General snake question: Biting/Body Language

[ChristinaM]

Hey folks, didn't know where to throw this one, so here it is.

If a snake is going to bite,
does it always go into strike positioning first?
Or is there other physical signs that it wants to bite?

I'm just learning snake body language, so any pointers, other physical actions that generally show whatever, I'd love to hear of them.

Lizards are so easy. Iguana's bob, tailwhip, open mouth threat, etc before biting. My iggy tells me she's hungry by pressing her nose against the glass watching me, till I notice the empty food dish LOL.

Dragons puff out their beards, and an open mouth threat as well. My dragons will stay in their feeding corner when they are hungry...etc.

Thanks

[nolagurl]

Watch snakes eat. It can be very similar/the same body language as that.

Sorry I'm going on three hours of sleep. Pardon my sounding ********.

[nolagurl]

wow. didn't realize i was using a "*" word. pardon my sounding stupid.

[Invictus]

It's not even different with the species - it's literally different with every single snake. I have a cal king with a nasty attitude that just bites - no warning, no coil, no nothing - he just bites. And I have another cal king that will tail rattle a lot, then go into strike position, then do nothing because she is full of crap. :) Each snake will have its own reactions to a stressful situation. You have to learn to read it, not its species.

[Simon]

I agree with Invictus...
I have had numberous bites from little corns that were 'calm' in the hands for the first few min and then all of a sudden...wham....gets me right on the hand....even though it doesn't hurt it does surprises you a bit...and remember when you got the brb from me? You were holding the tub...it sort of looked at you...and then all of a sudden a few bites....haha

some do 'warn' and do nothing.
some warn and does bite
and some doesn't care and bite all the time...
so to each of it's own....
just learn your little one and you'll know if it's going to strike or not~~

[Soul_Reaper]

I agree with the posts above and i couldn't have said it better myself, just watch your snake's feeding behavior, see if you can get anything out of that...

[Dark_Angel_25]

Feeding behaviour doesn't help much either..

Sometimes my Ball will so the whole coil (S) shape with the neck and strike, but last night he just went about his biddness like he wasn't interested and then WHAM! scared the crap outta me and my BF.

My Boa, will often strike, but one feeding (weird in my opinion) she just kinda moved gently up to the rat, and slowly opened her jaws and then slowly pulled it out of the tongs.. it was very gentle, and strange to see.. she did it that one time, and hasn't repeated that behaviour since...

But I personally have not been bitten by any of my current snakes as of yet, and I don't plan on it anytime soon.. they are both very sweet and good tempered so I don't think that will help.

but like I said, feeding behaviours (for my guys anyway) are never the same twice, so I couldn't tellfrom that if they were winding up to bite me either.... sorry!! :D