You guys all remember Remic, right? He's the derpy snake who bites Kyle from time to time. This is him, not eating. He hasn't eaten for six weeks now. In all other respects he seems perfectly fine - he's drinking, he's lively, he's nosey about what I'm doing when I change his water, etc - but he's shying away from his juicy rat pups, the ungrateful lout. Now, he does occasionally go off his food when he's due to shed, but that's not the case here. Last night we started wondering if he needs a trip to the vet, but given that he seems so healthy in every other way, I'm reluctant to put him through the stress of a vet prodding him.

So I turned to the internet! The general concensus seems to be that it's not really a problem unless he starts losing weight (which he hasn't, the fat lout). I guess in the wild a snake wouldn't have a regimented feeding schedule, so him not eating is not necessarily a sign of poor health. It's possible he could be in the mood for romance, in which case, tough luck, or it's possible he could be slipping into a semi-hibernation state. If that's the case, we need to up the heat level in his tank. His and Ket's tanks are both heated from one temp control, so we'd be upping the heat for Ket too. That doesn't really strike me as a problem - Ket is characteristically very lazy and doesn't stir much unless it's feeding or handling time, so I doubt a little extra warmth will make any difference to him. It's been a mostly miserable summer here, and king snakes are inclined to eat less in autumn and winter, so it could be that Remic's sense of season is just messed up.

The other possibility is that he just doesn't fancy rat pups so much. Which is understandable. I'm planning to switch him to smaller mice for a while and see if the scarcity principle kicks in and he just starts eating everything because it's all so tiny. I don't know if snakes have the same reaction to tiny food that I do, though.

Anyway, actions must be taken! I can't deal with an animal that won't eat. Fergus would never stop if he had the choice, and Ket is like clockwork. Remic must fall in line.