For those of you out there that hate King snakes (black snakes)

[mistyfeather]

Quote:
i spent over 5 years trying to convince people like you that there were wolves around my home, the wild life people said "thats imposible they were over hunted and dont exsist in this area any more and havent since the 50's , team after team have gone out and have never found trace of them " they would tell me i was hearing someones hybrid dog and such .that the one i saw while backpacking was some ones pet that got loose, untill the day one was accadently traped no one belived me , now its a fact that wolve live in the mountains round my parents house and have been there for quite some time . just because its in the world record book does not mean it doesnt exsist, just means its not in the book, and for the record i lived in florida, people hve been seeing those snakes for along time before anyone ever caught one

 

[chickenwhisperer]

Quote:
You obviously have no clue what you are talking about . . .
I have learned from experience, not discovery channel or wiki . . .

Given a choice, any Lampropeltis sp. would rather eat a lizard.
Believe what you want, herpetologists know the truth.

My last reply to this thread which is full of myth, rumor, suspicion and emotion . . .
Have fun with it!


EDIT-
Here are my qualifications . . .

 

[TwistedSerpent]

No idea what the lizard thing has to do with this? Its a kingsnakes its going to eat anything it thinks is food. Most baby ratsnakes too survive more so off lizards then rodents. Chickenwhisperer you forget that many species through years of captive breeding have had this preferance bred out of them, its just that kingsnakes are so hard wired to feed on snakes, lizards, and anything else (hence their name) it is just too strongly in their nature and a key to their survival.

If given the choice just about every baby snake especially wild babies would take lizards, even adults. In my experiance a most kingsnakes food preferances are whatever is being offered to it at a time. Unless you set up actual tests to see if there is an actual preferance instead of whats closert or in sight first its impossible to say its an actual preferance. There are so many other factos going when they eat and not just species alone.

 

[chickenwhisperer]

Quote:
People here are being led to believe that a kingsnake is going to hunt down and kill/eat venomous snakes.
That is not the case.

Thru my experience, only 1 species of Lampropeltis actively and routinely hunts and eats snakes- L. splendida- as a wild snake.

The only influence that captive breeding has on what a snake eats, is that it can only eat what is offered(the original picture).

I have caught and kept so many kingsnakes in my life, and I stopped doing it because I hated spending my saturdays catching fence lizards to feed them.
If I could have fed them all my unwanted CB babies, believe me, I would have

I have never seen evidence of a wild kingsnake eating a rattlesnake, and I hunt and catch both, in the same places.
Can a kingsnake do it . . ? Sure it can.
Has a kingsnake done it . . ? Id say of course.


If you took a wild snake, put a chick, a lizard, and a non/venomous snake in front of it . . . it would almost certainly go after the lizard.
Start a CB baby off on lizards, and you can forget giving it mice.


Go watch my videos I just posted, and look thru my others on my page . . . then come tell me I dont know what Im talking about.

 

[StrawberryHouseMouse]

I think one of the things we have to remember, is each snake has its on individual personality just like we people do. Where some may prefer lizards over snakes, another may prefer snakes over lizards. I have a ball python that refuses to eat rats or mice. I feed it culled chicks.
And nature is always surprising. Where you might think that a snake can only go so far north or south or east or west... remember that nature does not abide by our rules. There's been animals thought to be extinct, found years after thought to be gone, in a place where no one expected it to be.
And lastly, Ive also seen pretty large king snakes, not all records have been documented. A typical person doesn't think to themselves, hey this snake is big, I'm going to call the right person and tell them to come get it, measure it, and put it in the books. But also, some times people have been known to look at a snake and think it's longer then it actually is. I think the longest king snake Ive ever encountered was close to 10ft long. Not that I measured it, but just an estimate. I currently have snakes that are 9ft long, so I can get some sort of idea by just looking at the length visually.

This thread was not intended to make people fight. A lot of people like to debate based on personal experiences. Nothing is wrong with debating but lets keep it civilized or else this thread which is helpful might get shut down and we don't want that.

 

[StrawberryHouseMouse]

Quote:
People here are being led to believe that a kingsnake is going to hunt down and kill/eat venomous snakes.
That is not the case.

Thru my experience, only 1 species of Lampropeltis actively and routinely hunts and eats snakes- L. splendida- as a wild snake.

The only influence that captive breeding has on what a snake eats, is that it can only eat what is offered.

I have caught and kept so many kingsnakes in my life, and I stopped doing it because I hated spending my saturdays catching fence lizards to feed them.
If I could have fed them all my unwanted CB babies, believe me, I would have

I have never seen evidence of a wild kingsnake eating a rattlesnake, and I hunt and catch both, in the same places.
Can a kingsnake do it . . ? Sure it can.


If you took a wild snake, put a chick, a lizard, and a non/venomous snake in front of it . . . it would almost certainly go after the lizard.
Start a CB baby off on lizards, and you can forget giving it mice.


Go watch my videos I just posted, and look thru my others on my page . . . then come tell me I dont know what Im talking about.

I will let you know this. The snake in the very first post on this thread. Was a wild caught king. My friend Chuck owns it and many others. He feeds them what they will take, not what he wants to feed them. He has many options of animals for them to eat. Rodents, birds, other snakes. He lives in Georgia and it's not just a hobby for him. He works at a zoo part time, doing demonstrations and seminars for people visiting. He sells venom to hospitals from his collection of venomous snakes. And he breeds many different types of snakes, both venomous and non. His specialty is wild types of snakes. Like king snakes, cobras, copperheads, cottonmouths, rattle snakes, and so on.
Now a king snake may not restrict its self to eating just snakes, it certainly will take down a venomous snake in the wild if it gets the opportunity.

 

[chickenwhisperer]

Quote:
Try getting your hands on some African Fur Rats.
I gaurantee your ball will eat them.

Careful tho, they are not legal in some states as live.
You can order frozen ones off kingsnake.com .

 

[StrawberryHouseMouse]

Quote:
Try getting your hands on some African Fur Rats.
I gaurantee your ball will eat them.

Careful tho, they are not legal in some states as live.
You can order frozen ones off kingsnake.com .

I've considered that, I have a few friends localy that has some. But I decided to just stick with the culled chickens since she likes them so much. Its much simpler for me, makes me feel better about culling them. Atlease they arent going to waste.

 

[chickenwhisperer]

Quote:
People here are being led to believe that a kingsnake is going to hunt down and kill/eat venomous snakes.
That is not the case.

Thru my experience, only 1 species of Lampropeltis actively and routinely hunts and eats snakes- L. splendida- as a wild snake.

The only influence that captive breeding has on what a snake eats, is that it can only eat what is offered.

I have caught and kept so many kingsnakes in my life, and I stopped doing it because I hated spending my saturdays catching fence lizards to feed them.
If I could have fed them all my unwanted CB babies, believe me, I would have

I have never seen evidence of a wild kingsnake eating a rattlesnake, and I hunt and catch both, in the same places.
Can a kingsnake do it . . ? Sure it can.


If you took a wild snake, put a chick, a lizard, and a non/venomous snake in front of it . . . it would almost certainly go after the lizard.
Start a CB baby off on lizards, and you can forget giving it mice.


Go watch my videos I just posted, and look thru my others on my page . . . then come tell me I dont know what Im talking about.

I will let you know this. The snake in the very first post on this thread. Was a wild caught king. My friend Chuck owns it and many others. He feeds them what they will take, not what he wants to feed them. He has many options of animals for them to eat. Rodents, birds, other snakes. He lives in Georgia and it's not just a hobby for him. He works at a zoo part time, doing demonstrations and seminars for people visiting. He sells venom to hospitals from his collection of venomous snakes. And he breeds many different types of snakes, both venomous and non. His specialty is wild types of snakes. Like king snakes, cobras, copperheads, cottonmouths, rattle snakes, and so on.
Now a king snake may not restrict its self to eating just snakes, it certainly will take down a venomous snake in the wild if it gets the opportunity.

Ok, so in the case of that snake, I am off some.
Your last sentence is the point Im trying to make.

 

[chickenwhisperer]

Quote:
Try getting your hands on some African Fur Rats.
I gaurantee your ball will eat them.

Careful tho, they are not legal in some states as live.
You can order frozen ones off kingsnake.com .

I've considered that, I have a few friends localy that has some. But I decided to just stick with the culled chickens since she likes them so much. Its much simpler for me, makes me feel better about culling them. Atlease they arent going to waste.

I been feeding my frogs baby quails . . .

A bird is actually one of the best foods you can feed to any herp.