Friends Not Food

I have a small zoo at my house, as most of you know. Today it is time to meet my predators. I'm not talking about a lion or a bear or anything like that. The two animals I am talking about is my ball python Princess, and my bearded dragon Drake. Now I know they are considered predators but it seems that these two are a little confused.

As you can see in this picture, she is about to eat the rat. Or that's how it appears. What you can't tell from the picture is that Princess and the rat did this for three days before she finally ate him. I believe she was trying to earn his trust to make it easier to capture him.

Drake is usually pretty good about eating his crickets when we give them to him. He usually lets one or two crawl up under the log where he can't get them. I do not understand why when they crawl from under the log to sit on his head he does not eat them. Unless like Princess he is gaining their trust to make it easier to capture them. When I see this happen with these two I remember the story Finding Nemo when the sharks are at a meeting trying to learn that fish are friends and not food. They make friends with Nemo's dad and Dori but end up not being able to handle the temptation of Dori's blood and chase them down to eat them. Of course Dori and Nemo's dad had a happier ending then the rat and the cricket and escaped.