King Snakes

[Chuckie]

The snake discussion on snakes on "Simme's" post about his daughter's clinic made me want to post this King Snake eating a Copperhead.
I walked past on one this past weekend while looking for a short in my fence. He was long and thick, but they surprise me with how small their heads are. They are black with many white dots all over their bodies. I walked around him and he did not move much. I was glad to see him.

The King Snake kills poisonous snakes if they have built up immunity to the poison. I read where they are not born that way, but their bodies get immunity to the poison and it does not affect them. I only kill Copperheads that are around my dogs or horses. My Jack Russell, even though she is 14 years old will grab and bites and shakes them till they can't move. She has a scar on her mouth that the hair will not grow back where one she killed got her before it died. I treated her myself with Clindamycin pills after giving a penicillin shot to get it in her system immediately. Then a shot of Dexamethasone. The swelling went down pretty good and she recovered quickly. I did not know she was bit until the side of her mouth and face stared to swell up which happened quickly afterwards.

Anyway, don't kill King Snakes. They are not poisonous at all and have dots all over their body. They eat rodents and the other snakes.
We have the speckled King Snake. Black with a lot of white dots all over it. In different areas they are colored differently. I have seen two different patterns of speckling here. One that had a bit of a band of speckles with spots in between, and then just spots scattered on the other.
Here is a couple of videos of a King Snake killing Copperheads. I always wondered how they did it.

 

[Chuckie]

What I can't figure; if the copperhead is longer than the King Snake, how does that work? I realize King Snakes as a majority are longer, but what about a younger King snake with an older CH? Imagine swallowing something whole and can't bite it so it has to slide down all the way. I see the diameter of the King snake before he swallows the Copper Head, but look how much the diameter expanded once he got all of him swallowed. I don't see how he was able to move with a cold snake inside him. Seems like it would become too stiff to move unless his body breaks it down very quickly.

I have seen the fake pictures where they took a picture of a huge snake in another country and they would report the man had fallen asleep and the snake wrapped around him and then swallowed him. They cut the snake open and would show the man after he swallowed him.

After watching that King Snake swallow that Copper Head whole like that, now I am wondering if those fake snake pictures were actually real. Never having seen one do that, I would have said he couldn't swallow a snake that big. But he surely did.

 

[Mark Reynolds]

What I can't figure; if the copperhead is longer than the King Snake, how does that work? I realize King Snakes as a majority are longer, but what about a younger King snake with an older CH? Imagine swallowing something whole and can't bite it so it has to slide down all the way. I see the diameter of the King snake before he swallows the Copper Head, but look how much the diameter expanded once he got all of him swallowed. I don't see how he was able to move with a cold snake inside him. Seems like it would become too stiff to move unless his body breaks it down very quickly.

I have seen the fake pictures where they took a picture of a huge snake in another country and they would report the man had fallen asleep and the snake wrapped around him and then swallowed him. They cut the snake open and would show the man after he swallowed him.

After watching that King Snake swallow that Copper Head whole like that, now I am wondering if those fake snake pictures were actually real. Never having seen one do that, I would have said he couldn't swallow a snake that big. But he surely did.

I'm not entirely sure, but snakes are still able to breathe while they are swallowing very large prey that would choke anything else to death if they tried to swallow anything relative in size comparison. I may have read or encountered a video (I don't know why I would think this otherwise) where a snake eating a snake longer than itself is able to swallow a good portion of the snake it is eating with a portion of the meal hanging out of its mouth for days until the first part of the meal digests enough such that the remainder of the meal can be swallowed. (YIKES!!)

 

[TexasJerseyMilker]

Not much in nature is wasted.
search assist : The case-fatality rate for copperhead bites is about 0.01%, indicating that deaths are uncommon.

 

[Chuckie]

I'm not entirely sure, but snakes are still able to breathe while they are swallowing very large prey that would choke anything else to death if they tried to swallow anything relative in size comparison. I may have read or encountered a video (I don't know why I would think this otherwise) where a snake eating a snake longer than itself is able to swallow a good portion of the snake it is eating with a portion of the meal hanging out of its mouth for days until the first part of the meal digests enough such that the remainder of the meal can be swallowed. (YIKES!!)

Goodness. The bad part is the Kind snake is defenseless until he gets it completely down.
The Heimlich Maneuver won't work in this case. Ha-ha!!

The King Snake I walked around the other day was quite long. Not as long as the rat snake I took a video of last year in my yard. I saw him early yesterday as Rooster, my dog was smelling of something in the grass. I looked and there was Bob again. If it was not Bob, it had to be his twin brother. He was exceptionally long, and made him turn around as he was headed toward the house where Abbey hangs out.

As long as that King Snake was, I can see him swallowing a whole copperhead. Here, they grow large in circumference and seem to be around the 2-2.5 ft range. But looking it up, it says they can reach 3 foot and as long as 4 feet. People kill them and make hat bands. They are a pretty snake.

 

[Chuckie]

Not much in nature is wasted.
search assist : The case-fatality rate for copperhead bites is about 0.01%, indicating that deaths are uncommon.

I spoke to a vet that treated my first Jack Russell that was bit by a Copperhead. He said that in all his years of snake bites from Copperheads, that only one dog died. He said he had treated many.

The cat , Spiderman, brings in snakes through the pet door, so I am just waiting for that copperhead. Usually he brings garter snakes and such.

I knew of only one person that got bit by a Copperhead and she saw her little boy get close to one and I guess she panicked and probably kicked it or grabbed it by the tail to get it away. Not sure if it was her leg or hand where the snake bit. I was a kid when it happened and when I heard she got bit, I thought it meant she would probably die. (From watching too many westerns) But she was in the hospital for a couple of days. She told me in later years that it was a very painful bite. I remember her showing me a huge bruise that covered a large area from where it reacted with the tissue.

 

[Double R Ranch]

Great thread. Have seen 2 copperheads in 24 hours at our new place. Still learning about them. Also have seen a rather large king snake and a baby. Happy to have them around. Thinking maybe that's why the copperheads seem to be at the end of the driveway and not up at the house. The king snakes are up at the house.