Need help with wildcaught Hognose

[DragonClaw]

I found this beautiful snake in the jaws of my little brother's cat, thought it was dead. It looked like a copperhead, and it didn't look like it was doing very well.

I put it in a cage carefully and came back to find it perfectly fine. It saw me and did its playing dead routine.

This snake is so pretty, it's more vibrant than a copperhead I saw out here.

I plan to give it to a friend who is a wildlife rehabber/educator, but he lives a bit away and I don't have money to ship it.

Little snake here must be getting hungry, but he wouldn't even eat a pinky. He looks barely big enough for a pinky.

Basically, what can I feed him? He told me it ate frogs and toads, but I don't know where to get them small enough for him. I live in East Texas on a piece of land with woods, running water and still water in it. What's the best time/place to go catch small frogs/toads? Best method?

[FWK]

Field collected Eastern Hognose are not easy snakes to keep. They can be very stubborn feeders, if they will eat at all. Even captive hatched Eastern Hognose can be very hard to start. They would likely be very popular in the hobby if they were easier to keep, they are beautiful snakes with great personalities. Your field collected animal is probably preparing to burmate and may well refuse to eat anything until spring anyway. The best thing for both you and the snake would be to release it in suitable habitat near were it was found. The land you describe would be perfect.

If you are intent on keeping it the first thing you must do is manage its stress levels. Make sure you have proper thermal and humidity conditions in the enclosure. Provide lots of cover. Hides, fake plants, even just bits of crumpled up newspaper, anything as long as the enclosure is very cluttered. A substrate that it can dig in is preferred. Hognose spend most of their time underground and will stress quickly if they feel exposed. Note that it played dead when it saw you. Then you need to leave it alone for a while. At least a week or two. Do not touch it, don't even open the enclosure other than to change its water every few days. It would be best if the enclosure is located in a low traffic area in the house. It has been through a very stressful encounter with two predators, a cat, and then you. There is a reasonably good chance it has internal injuries sustained in the encounter with the cat. In the meantime post pictures of the snake and its enclosure so we can help you optimize the setup for the little guy. Details on heat sources, how they are controlled, and temps/humidity levels would be helpful as well.

The best place to look for Toads would probably be near the water on the land you mentioned. It may not be easy to find anything this time of year though. Look under cover such as logs and rocks. Be careful, don't put your hands anywhere you can't see. You don't want to take a Copperhead bite while trying to find food for a Hognose. If you can find an appropriately sized Toad the first thing I'd try is just putting it into the snakes enclosure (once the snake has settled in for a couple weeks) and leave it for a day or two. If that doesn't work the next thing to try is to put the snake and toad in a small paper bag, fold it over so they can't get out, and put it back into the enclosure (away from the heat source!) over night. If it hasn't eaten the Toad by morning, put the snake back into the enclosure and repeat the process every 10-14 days. Now you need to figure out how to care for the Toad for a couple weeks, or release it and try to find another. You may get lucky and the snake will eat for you right away, you may not get lucky and the snake will stave to death before it will eat for you. If it does start eating for you, you will have new issues to deal with, like switching the snake to f/t rodents. A diet of field collected prey will almost certainly kill the snake in time, amphibians tend to have a very high parasite load.

I'm not trying to scare you out of keeping this animal, but you need to realize this is not an easy snake to keep and you are probably going to have to jump through hoops to keep it alive. If you can keep it alive at all, success is not guaranteed even if you do everything right. Some field collected snakes are easy to keep, such as Rats and Kings, while others are not so easy. You have picked a particularly difficult animal. Share pics and details as soon as you can so we can help. Good luck.

[Minkness]

Also keep in mind that since it's wold, it may have parasites or a disease all ready that may very well put an end to any good you are able to do for it.

I stand with FWK in saying you let it go and look into buying an established, captive bred baby.

Good luck.

[DragonClaw]

If it burmates, is that bad to have it heated?

Right now all I have is Aspen bedding for reptiles. He loves it though. Pokes his head out and watches.


This is before you said to not touch him, but
I'm not sure if this is because his temperament or perhaps he's hurt internally (Couldn't even find puncture marks on him), but I picked him up and he was very happy to crawl through my hands and investigate.

He doesn't strike at me, he hasn't played dead since then, and he seems fine. I tried a small cricket and a pinky, but no luck. A friend of mine lives near a lake and it's a lot more humid there, he has frogs that stick to his window at night and he will catch me some.

Since it was a spur of the moment, "Drop that snake!" kind of encounter, I didn't have an aquarium set up for him. I do have a spare Zilla reptile tank with the sliding/locking lid, but it's like 27-29 gallons long. Kinda big for his size I think.

He was more calm than the corn I had.

I've heard that wild caught prey is dangerous. But he is a wild snake that is probably hungry. I have no idea what his last meal was or when.

He's in a medium sized kritter keeper thing right now.

I understand that he will need care, but there's been a series of fronts moving though and I don't want to release him before the weather improves if I release him. Plus, when I get him to the rehabber, he can take care of it. He's good at this stuff.

If I can't get him what he (Or she? ) needs, then I'll wait for a break in the weather and release him.

[FWK]

Aspen will do fine as a substrate. I agree the Zilla reptile tank is to large for now. The Kritter Keeper will probably be fine as long as you can create a proper thermal gradient. Put a thermostat controlled undertank heat pad under one end of the Keeper, ideally taking up about a third of the bottom of the keeper. Aim for 85-87 on the warm side and mid 70's on the cool side. Offering it a warm spot will not do any harm if you are going to keep it. If you are going to release it do so ASAP, every day you keep it reduces its chance of survival. And baby snakes have pretty low odds to begin with. Not offering it a thermal gradient would be a bad idea regardless of your intentions. The Frogs your friend sees on his windows are probably Tree Frogs, I don't know if the Hognose will be interested in them. Hognose are typically Toad eaters. Worth a shot though. I have heard of Western Hognose starting on Guppies or even the white of a hard boiled egg, you may want to try these as well. Western are generally much easier to get feeding anyway though, hence their popularity in the hobby.

On the subject of your rehabber friend, if he wants an Eastern Hognose I can see hanging on to it long enough to get it to him provided you can care for it in the meantime. But this snake does not need to be rehabbed, if your friend does not specifically want to keep the snake then you should just release it. Provided, of course, you do not want to keep it yourself.

Other than making any necessary adjustments to the enclosure, continue to stay hands off for a while. It will take a while for it to adjust to captivity. Don't mistake its apparent calmness with content. This snake is probably going to require a lot of patience. I'd still love to see pictures if you can, Hognose are awesome little snakes.

[DragonClaw]

I thought I replied, how can I check if a mod has to check my post?

Is that permanent? Does everyone get their post checked?