Why are common tree snakes not so "common" in the hobby?

[chirpyderp]

Hi all,

I'd like to start out first by saying that I actually keep common tree snakes. I genuinely feel lucky for this, as I spent several years searching to find my male, and recently secured a mature female to pair with him. Hoping to breed, I understand breeding these guys and getting the babies to feed is quiet difficult, but keen to give it a shot..

With that being said, why are they so scarce within the hobbyist community? It just saddens me a little, I love these little snakes, but there is genuinely much more demand for them than what is available. All Colubrids seem to be harder to find, which is frustrating as I'm not particularly interested in pythons haha.

On top of this, there is barely any information around about them and much of the information seems to be incorrect of conflicts with other information.. I know A LOT about their care now, but didn't have much to reference too when I first started keeping him. Learnt originally from previous owner.

Anyway just curious.

Have a great weekend all

 

[dragonlover1]

Can't offer any good news but had the same drama. My son was after a blue or green , preferably. Found someone with a trio of browns after a few years search. Seems we have 3 females, no fighting and no babies either. Hardly anyone breeding them and it seems lots of people looking for them. Can't understand the discrepancy, it's similar with some of the dragons I want

 

[Sdaji]

They're not particularly easy to keep and they need to eat often and generally won't eat rodents. Australia doesn't have any colubrids which are well-suited to captivity. Some of them are fantastic snakes and skilled, dedicated keepers can do well with them, but none of them are easy and all of them take a lot more work than pythons or foreign colubrids like Corns, North American Kings, Milk Snakes, etc etc.

 

[dragonlover1]

They're not particularly easy to keep and they need to eat often and generally won't eat rodents. Australia doesn't have any colubrids which are well-suited to captivity. Some of them are fantastic snakes and skilled, dedicated keepers can do well with them, but none of them are easy and all of them take a lot more work than pythons or foreign colubrids like Corns, North American Kings, Milk Snakes, etc etc.

Actually not that hard to keep. We have a trio of browns. A hopper mouse weekly or thereabouts, mist them occassionally. So not much harder than our Antaresia's or Morelia's. We are about to embark on a bio setup which should be even better

 

[Sdaji]

Actually not that hard to keep. We have a trio of browns. A hopper mouse weekly or thereabouts, mist them occassionally. So not much harder than our Antaresia's or Morelia's. We are about to embark on a bio setup which should be even better

LOL



As I said, an experienced and dedicated keeper can certainly do it, but we're being outright dishonest if we pretend any Australian colubrid is comparable to an Antaresia or Carpet. Even Chrondros (maybe that's what you meant by "Morelia"?) are significantly easier than any Australian colubrid, and even some of the veteran Chondro breeders admit they're a snake better suited to experienced keepers.

I don't even know what a 'brown' is. My first thought would be an unspecified Pseudonaja but we're talking about colubrids. If you're talking about Boigas, they're notoriously difficult to get on to rodents, and while some individuals, even wild caught, are complete pigs, it's most common that people have complete nightmares getting even most adults to feed, let alone hatchlings (the worst clutch of snakes I've ever had to get feeding was a clutch of east coast Boigas, and their parents were complete pigs on thawed mice).

The true reality is that so many people desperately want to work with them but the vast majority fail, and if we had a colubrid which was genuinely comparable to something like an Antaresia or a Corn in terms of husbandry, it would be one of the most common and popular species. People having success are the rare exception, not something we should lead people to expect they can achieve. I don't for a moment mean to put anyone off if they're capable, but I've seen so many people over the last few decades buy colubrids and fail with them, which is just outright unpleasant for both the people and the snakes. The feeding is the biggest issue, but we don't even have a a colubrid which would be likely to survive long term in a typical Antaresia setup, even if it was feeding routinely. Many Australian colubrids are the sort of thing which would go well in a bioactive setup, but despite the myths spread by people who love them, they aren't anywhere near as easy to set up or maintain as a normal snake enclosure and if you get them wrong (which most people do) they're terrible for the snake. It's just a reality that snakes which require high humidity are going to be a bigger challenge and require more effort to keep healthy. Get it wrong and you either have dehydrated/dead snakes, mould/fungus, or respiratory issues.

All these things are brilliant for anyone with the time and skill to do it, you're obviously doing well and hats off to you, that's wonderful, great job, but the obvious reason thousands of Australians aren't keeping thriving colubrids is that it's very difficult - their absence in captivity is not for lack of people trying, it is for lack of people succeeding. If it genuinely was easy, everyone would be doing it like they are with with Children's and Carpets. Same deal with Chondros for that matter - many people claim they are easy, but if that was true they would be hands down the most cheap and common python in Australia by now, but in reality it's only the more skilled and dedicated keepers producing them and the majority don't thrive or even survive. You can do it, I can do it, but most people can't, and that's why I say it's not easy.

 

[dragonlover1]

I am definitely talking about Boiga irregularis. We have a trio that eat hopper mouse with little to no problem. We have had them for more than a year and a half . Okay I did say not much harder than Antaresia or Morelia, but not so difficult, different temps and a mist here and there.

 

[Sdaji]

I am definitely talking about Boiga irregularis. We have a trio that eat hopper mouse with little to no problem. We have had them for more than a year and a half . Okay I did say not much harder than Antaresia or Morelia, but not so difficult, different temps and a mist here and there.

They're probably the Australian colubrid most prone to eating rodents, but even ignoring the fact that even the best rodent-feeding colubrid in Australia is far less prone to eating rodents and less reliable a feeder on even their preferred diet than any python, they're still far more difficult and less forgiving to house than Antaresia or Carpets (and still significantly more difficult than Chondros, though - it's best not to lump all Morelia together in this context, they vary hugely).

If everything is perfect, any species of animal on the planet will thrive and may seem 'easy'. One of the main things which makes something easy is being able to thrive when things aren't quite perfect. Many people manage to keep their Antaresia and Carpets thriving in far less than optimal conditions without even realising they're doing things wrongly, but with specialist species, get things wrong and you have big problems. You're lucky enough to have good feeders, but that's only one of the problems.

As always, the best proof is in the empirical evidence - there are countless people who eagerly wanted to work with colubrids. 20 years ago I put up an ad for some young Keelbacks (back then the internet wasn't the main way we advertised and I was using a pen and paper at a reptile meet) and before I'd written much more than "Keelbacks" they were all sold, with people arguing over who would be buying them. I hadn't even written down the price. I sold them all as male/female pairs. All went to very keen and for the time experienced snake keepers. None bred, few survived to the end of the year. Had they been Antaresia or Carpets, it would have been a different story even if they were bought by novices.

For decades they tried and failed and gave up and now few bother, and most of the new folks go the same way the old veterans did with their colubrids. So many times I have seen veteran snake breeders get some colubrids, struggle for a while then give up and go back to their pythons and elapids. Pythons thrived throughout the establishment of the hobby and are now kept and enjoyed by many thousands of people in Australia. The odd person here or there has a bit of success with a small group of colubrids and generally says they're not so difficult, and generally after a few years stops working with them because of all the hassle and/or deaths.

I plan to keep colubrids again in the future (actually, I'll likely keep some easy ones outside Australia again before keeping any Australian ones in Australia), but not until I have a lot more time etc, but because despite having the ability it just takes a lot more time and effort to ensure everything is correct and to maintain them. The fact that you can throw Corns or Children's or Balls or Carpets or Olives or Hog-noseds or Womas into a rack and just expect them to thrive shows how easy they are. The fact that you simply can not do that with Australian colubrids shows that they simply are not as easy to keep.

 

[Mack86]

Lol

 

[dragonlover1]

The fact that you can throw Corns or Children's or Balls or Carpets or Olives or Hog-noseds or Womas into a rack and just expect them to thrive shows how easy they are. The fact that you simply can not do that with Australian colubrids shows that they simply are not as easy to keep.

Ah there you go, "throw them in a rack" This why they don't thrive. Drawers are for underwear , not snakes.
None of our reptiles are in drawers, they all have somewhat naturalistic enclosures. I know, you will say this is for our benifit, not theirs. Partly true, we like to see them in their natural habitat but I think they get something out of that too. Yes I know a wooden box is not their natural habitat but we can replicate it to some degree.
Racks are good for hatchies but should be moved into something closer to home at some stage.

 

[Sdaji]

Ah there you go, "throw them in a rack" This why they don't thrive. Drawers are for underwear , not snakes.
None of our reptiles are in drawers, they all have somewhat naturalistic enclosures. I know, you will say this is for our benifit, not theirs. Partly true, we like to see them in their natural habitat but I think they get something out of that too. Yes I know a wooden box is not their natural habitat but we can replicate it to some degree.
Racks are good for hatchies but should be moved into something closer to home at some stage.

This is besides the point. In this context I'm not advocating for any particular style of enclosure, and what you say here further highlights that Australian colubrids are less robust and suited to captivity than are pythons. As I said, you can 'just chuck pythons' in any old enclosure including a substandard one and they'll generally thrive anyway. Get anything wrong with an Australian colubrid and you have problems.

Natural environments are not ideal environments. We can provide them with much better than nature. We should cater to their requirements, not replicate nature. Nature is a hostile environment animals adapt to cope with, but we can custom design an environment to suit their needs. That's why the vast majority of wild snakes die before reproducing, but the majority of captive pythons (though not Australian colubrids!) hatched in captivity live long lives and reproduce if the owner chooses to take that path. Generally speaking, pythons are very hardy and adaptable. The majority of Australian pythons evolved in the harsh conditions of Australia (Chondros and Scrubbies being the most notable exceptions, they didn't evolve in Australia and are recent tropical arrivals, and not surprisingly, Chondros are the Australian python keepers have the most trouble with). All the colubrids in Australia are recent arrivals and arrived as wet monsoon specialists, which generally speaking are the most difficult snakes to care for, not to mention the feeding issues.

But again, all you need to do is look at the actual reality - colubrids which evolved in harsh environments like North America and Africa thrive in captivity and are popular pets including for beginners. If any had evolved in Australia they would thrive in captivity too, but take a look at the reality of snakes kept in Australia and you see pythons abound and colubrids are few and far between and not at all for lack of enthusiasm for them. Elapids arrived in Australia long ago (far far longer than colubrids), adapted to the harsh climate and the large Australian elapids thrive in captivity, the only thing holding them back from being more popular is the whole deadly venomous thing (being mildly venomous is one of the things reducing the suitability of Australian Boiga to captivity).

 

[NicG]

Getting back to the original topic, I always initially direct anyone who asks me questions about CTS husbandry to this thread ...

https://www.aussiepythons.com/threads/pros-and-cons-of-keeping-common-tree-snakes.153693/
... which I wrote a decade ago. I've learnt a bit since then, but most of it is still relevant.