Boas Pet Snake Boa Constrictors: Boas - Peoples fear & hatred of Snakes

Peoples fear & hatred of Snakes

Boas As Pets

I'll never understand why so many people have such a great fear & hatred of Snakes. Of course, Venomous snakes are dangerous, deadly. Most People are never in a position to be exposed to venomous snakes though. What doesn't make sense are people with an intense hatred or extreme fear of Boa Constrictors? These animals, for the most part are extremely gentle and timid creatures. Boa Constrictors are quiet non aggressive snakes. The only time Boas become aggressive is at feeding time for the most part. Of course there are exceptions to this .Boas can act out aggressively if they feel threatened with harm. In captivity most Boas feel quite secure, remaining calm and quiet. Boas can eat a wide variety of animals in their natural habitat. Which is for the most part the Jungles of Central and South America. Boas diet consists of Lizards, Rodents, other snakes, birds, and small mammals to name a few. The Boa Constrictor will normally feed on an animal smaller in size then the Boas girth at the largest spot. Boas can not & will not eat or attempt to eat homo sapiens! Homo sapiens a far too large for the Boa Constrictor to take notice! The Boa "Constricts" its prey not crushing it to death but suffocating it to death. Every time the prey breaths out the Boa tightens its grip eventually the prey item can not inhale a breath and suffocates. In captivity Boas are fed a diet of mostly medium & Large Adult Rats. Young smaller Boas are fed mice of appropriate size. The size of the food item corresponds directly to the size of the Boa. Some Boas are fed rabbits. Most Breeders feed their Boas pre-killed rats. A Rat can badly injure or even kill a Boa. Plus, personally I just don't Like the idea of putting a poor rat in the cage to be killed by the Boa. Also I think pre-killed or frozen thawed in my case, helps keep the Boa even that much more docile.
The Boa Constrictor species consists of a large variety of Locality Boas and color pattern Morphs. There are two main groups or classification of Boa Constrictors. These two groups are "BCI"- "Boa Constrictor Imperator" and "BCC"- "Boa Constrictor Constrictor" . "BCC" Boas are often referred to as "True Redtails" due to their bright orange/red or maroon/ burnt-Red tails. Almost all Boas have a reddish or orange colored tail, not all though. The BCC Boa mainly comes from South America near the Equator. Peru , Guyana, Surinam, Brazil the Amazon Basin. Other South American Boa species exist, Bolivian Amarali Boas, from Bolivia of course. Bolivian Boas are very beautiful silver grayish colored Boas with bright orange, red, purple or fluorescent pink highlights on their flanks and a short amount of reddish color tail splotches. Argentina has their own variety of Boa as well. These Argentine Boas are very dark colored. This dark color probably exists so the Boa can warm up from the Sunshine quicker being the farthest South of the Boa Species. Argentina's more harsh weather climate forced the Argentine Boas to adapt. Argentine Boas are protected By "CITES" because they were hunted for their skins so much in the past. There are many other Locality Boas I have just touched the surface here with the more well known or popular species. Other types of Boas within these groups of "BCI" & "BCC" Boas exist. I'll refer to them as color and Pattern Morph Boas. There are many natural occurring Color and pattern Morph Boas that have been discovered. Many of the Color and Pattern Morph Boas are Man made or developed. Some of the natural occurring Morphs are T- Albino Boas-red eyes lacking red Black pigment or Tyronase. Tyronase is what the "T" stands for. There are two types or strains of T- Albino Boas. The original Strain or Kahl strain and the other is the Sharp Strain Albino Boa. T- Albino Boas are more common then T+ Albino Boas. There are very few people who own T+ Albino Boas. There are two types of T+ Albino "BCI" Colombian T+ Albino Boa or Caramel Albino Boas as some people call them. The other "BCI" T+ Albino is the Nicaraguan T+ Albino. Argentine T+ Albino Boas also exsist. Another natural occurring Morph Boa is the "Anery" Boa short for Anerythristic Boa. The "Anery" Boa Lacks any red pigment and should appear white or sliver and black, some are a brownish color though. Another Morph is the "Hypo" Boa short for Hypomelanistic.Hypo Boas have a reduction of melanin .This reduction of melanin allows the under lying red and orange colors to show more clearly. Leaving a Boa with a very red or orange appearance with little to no black highlights. Then there are some natural occurring pattern Morph Boas Like the Arabesque Boas or the Motley Boas. These pattern morphs are hard to explain. Pictures are a far better way to explain these two pattern Morph Boas. Then there are many man made Morph Boas .Breeders combine these Natural occurring Morphs to create Boas Like the Snow Boa which is a combination of the T- Albino and the Anery Boas. Sunglow Boas , which are a combo of the T- Albino and "Hypo" Boas. Ghost Boas are a combo of "Hypo" and "Anery" Boas. Pastel Boas Stripe Boas and many other types of Morph Boas exist. Of these Morph Boas ,T+ Albino Boas are probably the rarest though. Only something like six people in the entire world own Colombian T+ Albino "Caramel" Boas. As for T+ Nicaraguan very few of these exist either. T+ Argentine Boas are rare but there are quite a few more of these then the other two.
So over all what's not to Like about Boa Constrictors .Boa Constrictors are mellow easy going animals. With beautiful markings and coloring. Boas not all but alot of them are very intelligent acting. Some Boas are even socialable animals and interact with people very well. Some Boas know there names but like most kitty-cats they don't come when they are called either. They do Look at you when there name is spoken the special Boas , not all of them. There is no dander or hair shedding from Boas. So allergies are not a factor.Boas shed their skin every few months.The shedding of their skin is a process that occurs over approximately a 7-10 day period.The Boas eyes fog up and become a bluish shade. After a couple days the eys clear up this is an indication that shedding will take place with in a day or two. The humidity plays a large roll in the shedding process. Humidity and healthy diet are directly responsible for the Boa shedding their skin ,usually in one piece. If the skin is shed in pieces usually humidity is to blame, but if they’ve had a poor diet this can also be responsible. The Boas will kind of roll the skin off starting from the tip of their nose working it off towards the tail. Once the skin has been shed it's inside out and rolled up much Like a women rolls off her stockings/Panty Hose. Feed the Boa a frozen thawed rat every seven to twenty one days approximately. Yearly and younger Boas should be fed an appropriate sized mouse every seven days .Keep there water dish clean & full as well as their enclosure .The enclosure should be lined or filled with paper towels or Aspen shavings. Aspen shavings are my favorite bedding. There's not much else to keeping Boas as pets. Breeding Boas is another subject altogether and can be discussed at a later date. Well I'll put a few pictures up now and again to show all the different types of Boas.