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A happy ending after four months of force feeding.

antsterr
12-19-2006, 12:42 AM
You may have read one or two of my posts about my non-feeder and force feeding options. They fallow the story of a male butter I purchased this summer who refused to eat and had to be force feed for four months.
After trying every trick in the book (or on these forums) after months of shoving pinky heads down his mouth with a barbecue skewer he finally ate on his own two weeks ago. I'd been trying anole saliva with no luck when I found one of them shedding. I decided to try using it's skin and was successful in getting the snake to take a soap washed f/t pinky with anole skin on it's head. It took almost twenty minutes for him to swallow it but every four days after that he took a non-washed pinky f/t with anole skin. I did this one more time and then yesterday I tried a regular f/t pinky with no skin and no wash. He was the second one finished out of four feeders that day. I'm so glad that patience has paid off, I was almost ready to give up on him.
I hope this gives some hope to owners of non-feeders, even after many months of force feeding you're snake might still decided it wants to live.

One little trick I did figure out though is an easier method of force feeding whole pinkies. If you find it too hard to force feed a whole pinky it's pretty easy to push just the head down your little snakes throat, just wet the head with a little water to make it slippery. The problem with forcing a whole pinky down is that with such soft bones they are so squishy that they are really hard to force in to a hole. Most mice are frozen very soon after death. Rigor mortis takes about three to four hours to set in. If you leave a pinky to thaw for that amount of time it should be nice and stiff and much easier to force into the snakes mouth. If you've tried to force feed you'll find the first problem is that you don't have three hands. My method was to use a barbecue skewer. I would hold the snake behind it's head and with a finger nail I would open it's mouth, I'd hold the skewer with my knees and then let the snake close it's mouth on the skewer so that it was still held open a bit. I'd then with my free hand grab the pinky and push it's nose in to the back of the snakes mouth. I'd both push the mouse in and with my thumb help it's bottom lip slide up the mouse. It's also easier if you cut off the front legs. Then I'd use the skewer again to push it a ways down the snakes throat. When I tried feeding him I'd place him in a little clay planting pot saucer and turn the put upside down on him. I'm pretty sure that paper bags and deli cups are just as good but a breeder at a show told me that he got a few non-feeders to eat by feeding them inside clay pots so I figured there was no harm in trying.

http://homepage.mac.com/antsterr/.Pictures/snakewater/malachi.jpg
Expect to see pictures of Malachi the butter corn snake again.

diamondlil
12-19-2006, 12:47 AM
:cheers: Fantastic news, congrats for your persistence and hope the success story continues!

Nanci
12-19-2006, 07:42 AM
Congratulations! I hope BlackAdder takes heart from your success story. That's interesting about cutting the front legs off- they do get in the way.

Nanci

laceyjane260
12-19-2006, 07:55 AM
Great news! I just love happy endings! :dancer:

Fenderplayer108
12-19-2006, 09:28 AM
Good job switching him off scented so fast. Its not a easy task to do, you got lucky! I can't wait to see this little guy grow!

Ryan

BlackAdder
12-19-2006, 12:41 PM
Thanks for writing this antsterr, its encouraging to read that someone else has the same problem, and came out of it with success. Also, I'll definitely be trying some of the methods you described. I hope my corn will decide to eat soon, and congrats on your success.
Thanks