Lincoln bites the tongs.

[ClockwerkBonnet]

The craziest thing just happened while I was feeding Lincoln.

I was dangling the mouse in front of him when I accidentally dropped it onto the floor of his cage. It took a short time for the snake to realize that there wasn't anything in the tongs anymore. However, when I found a chance to reach in and pick the mouse up again, Lincoln struck at the tongs and tried to constrict them! He didn't let go until he sensed he wasn't able to bring it down and swallow it. I had to hold him up to the mouse on the ground in order for him to get the idea of where it was.

I really wish I had the camera when this happened. It was truly a sight to behold.

[akane]

Snakes aren't all that great at telling different objects sometimes. That's part of the reason for using tongs and mine have a rubber coating 1/3rd up for such accidents. They smell food, they see movement, and they strike it. I find my bulls and pines that tend to bluff strike are considerably better at only hitting the correct object than other species. My rosy boa got the tongs in place of the mouse last week but not being a very strong constrictor or bold species she released immediately and then seemed too confused about the inedible object to go after the mouse.

I did have one bull accident when my male kankakee left a large rat uneaten and I decided to remove it by the tail without tongs. He popped up from the backside of the hide and got my moving fingers instead of the rat I'd started to pick back up.