Monday, February 23, 2009

Picture of the Day: Ball Python vs. Dining Room Chair

More often than not when I am responsible for Hydra, she has more fun. Tim hates it when I let her do stuff like this, but she loves it. (In this particular instance he was afraid I wasn't going to be able to disentangle her from the chair. It took me less than 5 seconds. She's fairly cooperative if you let her explore for a while.)
Of course, there was the one time I let her loose on the couch, got involved in watching TV, and panicked when I couldn't find her. Turns out she had slithered along the back of the couch and come face-to-face with Azrael, sleeping peacefully in his scratching post/throne. I still shudder to think what would have happened if my vicious killer had woken up and found the cold-blooded nuisance in his face.

2 comments:

  1. How do you know when your snake is happy?

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  2. How do we know when Hydra is happy? It's funny, Tim and I were just talking about this, and how weird people think we are when we say we can tell what out animals are feeling.

    There's not much facial expression a snake can give, so it comes down to motion and activity. If she's content, she's very active, wriggly, slithery, tongue flicking - you can tell she's excited and happy to be where she is. If she's pissed, or feeling agresive, her neck gets that telltale "S" shape, and her head stays rigid, fixated on prey. If she's curious, her neck is perfectly straight for about the first four inches of her.

    I hesitate to say it, but I think of it much like a mother figuring out baby talk and body language.

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