frozen thawed i charge 300 for these because black
black mexican black snakes are now going for around 400 here in canada canadian dollars
so these to me are everybody is amazing if not more tons of personality uh great they're just
difficult to get eating and i charge 300 bucks for them and i have some so if you want one and
you're in canada they're pretty easy to get and i won't sell you anything unless it's easy eating
frozen thought so check out that video about co-habilitation subscribe to the
channel thank you to all the new subscribers love you long time and see you in the next one