• 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.

Influencing snake size via feeding schedule

J

JjSnake

New member
I'm sure this has been asked somewhere here before, but I can't find it with the search function.

I think I read in a book (or somewhere else) that if you feed the snakes less when they're younger, they'll usually end up to be a smaller size when adults. Likewise, for people who want larger sized breeders, they'll feed the young snakes more often.

Here's the question: If I want to keep my snake as reasonably short as possible, without causing any harm or stress by not feeding him enough, what would be a proper feeding schedule? He's a hatchling now, maybe about a foot long, and I'm planning on giving him 1 pinkie every week or so. Does that sound standard? Are there any variations from that schedule that I could consider? Am I supposed to be feeding him more often?

BTW I just got him yesterday, so I'm not planning on giving him anything until 6 days after he arrived.

Thanks! :)
 
There are most likely several factors involved in size of snakes. One would be feeding and the other would be genetics. My locality Okeetees were large snakes. their offspring were large from the very beginning being over 10 grams most of the time at hatch. The babies from other morphs I had were usually 5-7 grams in comparison. I suspect that even if you fed moderately the snakes would be small. I've caught fairly large wild snakes and they eat way more conservatively than our domestic snakes so frequency of meals doesn't necessarily mean a smaller snake, just one that grows slower. I feed every 2-3 weeks for subadults on. Babies are fed every 7-10 days. they don't grow as fast, but I think they are more healthy. They are also much more active than other people's snakes. My cornsnakes were out and about all the time, day or night. They rarely spent much time in hides unless they had just been fed or about to shed. I had some small adults and I had large ones. My high pink snow was pretty large. My locality okeetees were very large (almost 5 ft and over 800 grams). My normal aztecs were very small. The female barely 3 ft and slender as was the male. Babies hatched out at 4-6 grams a piece but fed just fine. My amel was fed weekly (he was my first snake) and was well over 4 ft. I think weekly feedings for babies is fine and then move out to every 10 days once he's a subadult and then as an adult every 2-3 weeks. They are not designed to have a lot of food in them all the time and we overfeed domestic snakes. I'm not sure you're going to keep your snake short though unless he's just small. He might not get long or large very fast, but he will grow.
 
Length isn't influenced by feeding - that tends to be more related to bloodlines and inherited genes. I have small three and a half foot adult female, but I know that the breeder she came from has stock which stops at that size. She's always been on the same feeding regime as my other females so her size hasn't been influenced by her eating pattern.

If you try to influence your Corn's size through feeding, you'll be tinkering with its weight, fat percentage and body profile, rather than its length.

You're more likely to end up with an overweight snake if you increase feeding. If you try and keep the snake small by underfeeding, all that you'll end up with is a skinny underfed snake (which is probably better than overfeeding but isn't ideal).

You can't really bonsai a Corn - it'll be the length that it's going to be and you'll just have to be prepared for it. Four to five feet is reasonable, but they go above and below that as well. The odd six footer has appeared but yours is statistically unlikely to be one of those.

Is there any particular reason that you want yours to stay shorter? Perhaps there are other ways round it, rather than trying to alter the Corn.
 
I keep seeing this myth in places- and I get asked about it by nearly every one I sell a corn to.

Corns can get long- and it is genetics. I've seen nearly 7 footers. I've seen them at the local reptile stores because people thought corns were only 3 feet and got rid of them when their corn turned out to be a large one.

I've found that the only way to get small corns is to either buy a small adult of buy the offspring of two small adults.
 
World record for a cornsnake is 6'1"....I've rarely come across any that are over 5 ft. in the domestic trade. My locality Okeetees were the largest of all mine. They were almost5 ft long. Most of my corns averaged 3-3 1/2 ft. and my aztecs were very slender and small. Most of the stripes I see out there are also very slender and small....possibly from breeding back to lock in the traits...don't know.
 
6'1"? I swore the one I saw looked bigger, but I'm only 5'11", so maybe that is why it looked so big! LOL!
 
Haha, I would have sworn that one of my friend's miami's was way bigger than 6'1"! BUT I only had hatchlings at the time, so she probably just seemed huge to me!
 
Maybe I'm the only who would like to know why the OP wants to keep his corn "as reasonably short as possible"? If you didn't want a snake that will be 3-4 feet in length as an adult, and possible longer, why did you buy one? There are other species that stay smaller. I'm just shaking my head at this one.
 
dionythicus said:
Maybe I'm the only who would like to know why the OP wants to keep his corn "as reasonably short as possible"? If you didn't want a snake that will be 3-4 feet in length as an adult, and possible longer, why did you buy one? There are other species that stay smaller. I'm just shaking my head at this one.
Click to expand...

I knew how long cornsnakes get, and my breeder told me the size he expected my own specific cornsnake to become, even before I made the purchase.

The book I had read made it seem like one can influence the size of the cornsnake by modifying the feeding schedule. If this was true, why wouldn't I be interested in it? If I could make my cornsnake grow to a maximum length of 3' instead of 6' (in a healthy manner), why wouldn't I be interested? This would change many factors, including the size of the adult vivarium, and the amount of table space that the snake would occupy.

This second cornsnake book that I'm reading also claims that one can modify the snake's growth by adjusting the feeding schedule. But I get the impression from this book (and from the helpful members' posts above) that this would only adjust the rate at which they grow, while they would still become the same adult size that they are genetically predisposed to.

Your post is obviously implying that I impulsively purchased a cornsnake without giving it much forethought. Does it seem like someone who reads an entire book about cornsnakes before he buys one is being impulsive? And now I'm 15% through my second cornsnake book, by the way.

I don't mean to sound offensive, but maybe you can find something better to do than shake your head at newbies who are trying to learn? Just a thought.
 
It was the way you phrased things. You bought a snake that can reach up to 5 feet, but you don't want it to reach that way so you're going to try to stunt its growth, is how it came off. And that sounds like you didn't do enough research if you don't want a snake that *can* reach 5 feet, but would rather have a snake that *can* reach 3 feet. Trying to force an animal into something other than the size it's naturally going to be is not good for it. To truly stunt the growth you'd have to underfeed so severely that it would never be healthy, and would run an increased risk of dying.
 
Guys, I actually sold JJsnake his first snake just a week ago. We talked on the phone and he is one of those people you are happy to sell to. Very well spoken, and more than ready for a snake. Influencing size with prey is easily accomplished and rarely has any side effect on the animal.
I mean look at Ball Python breeders, they get males to breed in 6 months or less. I know females that bred at 16 months and laid an 8 egg clutch. Feed mice instead of rats, or feeding every 14 days as an adult as opposed to every 7. I mean I try and keep my male AFTs under 70 grams because as that size they become lazy breeders. I want my females to hit at least 40 grams by the time they are 10 months old. I feed my males much lighter than my females so that they don't become lazy breeders.

A lot of Corn people work by the rules of 3? Well I know people that can get a female Corn to a HEALTHY size and weight to breed in 16 months. Male Corns can breed much earlier. But these people breed for a living and have the budget to feed multiple times a week.

If you're doing in a reasonable way and not power feeding or starving your animal, it's perfectly fine.
 
Thanks for the input, it's always good to have a view from the "real world" - sometmes things don't come across as intended online.

Influencing size with prey is easily accomplished
Click to expand...
I'm still not sure how you'd keep a Corn shorter than its genetics dictated, through feeding. I really think you're talking more about increasing growth rate and size by upping the feeding, rather than being able to have the opposite effect - specifically on length rather than body mass - by lowering the feeding.
 
Well by feeding certain prey items that are more or less meaty, you will only give it's body the resources to grow X amount.
 
You mean.... Like Doc and his snakes? Or my guys that went on a maintenance diet and barely grew for 3 months but are now growing at the same rate they should be?
 
JjSnake said:
This second cornsnake book that I'm reading also claims that one can modify the snake's growth by adjusting the feeding schedule. But I get the impression from this book (and from the helpful members' posts above) that this would only adjust the rate at which they grow, while they would still become the same adult size that they are genetically predisposed to.
Click to expand...

Yes. lol You can affect the rate in which the snake will reach it's max length by feeding however every snake is different and you can not determine how big it will get. That is in the snakes genetics just like it is ours.
 
David, getting a female corn snake up to breeding size in 16 months basically defines "powerfeeding" IMO.
 
I've seen it done with out the snake being obese or powerfed. In the wild I'm sure some females breed before that age.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top