Bad reputation gone good!

The behaviour of my adult male GTP has intrigued me from nearly the first day of owning him. He's easily over 60" long and a grown boy. I accepted Zalty into my care as an abuse case that had been rehabbed and brought back to good health from a dear friend that works with many animals. She admitted to being scared of getting tagged by this snake and was reluctant to provide more for him than basic care. He got a good taste of me on our first meeting also but I wasn't deterred thankfully.

In the short time I've owned him (approx 3 months) I have gone completely overboard in trying to provide him with proper care and be the "perfect" mom. First thing I did was create "natural" habitat with silk plants, waterfall feature, bark/bed-a-beast substrate, with the goal of increasing humidity and hopefully helping him with his fairly serious dry shedding problem. I increased his meal size from one adult mouse weekly to small rats which was a bit scary for me as he had only accepted live prey and I didn't want him hurt.

Zalty's last shed was complete in one piece and he has probably added a full 25% on to his body weight. I am very pleased to now say that this guy who once had the reputation of a pirahna has become a wonderfully docile guy to work with. Hasn't tagged me since the very first day, and I only now get a brief glance as I open his enclosure to do "maintainance" work. I can handle him easily if I remove his perch from enclosure and then from his perch to our arms where he will comfortably wrap and sit for extended periods of time enjoying the body warmth.

So, my conclusion is that perhaps some of the foul reputation that our GTP's (and perhaps other arboreals) have earned can be directly related to their own comfort level? I am very curious to know if others have noted similar experience.

He is also much more active than any of the other snakes I have kept in the distant past. We enjoy watching him cruise nearly every evening as he rearranges the flora and keeps his eyes open for a meal or perhaps even a lady to magically appear

Here's a picture of him in the same enclosure when we first brought him home.

I have to say he's looking great Looks like you're doing a nice job with Zalty. He's a very pretty looking chondro.

As far as temperament, you are right in the sense that the evil temperament of some arboreals are largely exaggerrated. But I will say that personality varies from snake to snake. I have 9 chondros right now 5 of which are completely tame and handleable. 2 of them are downright nasty and the other 2 are on the unpredictable side(sweet one time nasty the next). I also have 4 Emeralds and an Amazon Tree Boa. ALL of them are rather bitey. lol But that is just my luck.