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[Zantan]

I just found a live fire snake listed in my stocks, so I quickly forbid it and decided to try to extract some liquid fire.  I kept on getting cancellation messages saying that there weren't any appropriate animals, whether or not the snake was forbidden.  So then I zoomed to it from the stocks screen, and there it was, sitting on a table.  Or, at least that's where it sent me.  There was a yellow dot on the table, but the [k] screen just showed the table and floor (which is not engraved with an image of any vermin). 

Has this happened to anyone? and does anyone know if I can do anything to recapture it?

[Albedo]

Is it a reclaimed fort, by any chance?

[LegoLord]

No.  When a dwarf grabs something to eat and sits at a table, the food item goes into the table's item list (technically, inside the table as far as game coding goes, I think).  So the fire snake must have been forbidden after a dwarf claimed it as his food.  If looking at it from the tables 't' menu shows it to have an owner, then I'm afraid there's nothing you can do with it.

[Zantan]

Update:  I disassembled the table, and it is now free.  I just hope one of my dwarves catch it before it starts any fires...

[Martin]

In order to extract from the snake, you need to capture it in an animal trap. Build some and install them next to your pipe and bait them (anything will do). Once captured, you can then give the extract command at a butcher shop and it'll work.

You can tell them to capture a live animal, and someone will run around with a trap and try and get it that way, but it's always been a much slower process.

[Zantan]

I managed to catch the snake again (i have three dwarves looking for vermin to catch at all times, and as soon as I freed the snake from the table all three swarmed it immediately).  However, I'm having trouble extracting from it. 

If the cage and snake were forbidden, it said I didn't have an appropriate animal.

If the cage is forbidden but the snake is not, the butcher will grab the cage, and then realize that someone has already snagged the snake as a snack.

If the snake is tamed, it is safe from predatory dwarves, but my butchers refuse to milk it.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Elliott_Thinas]

I have trouble with my vermin too and until Toady makes them stop eating the vermin the only real solution is to get the vermin away from the trapper as quick as possible. Dump them down into a locked up room that only contains the milker and pray he milks them instead of eating them.

[Quietust]

I've found that simply performing the extraction in a remote location works quite well - I build the traps next to the magma pipe, build the butcher's shop right next to that, then designate a fire snake-only animal stockpile right next to it (preferably just outside the region tile so fire snakes will never actually reach it), a small meat stockpile for baiting the traps (again, outside the region tile so the barrels don't burn up), and a finished goods stockpile that only accepts glass vials (for whatever reason, my dwarves refuse to use metal flasks). As long as your normal food is always closer to your dwarves than the fire snakes, they tend to leave them alone.

[Martin]

Quietust has it right. I ran into this a lot with Morul (legendary trapper, animal dissector, milker). The best system was to lock him into his own space with the workshop, bait, and all the equipment he needs, as well as a bed, table, food/booze stockpiles. Now and then he'd fire down a maggot when he got hungry at the butcher shop or farmers workshop, but for the most part everything went smoothly.

I was very aggressive forbidding things, however, just to minimize the loss of vermin.