Another hard lesson learned :(

[slwatson]

Sheather

Do you think we could feed it small live mice?

[slwatson]

Babs

I think that's why it was so traumatic to see....and I actually have always liked his snake. My husband won't touch it, but my son always has it out, so it's very tame and calm. It was nothing like that when I found it with the finch!

[Lucille]

Sheather

Do you think we could feed it small live mice?

Feeding live may be problematic for many reasons, I do not think it is a good idea to change over a reptile used to f/th to live. For one thing, it is easier to get frozen/thawed and have them on hand. Once a snake gets used to eating live, they may no longer eat frozen thawed.
The other issue is the safety of the snake. People who feed live will sometimes see bites on their snake and sometimes those bites get infected. And the scars can disfigure the snake.

[Arama]

Wow that must have been horrific to discover. I'm sorry for your loss.

[slwatson]

Lucille

Yes, I've heard all of that...just wanted some different perspectives. Thanks.

[Sheather]

Oh, no, I don't think live feeding of birds or mammals intentionally is ethical at all, and if your snake will take humanely pre-killed prey by all means this is better, safer, and more ethical for both animals in question.

I was only stating that to learn to eat prekilled food is the unnatural situation for the snake, not the other way around. One does have to be learned, one is instinctive. Fortunately, your snake is used to the former and so you have nothing to worry about. Just make sure he stays away from the birds!

[MariusStegmann]

Sorry about your hatchling. It was an unfortunate mishap and not really a mistake on your part. I have made a lot of mistakes that caused birds to die or parents to throw away their babies. The only thing that I can say is that I won't make them again.

[slwatson]

Sheather MariusStegmann

Dylan-Thanks for your perspective! I'm looking up new screen covers and locks right now.

Marius-Thanks for that....I'm definitely learning more and more from my mistakes!

[Babs _Owner]

slwatson

Just a thought to make you feel better. By no means do I think societies are stupid birds, I find their social nature to make their memory of each other and of dangers pretty strong.

Just think of this... when you rushed in and got that snake out of their cage and protected the rest of the babies, they may actually find your presence comforting.

If they associate you with the event and you find them more startled around you (female constantly chirping-bleating in your presence would mean they associate you as danger with the snake event)....I would gently pick up a fledgling now and then while sitting by the cage and keep the baby in your open hand for a minute or two and give it back to them. That way they will realize your hand is not going to kill their babies.

I did that with CackleJax and he was fine with me handling the babies in front of him and removing the babies in his sight.

I did NOT do that with Lucky in her cage, and she associated me with DANGER after I pulled her mate's dead body from inside the nest and as a result, she went nuts and crammed all the kids inside the nest if I walked in the room.

I just realized through this post how if I had showed her (like I showed CackleJax) that I wasnt there to hurt them.....she may have been much less stressed.

The video you saw of me stroking the babies, CackleJax was completely fine with it and in the same cage while I did the video.

I actually learned a bit of a lesson from this post. Thank you for that!

[dunker817]

That's too bad. Corn snakes are masters of escaping their cages. The snake was doing what comes naturally. If you house predators and prey in the same house there is always a chance of something like this happening. I have terriers with high prey drives so I have to be extra careful with the birds.

[slwatson]

Babs dunker817


Babs

Thanks for your story! I did notice last night that they were skittish around me, and the babies weren't out as much as they were before. I'll see if I can handle a few today to put them at ease.


Layne

I'm working on getting a more secure lid to the cage with security clips to keep it from happening again. It traveled a pretty good distance to get to my finches, and climbed pretty high to reach them too. I'm fine with it now. It's just the image of seeing it wrapped around the fledgling that's so hard to get rid of. I've seen tons of nature shows with much larger snakes doing that, so you would think I would be used to it.

[MiaCarter]

Oh no!
I'm so so sorry to hear about this.

You can't fault a snake for being a snake. But how awful to lose one of your little ones in such a terrible way.

So sorry. Rest in peace and fly free, little one.

[slwatson]

MiaCarter

Thanks...I think the finches are recovering finally. I did have to go in and catch a finch earlier, and the adults were calling out danger alerts very loudly, but they calmed down quickly.

[MiaCarter]

slwatson I'm so glad to hear they're finally settling down. That's got to be very traumatic for them.

I'd ensure they cannot see the snake enclosure. It could cause chronic stress for them which can make them unwell (and not to mention mentally stressed!)

I TOTALLY know what you mean about the trauma of seeing one of your pets die - especially a case where one of your animals killed another.

Nothing can prepare you to see one of your creatures die. Nothing. And when it involves violence, it's even worse.

I literally had PTSD after breaking up a dog fight once. It involved 2 of my pit bulls and I honestly believed they were going to kill each other. I was home alone with them when it happened.
Ultimately, I got the worst of it - they just had miscellaneous bites here and there and just needed antibiotics, where I needed several hours of surgery to fix my hand. But it was okay. I did what I had to do to break it up and I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

But for several weeks after, I had PTSD symptoms. Any time I thought of the fight or even saw two animals fighting on TV (even cartoons), I'd get severe anxiety and flashbacks. It was awful. I know exactly what you mean about having that vision in your head of those awful moments. It's not something I ever understood until this experience happened to me.

I've broken up lots of dog fights over the years - a couple with much worse injuries to the animals involved. But the difference was that I genuinely believed they were going to kill each other -and- I felt helpless to stop it (though I ultimately did....but it took me maybe 1-2 minutes, though it seemed like forever.)

But don't kid yourself. Seeing one animal harm another can be very traumatic, especially when you have an emotional connection to the animals involved.

[slwatson]

MiaCarter

Thank you so much for sharing! I'm so sorry you had to go through that with your dogs! You're right...I didn't realize how traumatic that type of thing was until I went through it myself. That was my first batch of finch babies too, and I think that's why it felt so awful. The snake is on the other side of the house, and I told my son he couldn't bring it in the same room as the finches anymore, so that should help. I feel much better now...finally able to go into my son's room and see him handle the snake.