Can a mental scrubbie be calmed down?

[sherlock]

View attachment 261128View attachment 261129

This is what happens when you say no to a Scrub .She wanted to do her own thing while out and i said no and look what happened LOL .

The problem is you did not say it loud enough, it needs to be in the 120 decibel loudness range. Trouble is you'll scare the snake, your kids, neighbours, yourself and possibly have a visit from the police wondering what's going on. Then you'll have no trouble with him I'm sure. Your scrubby will be a quivering wreck every time he sees you.

 

[KaotikJezta]

I have 4 scrubs, one is 3 years old, one is 2 and two are yearlings. If you dont agree with something i say that is fine but there is no need to start getting rude, this is the reason i 'disappeared' for a while. I have no doubt you know your stuff but dont just think because of my age i have no right to give advice, this is what has worked for me with all sorts of pythons. If you dont want to believe or agree with something i say thats fine but as i said you dont need get all keyboard warrior over the internet.

From what I remember you disappeared because you were trying to tell people you were 35 and had been keeping for 15 years. At that stage you were 15 years old. I think Jamie is a lot more qualified to give advise than most people on the forum.

 

[longqi]

Ive had 2 scrubbies
Biggest was only 4.2 metres
I used them in demonstrations and never had a major bite from them
But I also very seldom let anyone else touch them

On the other hand Ive got a 5.6metre retic that weighs many times what any scrubby ever would and I let kids play with it

I believe they can be tamed down
I also believe they will always remain unpredictable

 

[snakelady96]

From what I remember you disappeared because you were trying to tell people you were 35 and had been keeping for 15 years. At that stage you were 15 years old. I think Jamie is a lot more qualified to give advise than most people on the forum.

KaotikJezta- Im really over this forum now, you people obviously have nothing better to do than bitch about me and other people who are simply trying to be polite and help out. The proper thing to do would be to PM me saying that 'hey theres something you said i dont agree with etc etc' but no instead start bitching about me on a thread, but thats cool- bit weird though that you so called 'adults' can hammer a 16 yr old but you dont want to do it to someone ya own age! This goes for EVERYONE having a bitch.

Now to stay on topic and answer your statement you made, yes you are correct that is what i said because i knew exactly THIS would happen if i said my age but now i really dont care. We have always reptiles me obviously have been around them since 1996 my parents have been around them since 1995 so i think its safe to say that i have reptiles my whole life! If you disagree then thats your problem.

Jamie probably is more qualified than most people on here i totally agree with you there but just because he has alot more experience he has no right to go hammering people that are answering a question with something that has worked for them. With the whole 'putting hand up to its face' thing yous are thinking about it the wrong way and im not discussing further into the topic as its just going to start up the whole APS war thingy again. But anyway its good to see Site Rules number 1 and 2 are being followed!

 

[Scleropages]

KaotikJezta- Im really over this forum now, you people obviously have nothing better to do than bitch about me and other people who are simply trying to be polite and help out. The proper thing to do would be to PM me saying that 'hey theres something you said i dont agree with etc etc' but no instead start bitching about me on a thread, but thats cool- bit weird though that you so called 'adults' can hammer a 16 yr old but you dont want to do it to someone ya own age! This goes for EVERYONE having a bitch.

Now to stay on topic and answer your statement you made, yes you are correct that is what i said because i knew exactly THIS would happen if i said my age but now i really dont care. We have always reptiles me obviously have been around them since 1996 my parents have been around them since 1995 so i think its safe to say that i have reptiles my whole life! If you disagree then thats your problem.

Jamie probably is more qualified than most people on here i totally agree with you there but just because he has alot more experience he has no right to go hammering people that are answering a question with something that has worked for them. With the whole 'putting hand up to its face' thing yous are thinking about it the wrong way and im not discussing further into the topic as its just going to start up the whole APS war thingy again. But anyway its good to see Site Rules number 1 and 2 are being followed!

I wouldn't care if you where 10 years old as long as you give good advice. putting a flat hand to the face of an aggressive scrubby is BAD ADVICE!
Please think before you post comments like that.

 

[Nighthawk]

KaotikJezta- Im really over this forum now, you people obviously have nothing better to do than bitch about me and other people who are simply trying to be polite and help out. The proper thing to do would be to PM me saying that 'hey theres something you said i dont agree with etc etc' but no instead start bitching about me on a thread, but thats cool- bit weird though that you so called 'adults' can hammer a 16 yr old but you dont want to do it to someone ya own age! This goes for EVERYONE having a bitch.

Hang on a minute; if you saw somebody giving potentially dangerous advice in a public setting I'm sure you would want to set them straight, also publicly, in order to warn others listening who may not be as experienced just how dangerous that advice is. Admittedly some people go about it the wrong way, but the only time I would ever say that putting your hand flat up to a pythons face to deter biting is if you're dealing with a hatchling ant. A scrub python is a whole 'nother story entirely, even a young one.
There are things that many experienced people on here do on a day-to-day basis to deal with their more dangerous animals that they take as calculated risks, but would never air on here for fear some wet-about-the-ears kids would take that as a guarantee they'll never be bit or killed and run with it. It may work for you, giving you the benefit of the doubt here, but it won't work for everyone.
I'm not trying to be nasty or feud, I'm not trying to make you feel bad or anything, I'm simply stating what I've observed. And what I've observed is that posts from Scleropages, Joemal, and Pythoninfinite seem to carry a lot more weight, credibility, and consistency than yours. I also think that you need to realise that, while you probably wouldn't recommend that a novice stick their hand out to a scrub (or any large python for that matter), and that anyone with any sense would know that that sort of calculated risk comes with years of experience and the ability to read their body language to a T, there are still impressionable and naive people out there who would look at that, say 'okay, this works for this person, I'm going to try it out even though I only got my snake yesterday'.
With experience comes responsibility. That kind of advice in this public a setting is quite simply irresponsible.

 

[adelherper]

scrubs demand a lot of respect and you alway need to be on your guard they are awesome animals but you need to understand like its been stated on here many times you can never underestimated a scrub one min they are casualy cruzin round next second they are after blood and lots of it haha
you need to have a lot of experience dealin with big snakes before you consider gettin one and id never recomend anyone gettin one with out atleast goin to someones place that has large scrubs spending time with the animal so you can get a feel of the power and how they act

 

[Joemal]

Ok as the pictures go ....Good day ,good day,bad day,good day,bad day and bad day .As you can see when she is good she is excellent and when bad she can be a bit of a handful and this is where things can go wrong for you because the change from good to bad can either happen in an instant or maybe a day or two .There is border line split personality with my girl but hey maybe that is a Scrub trait .Again it all comes down to not allowing them to gain your trust .Now that she is getting bigger i'm more weary of how i enter her enclosure or handle her .Only the other day i backed out of cleaning her cage because of her laying along her log that was above me .It is not a hate for me in her eyes but more a focused intent look she gets and as i have found out she is best left alone when showing these signs .I learn by my mistakes and what i do works for me but might not work for others .No two scrubs are the same so in theory you can't give advise on one thinking it will work with all .The only thing you can say that covers ALL scrubs is they are very unpredictable .They can be your best friend or your worst enemy and in cases like mine it happens out of the blue .If i could afford the feed bill i would have a few more .Love them or hate them you have to admit they are an unreal snake in their own right .....

 

[PythonLegs]

Oh my god...ahhh...weeee....this thread is awesome. Snakelady96,ahh..you Are My favourite comedienne..heeehehe..hand to the face! Argh..some wee came out...

 

[jairusthevirus21]

LOL nice one Joemal! my Scrubbie delivered the same after i had to grab its neck coz someones stupid King Charles Cavalier wanted to sniff the pointy end! nuthing like trying to handle a large snake thats covered in your own blood....:cry:StellaDoore. what worked for me was approaching my Scrubbies and treating it like a Rottweiler. Dominate it! Your the boss and you have no fear! i noticed my 4 meter Scrubbies were hesitant to bite if i went straight in and touched its head and stroked it (with a welding glove). then quickly shook off the glove and it was fine to grab a take out of enclosure. Animals do respond to the energy you give off. As stupid as it sounds they do 'smell your fear' so to speak. Thats why i love my Scubbies. Its a Psychological game as soon as i open the enclosure. be confident.
this worked successfully for me so who knows it might work for you too....

 

[PilbaraPythons]

jairusthevirus21
As crazy as some people might think your dominating approach is, I actually know there is some merit in it. I use the exact same approach with pythons that have bad reputations and it seems to work for me. Many people have been totally surprised when I have managed to pull out and handle their snakes that they swear would bite anyone who tried. Having said this , I am not sure I would do this with someones bad mannered 18 foot scrub python lol. Wild female Perenties seem to do the same ( as in totally submit once they think you have the better of them ) after first carrying on like a pork chop threatening to maul you. I thought this behaviour when I first experieced it was quite amazing. Awesome monitor, but thats another subject.

 

[StellaDoore]

Oh my goodness, what are people doing up at this time??

I've seen the dominating/confidence thing as well. I had to clean the enclosure of a darwin and I was relatively new to snake keeping, so was a little nervous with the bites. The darwin kept striking at me until I chickened out and got an experienced keeper to get it out. He just scooped it up, let is crawl around on his hands and there was no biting, striking, nothing...very cool to see.

I'm sourcing an enclosure to put this scrub in (he's not mine, but I'll babysit soon, and he's currently in an enclosure bank) and when I do, I'll be sure to get him out for a "play". My game plan is to act confident (er, with gloves...), never underestimate him, always be on alert, and have him out for a few minutes at a time, or at the very least, until he looks to have calmed down a little bit. I might try the bag method first though, I've heard good things about it and considering this snake has had minimal human contact (just to clean his enclosure), slow and steady might be the way to go.

Can't wait to get some cool pics up here =D

 

[caliherp]

jairusthevirus21
As crazy as some people might think your dominating approach is, I actually know there is some merit in it. I use the exact same approach with pythons that have bad reputations and it seems to work for me. Many people have been totally surprised when I have managed to pull out and handle their snakes that they swear would bite anyone who tried. Having said this , I am not sure I would do this with someones bad mannered 18 foot scrub python lol. Wild female Perenties seem to do the same ( as in totally submit once they think you have the better of them ) after first carrying on like a pork chop threatening to maul you. I thought this behaviour when I first experieced it was quite amazing. Awesome monitor, but thats another subject.

I have not read through the whole thread but I agree with you about approaching a snake with confidence. It is the best way to get it out of the habatat. What I do with my more aggressive pythons is let them know I'm there then I approach at a methodical pace never pulling back wether or not the snake is hissing or striking. Then I gentley pick it up and support its bodey. One huge mistake people make is getting afraid and pulling there hand back. 9 times out of 10 this technique works for me. Also I have never used gloves to handle any of my reptiles. I feel it stresses them out more then it stresses you out getting bit.

 

[disintegratus]

This entire thread has just made want a scrubbie more.

 

[caliherp]

+1

 

[Joemal]

LOL nice one Joemal! my Scrubbie delivered the same after i had to grab its neck coz someones stupid King Charles Cavalier wanted to sniff the pointy end! nuthing like trying to handle a large snake thats covered in your own blood....:cry:StellaDoore. what worked for me was approaching my Scrubbies and treating it like a Rottweiler. Dominate it! Your the boss and you have no fear! i noticed my 4 meter Scrubbies were hesitant to bite if i went straight in and touched its head and stroked it (with a welding glove). then quickly shook off the glove and it was fine to grab a take out of enclosure. Animals do respond to the energy you give off. As stupid as it sounds they do 'smell your fear' so to speak. Thats why i love my Scubbies. Its a Psychological game as soon as i open the enclosure. be confident.
this worked successfully for me so who knows it might work for you too....

LOL .. your approach is the way i do it jairusthevirus21 i call it the shock and awe tactic .I use a hook to "wake"her up then just bare hand wrestle that sucker out of her cage to shock her and catch her off guard then stand back in awe at a job well done .Works for me and yes i believe the pussy footing round approach just gives them time to react in a manner that will affect your health lol . With my girl now in a large enclosure and a large log to lay on above head height i have to now come up with a new way to get her out .When she is in her dog kennel it's only a matter of carrying the whole thing out through the sliding door but when she is out and about in the cage there are too many places where she has the advantage over me and the last thing i need is to be in there with her and her doing a Mike Tyson on me .

 

[-Peter]

Few years back, looks can deceive.

 

[MR_IAN_DAVO]

I got one once as a part of a cheap deal that the guy did not want. I can understand why.
It was about 2 yrs or so age & about 2.5 metres long. Well they are probably the most agile & strongest Aussie python that i have ever come accross. Their bite is huge & they are very fast.

Well if i was to keep this guy, i had to do something with him to settle him down as he was pretty agro, so i persisted with bruising bites for a short time until he started to accept me & from there on we formed a relationship with a lot of respect.

I got him to a stage where i could handle him with great ease & i feel that the process was all well worth it. As my wife did not me to keep it because they can grow to 4 to 5 metres in length, we onsold it to someone in NT. After that i missed the adrenalin rushes.

Cheers
Ian

When I first got this guy, I thought these photos would have been impossible,
But after 3 months or so of persistant handling, he became just like a puppy dog that you could scratch behind the ear...
But they do deserve a lot of respect & don't trust them for one minute.



Call me a Daredevil or just stupid, whatever tickles your fancy, But the photos show the story.

Cheers
Ian

 

[Addam]

congratulations APS you have gotten me even keener to get my scrubby! looking forward to the challenge!

 

[Striker]

This entire thread has just made want a scrubbie more.

Damn it disintegratus! I just read through 7 pages of scrub python behavioural descriptions, advice, photo's, war stories and of course fights. By the time I got to about page 3 and after reading Jamie's early descriptions I had decided I wanted one and that once I make it to the end of the thread I'll announce it for all the world to read (or at least, those in the world who bother to read this thread). So I finally make it to the end of page 7 only to find that you have stolen my line.....

Where are we buying from?