Corns living together?? Yes or no?

[HaisseM]

I should also point out that many would say that you have an ethical obligation to give the same quality care to your $40 pair of anerys as your $2000 pair of cinders. I have to say that I would agree with these people. My cheap pet store normal gets the same care as my cinders.

I've actually agree to that, and say this, when I sell/give away my pets, I normally give them away to people I believe will take good care of them and sell them to others since I feel once you make an investment you're more inclined to give better treatment

I guess what I don't understand about this question is that it is no more difficult to house them separately than to keep them together. Even space limitations aren't really an issue. Two corns kept together require the same floor-space as two corns kept apart. I've done it both ways, so I know. In fact, I think it was tougher keeping them together because I really had to give them a lot of time to get out of hunting-mode before I re-introduced them after feeding, when each snake still smelled like their prey. :shrugs:

You raise an interesting point, that maybe you can answer for me.

Currently my snakes are in the same bin 40 gallon tank... with bedding etc. I have two separates bins when they eat. a 20 gallon and a 10 gallon for each snake (feed in the same bin pretty much every time) The bin is cleaned if a mess was made by the rat/mouse. The feeding bins have no bedding and is just glass. I put the snake in 1st and he reacts like he knows its time to eat, I then give them about 1 minute alone in this tank to reset itself since it was just moved and then place the food in. Sometimes I feed two mice or 1 mouse but regardless, after they have ate and are sticking their tongue out and their stomach muscles are no longer pushing the food down like when they are swallowing it, I pick the snake up and put them back into their main cage. At this point they move around into their normal positions with little interaction with each other.

I tried to spell out everything I could.... Would you imagine my feeding ritual has something to do with the lack of aggression in their main tank?

 

[Roy Munson]

...breeding for more docile snakes, which I have already argued is not necessarily the case with most breeders...

Hah! More like it is probably the case with ZERO breeders. Corn snakes are a very docile species already. I can't speak for all corn breeders, but I'm guessing that most feel as I do: temperament is an absolute non-consideration when determining pairings. Some breeders of more aggressive and dangerous species select for temperament, but it isn't necessary for corn snakes.

I like hatchlings that are feisty right out of the egg. In my experience, feisty hatchlings are HUNGRY hatchlings. I'm not sure why there's a correlation between defensiveness and feeding-response, but there seems to be one.

 

[HaisseM]

What's not to understand?

regards,
jazz

LOL, 1st. I wasn't sure akin was word you were looking for and I didn't know the def of tautological. Now that I''ve looked up tautological, my point was before I would't have an opinion on the matter and probably would tell them i've done it fine for years without a problem, while now I would say be careful if you do because bad things could happen

 

[HaisseM]

By definition, selective breeding (in this case on one trait - cohab tolerance) cannot occur unless selection is occuring. In this case, you are either selecting for cohab tolerant snakes or you aren't.



Darn, I've got to go to class for a while. Don't have too much fun without
me!

However once you start selecting breeding you could be changing over variables that could effect the outcome of your plan. Simply put just by sticking corns together you could be at that point changing around whatever breeding criteria you are looking for, but I dont think that matters for our conversation

 

[Roy Munson]

You raise an interesting point, that maybe you can answer for me.

Currently my snakes are in the same bin 40 gallon tank... with bedding etc. I have two separates bins when they eat. a 20 gallon and a 10 gallon for each snake (feed in the same bin pretty much every time) The bin is cleaned if a mess was made by the rat/mouse. The feeding bins have no bedding and is just glass. I put the snake in 1st and he reacts like he knows its time to eat, I then give them about 1 minute alone in this tank to reset itself since it was just moved and then place the food in. Sometimes I feed two mice or 1 mouse but regardless, after they have ate and are sticking their tongue out and their stomach muscles are no longer pushing the food down like when they are swallowing it, I pick the snake up and put them back into their main cage. At this point they move around into their normal positions with little interaction with each other.

I tried to spell out everything I could.... Would you imagine my feeding ritual has something to do with the lack of aggression in their main tank?

Well, my guess is that their lack of aggression is due to the fact that corns just aren't normally that aggressive anyway. I don't feed my snakes in their tubs, so it's a similar process to yours, but they are returned to solitary quarters. I would recommend that you give them at least 20-30 minutes after eating to get them out of "hunting mode", before you re-introduce them to each other after eating. On several occasions when I cohabbed I saw one snake bite another after it smelled prey on its cagemate. It never amounted to anything-- I never even had to intervene-- but it scared me. This points out another pain in the butt that I didn't like about cohabbing: I had to feed all cagemates at the same time. Returning a just-fed (and mouse-stinking) snake to an enclosure with another hungry corn in it is not a good idea.

As long as your 40gallon tank is a long one (with max floor-space), your two probably have enough space to pull off cohabbing. Of course, I'd rather see them in separate 20s, but...

 

[HaisseM]

Well, my guess is that their lack of aggression is due to the fact that corns just aren't normally that aggressive anyway. I don't feed my snakes in their tubs, so it's a similar process to yours, but they are returned to solitary quarters. I would recommend that you give them at least 20-30 minutes after eating to get them out of "hunting mode", before you re-introduce them to each other after eating. On several occasions when I cohabbed I saw one snake bite another after it smelled prey on its cagemate. It never amounted to anything-- I never even had to intervene-- but it scared me. This points out another pain in the butt that I didn't like about cohabbing: I had to feed all cagemates at the same time. Returning a just-fed (and mouse-stinking) snake to an enclosure with another hungry corn in it is not a good idea.

As long as your 40gallon tank is a long one (with max floor-space), your two probably have enough space to pull off cohabbing. Of course, I'd rather see them in separate 20s, but...

Thanks for the input, I'll keep them in their feed bins for a longer period of time, since I don't watch them after they go back into their cage, I'm not aware of any biting that may or may not have happened.

 

[starsevol]

...whereas those of us who don't cohabitate know for certain that no bites have occurred. EVER.


Well, SOMEONE had to say it!

 

[Nanci]

And when Maizey regurges, I don't blame Jake by mistake...(He'd really hate to go ten days with no dinner!)

Nanci

 

[TrpnBils]

Okay, first of all... I cannot believe we're even having this discussion YET AGAIN.

SEARCH FEATURE.

Susang, i wanna make a point I think is interesting. I hear people talk so much about how cornsnakes are solitary by nature and in the wild they don't live together like they do in the same cage, but if we're going to have the arguement they are solitary in nature then why feed them dead food?

I don't think those two points have anything to do with each other at all. Living alone or together has nothing to do with eating dead food. Period.

Also at this point in the evolution of cornsnakes aren't they one of the most common place pets (meaning for generations they have been peoples pets and at some point the dangerous while still there aren't as strong as they once were?

Evolution? Are you kidding me? Corn snakes in captivity for 50 years or less does not count for jack in the big picture that is evolution. That is rediculous. There are very few "domesticated" animals that have actually been taken the majority away from their wild counterparts. Livestock and dogs. There isn't a single "domesticated" or "tame" reptile in the world. Every one of them is still capable of doing exactly what they do in the wild. That is why there are scores of "pet" burmese and reticulated pythons living wild in the Everglades after "for generations being bred as people's pets". By the way, those animals, even the ones that are still in captivity, are still potentially dangerous. My burmese python could kill me, and I know that. If corns were big enough, they'd be capable of it too. Breeding them in captivity doesn't change that this early in the big scheme of things.

If you'd like to read more about evolution and corns, go here to this thread that a few of us very actively participated in for several months two years ago: http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17597&highlight=captivity . 16 pages' worth of good discussion on the topic of corn snake "evolution" in captivity. You don't have to agree with either side, but it's a good discussion.

I say this because with the PROPER care I would imagine two corn snakes living together would be ok (this may or may not hold true for 2 males or 2 females living together because of the aggression i've read about during mating session)

So 2 males is not okay because of aggression, 2 females are not okay because of aggression, but a male and a female is fine for a 15 year old novice to house together so instead of aggression during the breeding season you get the female accidentally becoming gravid? That's smart.

Common reasons for not cohabing corn snakes

1. disease (Keep them disease free and you won't have to worry)
2. throw-up (Yea you won't know which one threw-up but wouldn't the real concern be WHY they threw-up?
3. Eatting one or the other (doesn't proper feeding take care of this)
4. corns are solitary by nature (at this point aren't we taking them out of their natural setting) plus how many generations have corn snakes been pets?
Look at some of the Vivs people put their corn snakes in (from babies to adults) talk about not being in nature

1. Nobody's perfect, and mistakes happen. Sooner or later, your snake will get sick. Of the people here that have been keeping snakes for awhile, I'd be willing to bet that we've all had at least an RI or something at some point. So are we irresponsible and bad owners?

2. To learn WHY one threw up, you'd need to know which one it came from. Maybe they're SICK? To me, a regurge is a bigger display of poor husbandry in adult snakes than a simple RI or parasite.

3. Why risk it? If you're housing them together in the first place you're already ignoring the advice of the majority of the members here, so who's to say the feeding size/amount is correct? Maybe you know better than all of us on that topic too.

4. I'll agree that keeping a corn on newspaper in an aquarium is not natural (nor am I saying it's harmful if done correctly), but how is ANY enclosure or substrate natural? There are walls somewhere, right? And at that, how is housing two corns together making ANYTHING any more natural?


I don't normally blow up on people on here but holy crap, read and take some advice from the rest of us before dispensing garbage. I'm not right all the time, no, but I'm not going to act authoritative and give a whole column of bad advice to a 15 year old who doesn't know not to listen to it.

 

[TrpnBils]

I guess co-habiting would be okay if you really wanted too . . .
But personally I believe that it is safer and healthier for the snakes to be kept apart and if you are going to buy another snake you should put the money in for another enclosure.
Whenever I sell snakes I tell people that they could cohabit if they really want to, but I wouldn't recomend it because of the problems it could cause.

Because you don't cohab yourself, I feel I can say this without you becoming offended, as it is not my intent to offend you....

but housing two snakes together "because you really wanted to" is the stupidest reason for anyone to do it. That's just code for "too cheap to buy a second UTH, cage, and water bowl". Just because you really really want to house them together isn't going to fix or prevent all of the potential problems involved. Your snakes are not going to say "let's leave a little sign on this mouse when I puke it up to identify which one of us it came from. I wouldn't normally do this, but since our owner really really wanted us together I'd like to avoid causing him problems"

The only "good" reason for two snakes to be housed together is if the intent is to breed, and that's ONLY a good reason if the owner/keeper knows what they're doing and is intending for that to happen in a safe, know-how-it-works environment.

 

[lenalenalena]

My ultimate favorite picture gallery CS site:
http://www.snakepictures.co.uk/index.htm
This guy knows alot about corn snakes and he does quite a bit of cohabbing. With no problems...
Is this just a coincedence? (that all the pairs of snakes he put together live peacefully)


And you guys, please dont snap my head off for asking this. Just answer the question.
I am very curious about this topic and just want to know this.

 

[ArpeggioAngel]

Just a note on the passing diseases portion of this thread...
Cornsnakes (heck from what I understand a lot of colubrid species) can carry crypto for years without any signs of it.
So just because you "think" your snakes are not sick, does not necessarily make it true. If one of them has crypto, and you choose to co-hab them, then the 2nd one is definately going to come down with it. And someday, when the signs show themselves, you will have no idea which snake it came from in the first place.
Crypto is deadly and uncurable so why would you want to risk exposing another snake to it by unnecessarily cohabitating them?
Just another example of "you may not see a problem, but the problem can exist". And there is just no good reason to risk the health of your snakes just because you want them to live together or think they like it.

 

[zwyatt]

Umm, if aggression is also part of the enviroment, then now that we've taken an animal from its home and moved it into a cage and is feed on a normal basis woudln't you imaging those aggressive behaviors are less likely to be seen?

I just want to clarify this point from before, when I had to leave the discussion.

When I said that aggression is partly "environmentally determined" that doesn't mean strictly the natural environment. Environment just means any surroundings. I wasn't saying that the natural environment (of Florida, for example) is what makes cornsnakes aggressive and that taking them out of the wild and into captivity is taking the aggression away. When you take something from the wild and begin breeding it in captivity, you aren't taking it out of THE environment...you are just changing the environment.

I don't really like being around a lot of people (I guess you could say I'm sort of solitary... :grin01: ). Now, this aversion to groups of people is probably partially genetic and partially environmental. In this instance, just as with the example about aggression, I'm not referring to the strict definition of environment as it applies to the outdoors. Because whether it was sunny or cloudy during my childhood probably didn't play a big role in my aversion to groups of people. However, the home environment I grew up in would influence me. In this case, my older sisters pushing me around in toy cars and purposely wrecking me into things would be an environmental influence that would influence my aversion towards groups of people. The fact that I grew up in the country and wasn't around large groups of people regularly could have played a role. Again this would be an environmental influence because it is my surroundings, but it doesn't necessarily have to be referring directly to the outdoorsy/nature definition of environment.

 

[Joejr14]

Three pages of this? Good god.

Let's start off with this website that was presented (www.snakpictures.co.uk) and some of the information, and remember that this guy knows a lot about corns as said by the OP:

This guy knows alot about corn snakes and he does quite a bit of cohabbing. With no problems...

Funny, checking out his website I see this:

here are around 200 pictures of my two corn snakes, Shaggy and Alice, now arranged into thirteen separate galleries.

So this is interesting---this guy obviously 'knows a lot about corn snakes' with his extensive background of two animals.

So probing into the website more I dig up this:

Snake keeping - or herpetology to give it its proper name - has been a hobby of mine since I bought Shaggy, my first corn snake, a few years ago.

But then further down the page....

But he told me I could have a 'starter-kit' for £45.00. (Remember, this was 1995 - a starter kit nowadays would be around £60.00).

That's interesting. I could have sworn this is 2007---and I highly doubt that this guy had his own 'snake pictures' website in 1997 or 1998. Soo...??

But that's fine, perhaps it was just an error. I'll search around some more. And we come to the cohabitation comment under the 'questions' portion of this website.

Can I keep corn snakes together? Like a breeding pair all year round? Or maybe even a few females and one male? Yes, you can keep a pair together all the time no problem - so long as they are roughly the same size... If you put a hatchling in with a full size adult, the hatchling would get eaten. Putting more than 3 together can be awkward - you'd need a really big vivarium. Say you had 6 snakes, 4 females and 2 males, then you'd be best off with 2 vivaria, with one male and two females in each. Two or more males together in springtime (whether females are around or not) will possibly get a bit argumentative until the dominant one is established. But other than that, corn snakes do get on together pretty well. They are mostly fairly friendly, mild mannered creatures - but I suppose, as in everything, there is bound to be the odd one or two with a bad attitude.

Well I'm sure glad he's giving us his expert advice on keeping his two snakes together. Gosh, I guess that means if I visit the Kennedy Space Center for a few hours I can be an astronaut, right?

Oh, and here's another charmer:

How can you tell a boy snake from a girl snake??
In Corn Snakes it is quite difficult if not impossible to tell just by looking. There are some differences in the shape of the tail, but these are so slight that even experts find it is not easy to tell for sure.

The only real way of telling is to have the snake probed by an expert. This involves carefully inserting a steel rod in to the snake's vent and by feeling how far the probe can be inserted easily, then the sex can be determined. I should emphasize that this should only be carried out by someone experienced in this procedure, as serious harm can come to the snake if handled badly.

Quite difficult? Impossible? Hmm, I could have sworn that females tails tapered drastically after the vent and normally were much shorter than males tails---which do not taper directly after the vent and are usually much longer. Guess I should go sleep in a Holiday Inn Express.


So basically, this dude is a 'tard who has no business giving out advice when:

So after thinking for a few days about what I was about to commit myself to, I decided to buy one! I was shown how to feed him, handle him and given instructions about how often to feed and water him. Thereafter I have been given all the advice I ever needed; the shop is even open on Sundays and I have a phone number I can ring anytime. I have taken my snake back there every so often, so that he may be given a onceover by the guy in the shop. It's reassuring to be told I'm doing things right - he's in the peak of health (the snake, I mean - I don't know about the guy in the shop).

Amazing how one can be given all the advice ever need in snake care after a few trips to the local pet store. What I find even more amazing is the fact that since he has been given all the advice he'll ever need---why does he need to call the pet shop and/or bring the snake in for a 'onceover' by the guy in the shop? A bit contradictory, isn't it?

Also it's pretty funny that when 'Alice', his female cornsnake, became gravid he separated her from the male? If cohabitation is fine and dandy, like he says, why separate them? Hmm.....

 

[Joejr14]

And you guys, please dont snap my head off for asking this. Just answer the question.
I am very curious about this topic and just want to know this.

Cohabitation is BAD!

Reasons to Cohab:

Nothing beneficial to the snake.
Owner gets to save money by purchasing one viv.

Reason not to cohab:
Parasite transmission
Disease transmission
Cannibalism
Stress
Egg Binding
Death

Boy, those reasons for cohabbing sure outweigh the negatives, eh?

How would you like to be forced to live with someone in a 10x10' room? You know, a room where there was only one bed, where only half of the room was heated....and you'd have to share a single faucet to drink water out of.

That sounds like a blast, doesn't it?

 

[kathylove]

From many pages ago..."I read somewhere that kathy herself mad a mention that it is not horrible to house same sex together..."

Well, not exactly...

I did say that, in my opinion, under some very specialized conditions, in some special cases, there could be some merit - but with a lot of contraindications (such as not for new snakes or new keepers, for starters). Generally, I vote NO. I have written out some really long and detailed answers about my experience and feelings on the subject in some of the previous threads, and on the FAQs, so I won't reiterate it all here again. They are posted in other places if anyone cares to read it.

I didn't read this whole thread, only skimmed it. I can't say that there is much (if anything) I haven't seen in other previous threads. Possibly the part about whether we are breeding corns for a social environment (I'm not). I can't remember whether that was discussed previously or not.

I can't add anything new that I haven't written before, and would not have participated at all except my name was mentioned, so I wanted to be sure my position is clear.

That's about all I can think of on the subject.

 

[Jillie]

Please dont think I am going against any of the experts here as I am only a newbie when it comes to owning snakes. My one question is you say that they dont like being housed together and actually find it quite stressful. Whenever I put my two snakes together in a viv with two hides on the warm side two hides on the cool side (identical hides) they always always within five minutes end up cuddled up together under the same hide, or in the corner. I let them out on my bed for a little slither about and when they have had enougth they both curl up together.(i always put a hide on the bed and a warm flannel as a heat source if they get cold) Once they stop slithering about I put them straight back but they always seem to go together. Has I said I am not going against what anyone says was just pointing out what my experiences are.

 

[diamondlil]

I got quoted!
Jillie, your snakes are most likely choosing to be in the same place because it's the most secure or the right temperature, rather than showing a desire to be together

 

[Jay@PJCReptiles]

NO!!! Do a search and you will see a ton of posts just like yours that got the same replies as yours. DO NOT COHABITATE
Jay

 

[suecornish]

Maybe one solution to this would be when everyone logged on the first page of the site they would see information on cohabitation. Like others, I am surprised that this question comes up that often. It seems that European snake owners co-hab more than American snake owners. Who knows why (nope, you all don't have to answer that)?

I currently have three snakes as you can see. All housed separately. I know if I put Gaia in with Smokey she MIGHT get eaten but then Smokey is so finicky that maybe not - I am not taking the chance. I would not house Queenie with Smokey - Smokey is longer but Queenie is fatter - because Queenie is a King Snake and is "wired" to eat other snakes. Would she eat Smokey, I don't know - I am not taking the chance. The two babies on walk-about were housed separately.

Now, in a few weeks I am getting a male and female Bolivian Short Tail boas. I am told they can be housed together as long as they are feed in separate bins. Apparently, from what I have read, the females don't breed until they are around 5 years old so that gives me 2+ years to get them in separate housing. So I will be cohabbing the boas until I can give them the type of housing they should have but you can bet that I will be watching them closely and getting them in their own enclosures within the next two years.