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Jamaican Boas Breeding

No anoles eaten last night by T3. There are 5 anoles remaining in the cage. I am going to leave the experiment running while I am gone and will update when I return.
 
Update on Harper

So I did decide to try handling on Monday night. I made sure he was already out so that I wouldn't disturb him too much. Slowly and carefully I encouraged him to climb onto my hand - he did seem to prefer the branches and attempted escape, but with a little coaxing I got him to wrap himself around my fingers and just sit staring at me for a good 20 minutes. Didn't musk, didn't strike, just watched. My general rule of thumb when handling snakes is to more or less move at the rate that they move, so as not to unnecessarily startle them. Seemed to work with Harper, as when I went to put him back he didn't even try to hide immediately - he just calmly started exploring the branches in his enclosure. Better yet, his little excursion didn't even put him off food - he ate a scented pinky last night. All in all, it went quite well!
 
I got back into town and there are 2 anoles left in t3's cage. It looks as though he is sticking to the rate of one anole every other day. I plan to feed everyone tomorrow and will update with results.
 
Another anole was eaten last night. I've been playing catchup and haven't had the chance to feed the others yet. Tomorrow for sure.

I'll check out your thread shortly, Helen. Thanks.
 
All holdbacks were fed chick thighs, the three unscented pinkie-eaters were fed unscented pinkies. T1 was offered a f/t anole, and the scented-pinkie eaters were fed scented pinkies.

The stubborn non-holdback was fed an anole-scented pinkie. This is a little bit of a change, but since he is the last of the non-holdbacks to eat rodents, I feel it would be better to move him to a group that was eating anole-scented pinkies, as I anticipate moving T1 and T3 that way shortly as well, just for the sake of consolidation. Hopefully, he eats it.

I will update tomorrow with results.
 
Not a great night. All holdbacks ate without issue. This is almost always the case. I'm not sure if it is the fact that they are always offered chick thighs, or if it is because they were all selected for appetite/vigor, among other things. Probably a combination of the two.

T1 ate the f/t anole.

The stubborn non-holdback (who will now be referred to as T4, for brevity's sake) did not eat the anole-scented pinkie. I think I am going to move T4 to a f/t anole diet, and then try to transition to anole-scented pinkies, as I am doing with T1 and will be doing with T3 shortly.

T3 did not eat last night, and seems to be taking his time a bit now that he has caught up. Probably a good thing, seeing as how he has eaten almost 10 anoles in 2 weeks.

2 out of 3 unscented pinkie eaters ate, which is good.

However, of the scented pinkie eaters, only one out of seven ate the scented pinkie. These were f/t pinkies scented with chick brains, which should have done the trick, especially considering the 2 week fasting period. Despite my efforts, I have not been able to recreate the numbers I got that one week. I have a theory on this. The only thing I can narrow down as having been different that week was that I fed the Jamaicans after I fed my hatchling house snakes, some of whom were given pinkies washed in ivory soap. I often use the ivory soap method to get stubborn colubrid hatchlings to eat, and I'm wondering if the residual soap in the cup (I used the same cup) helped to wash the pinkies before scenting. Next week, I will try washing the pinkies in ivory soap for the scented pinkie eater group, and we will see if I can recreate the numbers from a few weeks ago.
 
I'm certainly happy to only be stressing out about one of these little guys, but since Harper has started eating he hasn't actually given me anything to worry about. I weighed him again, and at 17.3 grams he has gained about 2 grams since being here. He's been on a bit of a fast since I noticed he went into shed, but I woke up to a fresh skin this morning, handled him a bit, and he just ate his scented pinky (only 12 hours post-handling). I doubt he's caught up to his siblings, but if he keeps up his appetite he could get there pretty soon!
 
GillianC said:
I'm certainly happy to only be stressing out about one of these little guys, but since Harper has started eating he hasn't actually given me anything to worry about. I weighed him again, and at 17.3 grams he has gained about 2 grams since being here. He's been on a bit of a fast since I noticed he went into shed, but I woke up to a fresh skin this morning, handled him a bit, and he just ate his scented pinky (only 12 hours post-handling). I doubt he's caught up to his siblings, but if he keeps up his appetite he could get there pretty soon!
Click to expand...

He is certainly doing well for you. I wouldn't necessarily compare him to his siblings. Keep up the good work.
 
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