keelback

[ashley_morris22]

hi all
i am almost 100% about to buy a keelback. i own 2 macccies and a murray, and i fell ready for something different. now does anyone have information that i shoud know that might change my mind? i have email snakesnt for a little info. and thats who im buy off.

so is there a reason i might not want to get this snake.
any help will be great

Thanks
ashley

[Tommo]

brodie cant post for some reason so he says-

"Keelbacks are great snakes, and if you dont mind feeding them fish you should have no hassles with keeping them"

can they be weined to mice?

[ashley_morris22]

what sort of fish

[ackie]

i suppose they could but they would be very difficult as most frog and fish specialists are. Even if u did wean them onto mice they would more than likely obtain to much protein. And make sure u dont hold em by the tail coz they can drop it.

[ackie]

most people feed em small bronze goldfish called commets, they r cheap and all petshops hav em usually.

[ashley_morris22]

thanks mate

[eddy]

they dont bite but they do let off a pungent odour when there unhappy

[africancichlidau]

Don't Bite ?!? The wild ones bl**dy well do

[hey_im_sam]

Dont' get them if you plan on weaning them to mice, IMO.. Feed them fish, it's great having at least one or two snakes in your place that eat fish anyway, for something a bit different! No guarantees, actually doubtful you'll wean em to rod=entsand have a healthy snake.

[ashley_morris22]

now the fish do i feed as i would a mouse or do i put in a small tank in the enclosure?

[jimmy_the_kid]

Originally Posted by eddy

they dont bite but they do let off a pungent odour when there unhappy

ill second that

[Fuscus]

Originally Posted by africancichlidau

Don't Bite ?!? The wild ones bl**dy well do

I've never let any wild ones get close enough to bite me. They are too simular to the rough-scale

[ashley_morris22]

im going to get it of snakesnt so they know that the snakes ok ha and wont be a rough scale.
( i might sound dumb but i just dont want to do the wrong thing by me and the snake)

thanks
ashley

[Sdaji]

Keelbacks are awesome snakes, but a little bit of a hassle, being fish feeders and all. Wild caught keelbacks are often really nasty to keep, they will possibly be close to impossible to get feeding on dead food for quite some time, if at all, although that's not a huge problem if you can get lots of live fish. Mine are captive bred and readily take thawed fish, they were very easy to get onto them. Wild keelbacks will also likely have parasites from their froggy diet and won't grow as big as a captive bred one. Keelbacks are generally really bad handlers (I've found that they almost never bite, and I've seen literally hundreds, although others say that they are snappy, which perhaps means that different populations have different temperaments). They're prone to going quite crazy and if startled will often leap around, even right off the ground. I don't believe that they are capable of dropping their tails (ie, through autotomy, like a skink or gecko) but their tails will come off if you hold them by it and they're frantically flipping around, just as any other snake's will. This seems to be a well propagated myth, probably based on one person handling one inapropriately (someone correct me if you know otherwise). They're really easy to keep and if you don't mind not being able to handle them and getting peed on if you do, they're probably a good choice.