Lily

[blakkangell]

This is Lily. She is a Peruvian Rainbow Boa produced by Jeff Clark. She is the runt of the litter so even though she is a little over a year old she is a bit small. However being small doesn't seem to effect her personality because she is very sassy and feisty. She already got out once, but my roommate found her right away and I fixed the problem. After she was found she acted all cute and wanted me to hold her like "please don't be mad at me mommy, look how adorable I am." She's very curious and inquisitive. I'm in love with her

[bigsnakegirl785]

Just be aware that snakes do not think like that, they don't enjoy human interaction and aren't social. This sort of anthropomorphism can be really harmful to the health and life of a snake if allowed to get out of hand. I've seen that sort of thinking kill snakes before, but as long as you're aware the snake doesn't actually think in that way and you provide proper care, then it's ok to pretend. I know for a lot of us it can make us feel better thinking they may possibly love us.

With all that out of the way, I'm glad you found her! Hopefully her enclosure has been tightly secured or replaced to keep this from happening again. She doesn't look all that small for her age, my oldest BRB was about that big at that age, maybe smaller depending on how close to a year she is.

[blakkangell]

Just be aware that snakes do not think like that, they don't enjoy human interaction and aren't social. This sort of anthropomorphism can be really harmful to the health and life of a snake if allowed to get out of hand. I've seen that sort of thinking kill snakes before, but as long as you're aware the snake doesn't actually think in that way and you provide proper care, then it's ok to pretend. I know for a lot of us it can make us feel better thinking they may possibly love us.

With all that out of the way, I'm glad you found her! Hopefully her enclosure has been tightly secured or replaced to keep this from happening again. She doesn't look all that small for her age, my oldest BRB was about that big at that age, maybe smaller depending on how close to a year she is.

It was just a joke. I'm not going to smother her..

[EL Ziggy]

Nice critter angell.

[macandchz]

dear Blakkangell-beautiful snake. who knows what a snake thinks? i prefer to think my snake loves me and appreciates his nice home. even if he can't have feelings, i can and if it wasn't for me who knows what his circumstances would have been?. just have fun with him and keep him protected.

[bigsnakegirl785]

It was just a joke. I'm not going to smother her..

I figured as much, but because of the situations I've seen I decided there needed to be a disclaimer of sorts. Not everyone reading your thread will have that context.

[blakkangell]

dear Blakkangell-beautiful snake. who knows what a snake thinks? i prefer to think my snake loves me and appreciates his nice home. even if he can't have feelings, i can and if it wasn't for me who knows what his circumstances would have been?. just have fun with him and keep him protected.

Yea, I'd like to think my snakes at least prefer me over others haha, if not love me. It's nice to at east hope they are happy

[blakkangell]

I figured as much, but because of the situations I've seen I decided there needed to be a disclaimer of sorts. Not everyone reading your thread will have that context.

Yea, I could see that. Some people are pretty ignorant even with their own snakes.

[blakkangell]

Lily is doing well. I found some mites on her and very quickly dealt with that. They seem to be almost gone, but I'm going to wait months after I no longer see any before I put substrate back in. She is eating wonderfully for me again, and is getting better with handling. I think she is learning to trust me and realizing that the giant hand coming for her isn't trying to eat her. She was in a dark phase this morning so I decided to do a photo shoot :) She's also about 71g and almost 3 feet long, last I measured.
35950

35951

35952

I love how her belly looks with the dark phase.
35953

[blakkangell]

Not sure why some of my pictures are sideways...

[Snakesitter]

Mites are a major pain...do you know where they came from? I've seen bags of substrate from pet stores harbor them, for example.

[blakkangell]

Mites are a major pain...do you know where they came from? I've seen bags of substrate from pet stores harbor them, for example.

They were from a bag of substrate I got. She didn't have any when coming here and she was the only one that got that new substrate when the mites started showing up so it had to be that bag. I got everything cleared out right away and the mites are basically gone. There's one left, but it's under her belly scale and I've done practically everything to get it out. I think it's dead and stuck there.

[Snakesitter]

Sounds good! If you buy substrate from a reptile store again, freeze or bake it right away.

[JellyBean]

Beautiful snake!
Thanks for posting about the substrate, when I switch over to bedding, I'll take that advise and freeze it before using it.

Your baby is beautiful! My BRB "Bean" just weighed in at 70 grams before eating last night, and he is 11 months old. Sounds about right.

Do you know what the differences are between Peruvian and Brazilian rainbows?

[bigsnakegirl785]

Beautiful snake!
Thanks for posting about the substrate, when I switch over to bedding, I'll take that advise and freeze it before using it.

Your baby is beautiful! My BRB "Bean" just weighed in at 70 grams before eating last night, and he is 11 months old. Sounds about right.

Do you know what the differences are between Peruvian and Brazilian rainbows?

70 grams is actually really quite small at that age, and 71 grams at 3' as with OP's is quite light for that size. My 3' male is 257 grams, and he's lean, he's also 2 years old but was a little over 100 grams at a year. My female was nearly 150 grams at a year. That said, as long as both snakes are eating well, they should mature just fine, they're just a bit light for their age.

Peruvian and Brazilian rainbow boas are different localities of the same subspecies. As far as physical differences, I'm not too sure, Snakesitter probably has some insight on that.

[blakkangell]

70 grams is actually really quite small at that age, and 71 grams at 3' as with OP's is quite light for that size. My 3' male is 257 grams, and he's lean, he's also 2 years old but was a little over 100 grams at a year. My female was nearly 150 grams at a year. That said, as long as both snakes are eating well, they should mature just fine, they're just a bit light for their age.

Peruvian and Brazilian rainbow boas are different localities of the same subspecies. As far as physical differences, I'm not too sure, Snakesitter probably has some insight on that.

I was told that mine was a runt so she's on the smaller side. She is eating and growing more though so that makes me happy. And the difference between Peruvian and Brazillian locality is the scale count and then some Peruvians tend to be darker.

[Snakesitter]

Peruvians are said to have more red and thicker borders. I believe there are also slight differences in scale count. Note that they used to be regarded as a separate subspecies, and a future reclassification could always restore that....