casting call

Anyone that has kept D'Alberts pythons (white lipped pythons), is probably familiar with what I am going to ask about. D'Alberts throw casts which, in concept, is pretty much like a cat spitting up a hairball. Basically, it is regurging/vomiting up a mass of undigested hair. My question is: Has anyone experienced (or should I say, witnessed) this phenomena in other snakes. I have seen it on occasion with a few snakes - the majority of which were also of the Liasis complex - and it happened no more than once or twice each over a period of years.

now that you mention it, I realize that i have seen quite a few from my thayeri kingsnakes. It happens quite often to me, probably every feed or so. I haven't actually seen the snake regurging the cast, so it may be coming out with the feces, but its not always in the same place as them.

I'm going to guess that what you are seeing is hair/fur that has passed normally through the digestive tract, as I have never noted this with colubrids. The frequency you mention is another indicator...I don't think I have ever seen casts more every 4-8 weeks, and that was on a young adult D'Alberts that was feeding heavily on rats.

Casts are usually elongated...maybe 3-5 inches long, and about 1-1.5 inches in diameter, though the size does vary somewhat according to the animal. If you pick it apart, or probe at it (I know, eeeew) - you will find it is densely packed & nothing but hair, and I have noted that they don't dry out any where near as fast as what passes in the conventional manner (remember, they are like hairballs...essentially vomited packs of hair, so they are slimy and moist).