Happy Snake

Timothy Price63 Comments
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Blue happily digesting dinner on her hot spot. She has a cute mustache.

If you ever wondered what a happy snake looks like, this is about as good as it gets. Blue was content and happily lounging on her hot spot last night after having two large rats for dinner. I feed her pre-killed rats once a month that I buy frozen, keep in the freezer, and thaw out a couple of days before feeding time. Then I heat the thawed rats in hot water before I feed them to her.

She decided she was really hungry last night after she shed her skin a few days ago. She was striking at anything that moved, mostly me, as I got her from her encloser into her feeding box. When I threw the heated rat in the feeding box, she grabbed it and constricted it like it was live prey. But then instead of just eating it, she had to play with it for a while. This is the only snake I know of that plays with her food. It’s very annoying because I want her to eat her rats so I can put her back in her enclosure.

How does a snake play with a dead rat you may be asking? After she’s constricted it for a while, she will bite it and drag it around the feeding box, push it around the feeding box with her nose, start to eat it, then stop, and check the other end of the rat. Often when I open the feeding box to see how she’s progressing, she will strike at me, and then resume playing with her food.

After she finishes eating her rats, she is satisfied and very easy to handle.

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Dinnertime

Timothy Price61 Comments
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Owlet out of the nest in the morning

The owlets are starting to get out of the nest. Last night I was checked on the owls well after sunset. Daddy Owl was hooting way up at the top of a cottonwood above the owlets. Soon Mama Owl brought home the bacon in what looked like a gopher. She perched with Daddy Owl for a few minutes before she flew down and gave the owlets the gopher for dinner. The three-minute video below is edited down to two minutes forty-five seconds of owl video from Daddy Owl hooting to Big Baby Owl hopping back into the nest with dinner followed by 15 seconds of credits.

Being well past sunset, I could only see outlines of the owls with my bare eyes. I increased the exposure on the video by two stops which let me at least see when the edges of things looked sharp when I focused on the owls. I had to focus manually and hope for the best. Daddy and Mama Owl were backlit, so the increased exposure was able to get their details pretty well. Once Mama Owl flew down to the owlets, the background became dark. I didn’t increase the exposure further, because the picture probably would have become very pixilated in the darkness. As it is I got the video pretty well focused and you can see some details in the owlets in full-screen.

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Owlet out of the nest after sunset.

LOL Cat

Timothy Price54 Comments

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Lola looking on the bright side after spending the day at the vet getting x-rayed, poked, tested, and re-splinted.

Since people have been asking about Lola, here’s the latest update. Lola had her two-week checkup today. Since she had been lethargic and not eating well over the past several days, the vet did an expanded radiograph and expanded blood tests. We knew she had degenerative arthritis from the x-rays of her paws, but the expanded tests show she has rheumatoid arthritis, and all her joints are affected. Therefore, she has not been feeling well since the last steroid shot had worn off.

Her treatment from now on will be wearing the splint so she can walk, getting steroid shots every three to four weeks and continued doses of Gabapentin twice daily.

Lola is a real trooper. She curls up with me at night and purrs both of us to sleep. Laurie says that when she wakes up in the middle of the night Lola will be curled up in my arm still purring. We will do our best to keep Lola comfortable so she can be as active as possible. She seems to always be happy and purring, as she looks on the bright side of life.

On the Water’s Edge

Timothy Price48 Comments

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A Cooper’s Hawk standing on the edge of the water in the clear ditch. I don’t know whether he was meditating, fishing, our thinking about taking a bath. After we spotted him, he looked like he was trying to decide whether to carry on with what he was doing or fly away. He finally few.

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Holy Bat

Timothy Price51 Comments

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I was a little more successful getting photos of this bat this evening. Once I started processing the photos, I notice the bat has a big hole in the membrane between its feet and tail.

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