Taking Care of Snakes

Video Transcript

"Hi. I'm Tim Cole with Austin Reptile Service and I've been keeping reptiles and amphibians for over forty years. I'm here to talk about keeping snakes. It's a fairly broad subject. The first thing you need to do is accurately identify the snake you're keeping and that way you'll know what kind of set up to provide it. Basically snakes need to thermal regulate which means they need a warm area in the cage. They need to be able to get away from that warm area to a cool side of the cage. They need a water container that they can get in and out of. They need a place to hide. If it's a snake that lives on the ground they need a hide box. If it's a snake that lives up in the trees, is arborial, you need perches or branches for them. The snakes feed on a variety of things depending on the species. Water snakes and garter snakes are fish eaters. King snakes and rat snakes are rodent eaters. Your boas and pythons are larger rodent eaters. You've got some snakes that are lizard eaters. They may not make a good pet. Hog nosed snakes, especially the Eastern hog nosed snakes, primarily feed on fish, toads, and frogs, and these are all things you need to consider when keeping these animals. Venomous snakes are not to be kept by people who are inexperienced. There's lots of caging that's available for snakes. The first thing you need to do is make sure it's a snake proof cage. Bricks on a screen top does not work for a snake. Not that they're going to push the bricks off, but that you're going to forget to put the bricks on. So acquiring cages that are locking is definitely a must. You don't want the snakes to be able to get out. There's different things that you need to know about different species. Some species tend to be more aggressive than others. Your anacondas and reticulated pythons may not make a good pet for somebody who is not experienced with them. Large pythons take up a lot of room. Buying babies when they're cute and two feet long may not be a good idea if you live in a one room apartment and don't have room to build a large cage."