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Typical temperament changes related to the age and gender of your snake(s)?

RubikAce

RubikAce

New member
I've recently been talking to a lot of people who keep hots, and many of them have said that their snakes' temperaments changed significantly with age. Specifically, that males often start out as skittish and evasive (and poor eaters) and become docile rodent vacuums, while females tend to start more docile and become feistier and remain more active as they mature. That in mind, I'd be very interested to hear opinions and experiences of this from fellow corn-keepers. Any observable changes? Differences in temperament between males and females? Is the venomous crowd unfairly stereotyping snakes based on their age and sex? :p
 
Every snake I have ever owned (2 Red Tail Boas, A Ball Python, A Cali King, and currently a Corn snake) had pretty much the exact same temperament with the exception of the Ball Python. It had virtually no Temperament at all. LOL. And I've decided for myself I'll never own another one.

All snakes can give you "That Look" and if you don't know what I mean, you'll figure it out in time.

I can look at a snake and tell if it's upset, or if it can be handled, if it's hungry, etc. You really need to learn to observe. The way a snake acts is how it communicates with you. (Even a rattlesnake rattles its tail before it bites. If you choose to continue and you get bitten you can't honestly blame the snake.) Corn snakes will give you signs as to how they feel too. Yes a corn snake can and will rattle its tail. It might hiss, it might strike at you, it might turn and slither in the opposite direction or it might just lay there and look at you while flicking its tongue.

Fortunately for "Us" (Corn snake owners) the corn snake tends to be generally a friendly, calm and mellow snake. However there are exceptions to every rule. I've heard people talk about having a corn snake they just can not handle. I've never had that problem. I happen to live in an area where corn snakes can be found wild and when I was a kid my friends and I would go out looking for them just to see how many we could find.

I could count on 1 hand the number of times I've been bitten by a corn snake, and I probably caught and handled hundreds of them.

So there ya go.
 
In my experience, all hatchlings flail around when handled, but settle down when they get bigger. All of my snakes get nervous and upset if a hand comes at their face, or if you touch them repeatedly but don't commit to picking them up. Two of them (a male and a female, unrelated) seem less easy to approach but I don't know if that's just me imagining it. I don't notice a big difference between males and females in temperament, and all my snakes eat well.
 
Rigby & Marcy said:
In my experience, all hatchlings flail around when handled, but settle down when they get bigger. All of my snakes get nervous and upset if a hand comes at their face, or if you touch them repeatedly but don't commit to picking them up. Two of them (a male and a female, unrelated) seem less easy to approach but I don't know if that's just me imagining it. I don't notice a big difference between males and females in temperament, and all my snakes eat well.
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I'd agree ..
 
In my experiences with dozens of species and hundreds of snakes over decades I would say there is no connection between temperament, gender and age.
I've had hatchlings including corns that were very passive to aggressive.
My adult male and female leucistic pines, scale-less rats and beauty snakes have flip flopped on which is going to be super sweet or pure evil from time to time.
Back when the only ball pythons were imports they would come in either super passive to continual strikers. My daughters pet import adult female BP was easily handled by anybody and never showed any aggression but when a friend asked to hold her she struck and bit him. Funny that he was asking if she had ever bit as he reached out to take her. On the other side my male adult WC texas bull snake would do his best rattler impression at any attempt to hold him. One day after a bit of work I got him out to clean his cage My friend and his daughter was over at the time. She asked to hold him as she reached for him. I said no but Tex immediately calmed down and she took him. They interacted like they were meant to be with each other.
Over time I've have come to the opinion that any age or gender snake can be nice or naughty :)
 
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