@soapone Oh gosh no. I get them frozen. They get put down by gas so they don't suffer. Just kinda fall asleep. I find live feeding to be a bit cruel. It's also dangerous to the snake since rats have teeth and claws (accounting for that requires even more cruelty).

@mauve
yeah, why I was wondering. I always knocked out/killed before I fed my corn snake.

Sometimes it was too retarded to notice the food there, focusing on trying to escape for a while before finally switching to "oh hey, food".
Snakes are not the smartest reptiles. Then again I'm not aware of any reptiles that are much smarter.

@soapone Yeah I kinda like how dumb they are. It's a fun contrast with how violent people expect them to be. I'm lucky my corn snake is a good eater, my ball python is a lot more finnicky. Sometimes it'll nom a bit and then shrug and go look for something else to do. 🤷 I find most predators I've encountered are pretty dumb outside of going for the kill. E.g. sharks.

@mauve
Maybe one day I'll get another one. Mine escaped after feeding right after a very long day of work (13 hours) and I forgot to latch the lid because was so tired. Hopefully it found a way out of the house, haven't found a corpse yet.

@soapone Unfortunate. 🫂 The person that had my corn snake before me actually lost her from a similar circumstance. She randomly appeared again after 4 months. They had moved on and gotten a new snake in that time. Probably hid in the vents the whole time and chilled. They're pretty resilient creatures overall.

@mauve @soapone my cats are pretty smart for 9 pound animals with 9 pound animal brains

@sapphire @mauve
and 100% more allergenic than a snake.
I might consider getting a hairless sphinx cat at some point though. Maybe I'll get a larger snake too and feed it bunnies and stray cats, help clean up the town a bit.

@soapone @mauve the hairless ones are still allergenic (it’s their dander that causes the reaction, hair is just a good carrier)

I wish someone would feed our local strays to something, especially now since I’ve homed the cuddliest one