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[danktat]

Yet another example of the dangers or two snakes in one cage. This was posted by JKReptiles over at Clay English's board

Here is a lesson and answer to all of those who ask the question "Can I house my boas together?"

Well, I have been raising boas now for about four years and have never seen anything like this. I was sitting in my snake room last night where I have my two North Brazilian Boas together for mating. Outside of mating season, they are housed separate as all my snakes are. Well as I sat here I saw my female just go nuts and ATTACK the male. She had a good grip with her mouth on him about six inches below the head and coiled to kill. As you can imagine, the male fought back. This is a 15# male against a 20# female. Before I even knew what was happening, I have a basket ball sized ball of snake(s) doing what I can only describe as an alligator death roll. Now, if you were unclear as to the power of these snakes, I'm here to tell you that it is unbelievable. I made a few attempts to separate them but to no success. I finally put on the welding gloves and reached in desparate to separate my pride and joy. It was like picking up a brick; it was that solid! Well both in a ball, I tried to uncoil the female from the tail only to find knots of snake with the male and femal intertwined in one big knot of snake. I took them to the bath tub where I soaked them under water; again with no success. Now it's at the point I can hear the male gasping for air but neither letting go. I then grabbed for a bottle of rubbing alcahol which was half full. I figured at this point, either someone is going to die or they will separate. I poured the content of the bottle on them but again, no success. Finally when the male was going limp, I was able to get the edge on the female and able to uncoil her mostly from the male to where he could get a breath. That just gave him more strenght. At this point I was able to gain some control and finally they were apart.

Now they are no longer in this death grip but not without harm. My male has fairly large amounts of skin torn to the meat. The females mouth is in poor condition looking pretty messed up.

I am now devistated. I have raised these two for the last four years and now breeding for this season is off. They are now under strict daily care. I'll be cleansing with dialuted iodine solution, coating with tripple anti-biotic cream and wrapping every day now for quite some time. The female will be getting her mouth cleansed every night for a while as well to try and prevent mouth rot due to the many teath that were lost in the battle.

So, do you still want to know if it is safe to keep snakes together? It's your call. Every one of my snakes has it's own Animal Plastics cage they live in most of the year but if you want to breed, these are the risks you take. This is an extreme case but it is possible for them to turn against each other.

The ironic part of all of this is I just finished watching a show on Animal Plastics about the 10 most extream snake meals. Wouldn't ya know, this was one of the 10.