Texas Rat Snake eating eggs?

anniefannie

Hatching
8 Years
Jan 17, 2012
2
0
7
We found this in our coop last night...
400
 
Ok, that posted before I was finished writing!

The facts:
I know it's a Texas rat snack.
It appears to be at least 4 feet long.
We have a wicked rat problem in our coop.
We have no intention of killing the snake.
We live in a rental house and we are using the coop that was already here - it's pretty shoddy.
We have 24 hens, 1 rooster, and 1 guinnea.
Previously my hens were laying about 12 eggs a day, yesterday I got 1, and the day before that I got none.
We were out of town Friday through Monday last week (we have a Pullet Shut to let hens in and out), and when we got home there was only one broken egg in the coop, and no others!

Could this snake possibly be eating that many eggs?! That seems like an insane amount of eggs for one snake (albeit a large one)!

Or, could they have stopped laying as a result of a recent change from being completely free range (on about 2/3 acre), to being confined to a smaller run? Had to get them off my porch - the poop was killing me!!!

Or, could it just be the Texas heat?!

I reckon it's probably a combo of all these things, but I couldn't find anywhere how many eggs a day a large rat snake will eat.
 
Last edited:
A month ago I caught a similar sized rat snake in the nesting box. He had 2 eggs in his stomach and mouth wrapped around another. I think they can go through a lot of eggs as they probably are not as "filling" as an animal with muscle,bones,fur etc. My guess is you have a combination of rats eating eggs, snake eating a few, and high heat humidity shutting the birds down(mine have dropped egg production by 50 percent the last few weeks).
Snakes are cold blooded and need far fewer meals than a mammal. I bet the rats are getting most of them
 
Just killed another. Wife heard them squaking. He had his head parked at the rear end of a broody hen who hadn't gone to roost. Like he was waiting for the pez dispenser to drop another candy! He measured out to 6 foot. Biggest I have seen
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom