What is small head syndrome???

[saikrett]

hey a shire person!!

[dan_lizard]

Yeah for the Shire!!!

[pythonss]

Pin heads nearly always come from over feeding. It can be corrected via a controled diet and the head will catch up in growth over time. While its not really considered a serious problem, over feeding of any animal isnt a healthy habit.
Would love to see any information about the head not needing to grow because of food item size. I have never seen anything that would sugest that a snake can stop its head from growing while still maintaining body growth. It is how ever known that the head of reptiles and most other animals wont responde from excellerated growth at the same pace as the rest of the body.
the origanal post said that they had a murray darling? This species dosent have as larger head as other carpet forms..In a later email you were asking about the head size of a 9 foot python. If that is the size of your python i think you will find that it may not be a murray darling as the average lenght for this species is in the 2 mtr range..
cheers paul.

[Fangs]

Alexahnder,the reason wabbits and chickens were suggested is because they are bigger than rats so snakey has to work his jaws etc a little harder to swallow it.

[saikrett]

do you have any photo's?

[hey_im_sam]

thanks for that paul, that's always what i've heard and believed, but didnt want to say anythying, not being qualified hehe.

[Alexahnder]

ok, sorry

[Nicole]

That 'head not needing to grow bit' is absolutely ridiculous in my opinion...
How many years ago was the theory of Lamarkism de-bunked???
This theory says that, for example, a giraffe has a long neck as they stretch up to eat leaves, and that each subsequent generation stretched up further to eat the leaves higher up the tree... by this arguement, a baby that has had an arm amputated, and learned to get along fine without it (ie never needing to use it) would then pass on this trait and ttheir child would be born with only one arm...ridiculous!

Environment can certainly influence growth in general, but in general only. It is far more likely that as the biggest bones in the snakes body, the bones in the head simply take longer to grow, and cannot respond to an unaturally accelerated growth rate like the body does.

This accelerated growth rate, even as the head catches up in the end, I believe it is unhealthy, placing strain on the animal.

[lutzd]

Methinks I smell the scent of a controversial topic here!

I don't know whether the head size increase by eating larger prey is valid (possibly not, I suspect), but it's an interesting theory nonetheless.

Wouldn't it be possible that the stretching/exercising involved in eating large prey mean they would develop larger jaw muscles plus widening the gap between the jaw bones? Admittedly this would not impact on the size of the top part of the skull... thus resulting in a big-jawed, small craniumed monstrosity! Hmmm... the more I type the more I'm convincing myself that you're right, Nicole! Better stop!

I'd be VERY interested if Steve or Fangs could get a fuller explanation from the breeder as to why exactly they think this is valid....

[Artie]

Hi Nic. I sure like your way with words and those examples you gave, I’m definitely with you on this one!

[Fangs]

Ok David,
Without dropping names(nicole knows who I got that info off I guess).
Anyway we purchased a couple of hatchies off this guy and as a person looking for value for money I spent a great deal of time picking his brain and checking out his setup.
One of the questions I asked was frequency of feeding and does "overfeeding"produce pinheads.
In his opinion he told me that from what he has seen on the subject that owners of these snakes tend to feed prey items that are way too small resulting in this condition.
At the end of the day he could have said anything but to what end?
I'm not saying that it is correct merely passing on what he had told me.

As far as comparing animals go I doubt you could compare anything or draw a similar conclusion.Dogs,cats even people. I mean if you overfeed your baby does it develop into a pinhead(lol what a visual) or do you just end up with an obese child then an obese adult?

cheers

[Stevethepom]

hey i wasnt stating a fact nicole i was merely extending tit bits of information i have picked up along the way, and to completely dismiss a theory without exploring it further shows a certain level of ignorance.

i`m not looking for an argument here just dont appreciate suggested idea's/theorys trampled on from beginners(as am i) in such a derogatory manner.

cheers
STP
Leader of the Love the Glove Party

[Nicole]

Hey STP,

If I came across as degerogatory, then I appologise for that, that was not my intent. I did state "in my opinion"... and I didn't make any personal attacks, just stated my opinion.

I'm not sure why you are steamed up, or why you felt I was 'trampling'... this was not intended.

I don't think I dismissed the idea without further investigation, merely tried to state that modern genetics is the further investigation that dispelled the 19th centuary theory of Lamarkism.

As for me being a newbie, I'll be the first to agree... but I hold my opinion.
Not pig-headly mind you, if there is reasonable info that comes to light, or I've missed something in interpreting this small prey - small head theory I'll be the first to listen....

So chill!
Cheers,
Nic

[Fangs]

Nicole how would you explain the variation between mainland and Chappell Island tiger snakes?

On Chappell Island the tiger*snakes changed their eating habits and grow bigger.
They have larger jaws (for eating the mutton bird chicks) and larger venom glands than mainland or Tasmainian ones for that matter.

They must have adapted to the local conditions imo,I say adapted as opposed to evolved .

[Artie]

I hope you don’t mind me budding in here, that so called adapting, took a lot longer then 20 years, (average lifespan of a snake.)