- 130
- Posts
- 16
- Years
- USA
- Seen Feb 14, 2009
My fear for snakes turned into passion a few years ago when I saved a baby northern water snake from a pond at my aunt's house that was being filled in. He was so small and docile and loved my warmth when I held him. Unfortunately, as it turns out, he was premature. After a weekend trip to the Boston Aquarium, I got home to find a dead baby snake. After he died, my aunt admitted that she had hit a rather large one with her mowing tractor, and since northern water snakes bear live babies, the premature babies were "born". I realized he was too small to have been born at the right time once I looked up their mating/birthing seasons, and that was probably a big reason as to why he died. His name was Niku, and this is a picture of the little guy.
I was heartbroken when Niku died. So much so, that my parents actually agreed to let me purchase a actual pet snake, as long as I paid for the snake and its necessities myself. Once I had the money, I looked at our local sales website, and found baby corn snakes that I could afford. We took the 45 minute drive, got to the place, and I had to choose between 4 babies; two snows (one only had one eye, the poor thing. I almost got that one out of sympathy) and two amels. I ended up choosing a "female" (so she said) amel, and named "her" Moeru. This is a picture of "her" right when we got home:
Once "she" was 2 years old, "she" had gained a lot of color and became very vibrant. I sent a photo of "her" to a national corn snake expert, and he informed me that my snake was a male. (We took him to get probed to be certain, and sure enough, he's a boy) Here's the most recent photo I have of him:
He's my baby, I love him more than I thought I could love anything. I don't know what I'd do without him. He's turning 3 in July.
After awhile, my mom agreed that I could get another snake. I again went to the local sales website, and came across a breeder that seemed very reliable. We drove 40 minutes to get to her house, and purchased this little girl snow, who I named Songo:
https://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p311/Kite_Katsumi/Snakes/1410987.jpg
We knew something was wrong 2 weeks after we got her, and she still refused to eat. We contacted the breeder, who was also a vet tech, and she said to bring her back. She gave us a replacement snake while she tried to nurse Songo back to health. This new snake was a male anery named Mozart.
A few days after we brought Songo back to the breeder, we got the email. Songo had passed away. She said it was due to a highly contagious respitory infection, which had apparently spread throughout her stock without her knowing. This, of course, meant Mozart also had one. He didn't eat either. The breeder wouldn't contact us when we tried to contact her to let her know that he was also sick. We were about to make an appointment with an exotic species vet, but Mozart died before we could.
Awhile after that, we decided to try once more. We purchased a ball python from Petco (first mistake) and I named her Umbreon.
She was skinny when we got her. We were in -constant- contact with our vet, because we knew she was sick once we got her home and could get our hands on her (I'm under 18, so I couldn't touch her in the store. Petco's policy. We called Petco and they insisted that their vet said she was perfectly fine a week prior, which was obviously not true. A snake doesn't get into her condition in a week). He told us to try many, many things to nurse her back to health, and we even bought Flukers Emergency Repto Aid for her, but she too passed away despite everything we tried.
After that, we decided to stick with Moeru and not to get any more snakes.
A few years later, we got a call from a friend of a friend. She said her daughter "outgrew" her two corn snakes, an amel and a snow, both males. We agreed to take them in. Once we got them, we realized that were grossly underfed and less than half the size that they should've been at their age. However, they're both still alive and eating/shedding very well. :3 They're gaining weight and growing pretty fast, all it took was a proper feeding schedule. However, Zuko became very aggressive less than a week after we got him. He's only handled at feeding time to transfer him into the feeding container to minimize stress.
Zuko is the amel, Sokka is the snow.
Anyone else own snakes? :D I'd love to see pictures and hear stories about other people's snakes. ^^
I was heartbroken when Niku died. So much so, that my parents actually agreed to let me purchase a actual pet snake, as long as I paid for the snake and its necessities myself. Once I had the money, I looked at our local sales website, and found baby corn snakes that I could afford. We took the 45 minute drive, got to the place, and I had to choose between 4 babies; two snows (one only had one eye, the poor thing. I almost got that one out of sympathy) and two amels. I ended up choosing a "female" (so she said) amel, and named "her" Moeru. This is a picture of "her" right when we got home:
Once "she" was 2 years old, "she" had gained a lot of color and became very vibrant. I sent a photo of "her" to a national corn snake expert, and he informed me that my snake was a male. (We took him to get probed to be certain, and sure enough, he's a boy) Here's the most recent photo I have of him:
He's my baby, I love him more than I thought I could love anything. I don't know what I'd do without him. He's turning 3 in July.
After awhile, my mom agreed that I could get another snake. I again went to the local sales website, and came across a breeder that seemed very reliable. We drove 40 minutes to get to her house, and purchased this little girl snow, who I named Songo:
https://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p311/Kite_Katsumi/Snakes/1410987.jpg
We knew something was wrong 2 weeks after we got her, and she still refused to eat. We contacted the breeder, who was also a vet tech, and she said to bring her back. She gave us a replacement snake while she tried to nurse Songo back to health. This new snake was a male anery named Mozart.
A few days after we brought Songo back to the breeder, we got the email. Songo had passed away. She said it was due to a highly contagious respitory infection, which had apparently spread throughout her stock without her knowing. This, of course, meant Mozart also had one. He didn't eat either. The breeder wouldn't contact us when we tried to contact her to let her know that he was also sick. We were about to make an appointment with an exotic species vet, but Mozart died before we could.
Awhile after that, we decided to try once more. We purchased a ball python from Petco (first mistake) and I named her Umbreon.
She was skinny when we got her. We were in -constant- contact with our vet, because we knew she was sick once we got her home and could get our hands on her (I'm under 18, so I couldn't touch her in the store. Petco's policy. We called Petco and they insisted that their vet said she was perfectly fine a week prior, which was obviously not true. A snake doesn't get into her condition in a week). He told us to try many, many things to nurse her back to health, and we even bought Flukers Emergency Repto Aid for her, but she too passed away despite everything we tried.
After that, we decided to stick with Moeru and not to get any more snakes.
A few years later, we got a call from a friend of a friend. She said her daughter "outgrew" her two corn snakes, an amel and a snow, both males. We agreed to take them in. Once we got them, we realized that were grossly underfed and less than half the size that they should've been at their age. However, they're both still alive and eating/shedding very well. :3 They're gaining weight and growing pretty fast, all it took was a proper feeding schedule. However, Zuko became very aggressive less than a week after we got him. He's only handled at feeding time to transfer him into the feeding container to minimize stress.
Zuko is the amel, Sokka is the snow.
Anyone else own snakes? :D I'd love to see pictures and hear stories about other people's snakes. ^^
