• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

Am I missing anything?

CarolB

CarolB

New member
Hi all, I'm new to this. I just got my very first snake, and it was kind of a fast/emergency situation. He is a rescue corn snake (on his way down the toilet according to the last owner) very gentle, not aggressive, don't know if he's male or female. He's not full grown. I've been researching and I think I have things covered but would appreciate input from all you experts.

Before I got him, they had him in sand (very little) and he had some compacted in his scales. They also had a heating rock in with him. I put him in a 40 gallon tank, UTH on one side with heating lamp on same side, no heat rock, 2 hidey holes (one on warm side, one on cold) and pool/drinking water (mostly on cool side) and white lite on top to differentiate between night & day. I have the coconut substrate, about 3 inches deep (he seems to love to dig) and a driftwood climbing stick that goes about half way up the tank.

The previous owners had him for a year and told me they fed him every 2-3 weeks and that he shed everytime he ate. They also told me they were feeding him 2 mice at a time. That seemed to be a lot of shedding to me.

He shed last night, in pieces and didn't appear to be in any distress. I fed him 1 mouse today, but he still seems hungry. I fed him in a separate tub, and put him back in his house when the mouse was about 1/3 of the way down (didn't take long at ALL!) and I know I'm not suppose to handle him for about 48 hrs.

I'm growing quite attached to Zeke (his new name), and want to make sure I'm giving him everything a corn snake needs and loves, so if I'm missing anything, or doing anything wrong, or even could be doing it better, please help. I'd appreaciate any comments/advice you have.
 
The feeding by the other owner is all wrong. It might have change the normal growth of the snake. So....big is the snake two foot three.

Hatchling can be feed every five days subadults every seven day. adults every ten to fourteen day. But this vary with owners too.

You should feed the snake something that is 1 1/2 time the snakes girth.

Not able to see the snake so you will have to figure that part out.
If you have a scale you could search the Munson feeding plan too.

so what size is that snake again???
 
I'd say pick on heat source and stick with it - either the UTH or the lamp. Even with just one, you'll need to control it with a thermostat to keep the floor of the tank cool enough - the warm end floor needs to be in the mid 80s, which is surprisingly cool to our touch. A UTH without a thermostat to control it, can easily get to 120.

Ideally, you need to be measuring the temperature at floor level with a digital or infra-red thermometer. The stick on cardboard strip or plastic dial types are notoriously inaccurate.

The light isn't necessary as long as the room has daylight through a window. It could also be bumping the temperature up further.

I'd say the previous owners were probably wrong about the shedding. If he's a full grown adult, then I'd expect him to be shedding about four times a year.

If he's eating adult mice, then I'd say the previous owner's feeding regime averages out OK. I feed my adults one large mouse every 2 weeks (although my fat boys need to stick with one every 3 weeks!).

You could add more hides and some extra ground cover like plastic foliage (looks great and helps the snake feel like it's sneaking around without being seen).

Sounds like Zeke's landed himself with a fabulous new owner! You should have many happy years together. And yes, they're pretty easy to become attached to!
 
Zeke is about 3 foot long. My guess is about 1 1/2 years old. I fed him a med size mouse today (about 1 1/2 times the width of his jaw) and you could barely see the mouse "hump" at all.
 
Another question: how much open space should he have in his tank (space not taken by hideys or pools or such)? Does he need open space? Is it better to have his pool on the warm or cool side, and how big should the pool be? (Okay, okay, that was more than one question, I'm on a crash course here, lol)
 
CarolB said:
Zeke is about 3 foot long. My guess is about 1 1/2 years old. I fed him a med size mouse today (about 1 1/2 times the width of his jaw) and you could barely see the mouse "hump" at all.
Click to expand...

Usually its 1 1/2 times the biggest part on the snake and if you can barely see the bump you might try a bigger prey item.
 
CarolB said:
Another question: how much open space should he have in his tank (space not taken by hideys or pools or such)? Does he need open space? Is it better to have his pool on the warm or cool side, and how big should the pool be? (Okay, okay, that was more than one question, I'm on a crash course here, lol)
Click to expand...

Well most provide a water bowl that is place on the cool side or center.
A 20L in the min for an adult corn so I think you should be fine.
 
The 1.5 times the girth size for a prey is max., most people feed smaller than that on average as far as I know.
 
Thanks everyone. I'm getting a thermostat tomorrow, and maybe some more hideys and some plastic plants. I'll keep to the size mouse i used today and feed him every 10 days (for now). I really appreciate all your advice. I'm really excited about my new adventure with Zeke.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top