• 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.

Wandering about my corns behavior...

Z

Zero2K

New member
I am a new Corn Snake owner and I have had my beautiful anery for about a month now and so far it seems I have been doing things right. He is still a juvenile and is roughly 20 inches long, but I'm not sure about his age. I've been feeding him down to 1 pinky a week(the place I got him from had him on fuzzies which are way to big for him) and put him in a separate container for that. I gave him a few days to settle in, but it seems as if he's always hiding until 3-4 am in his hide spot. I have made it a habit to take him out once a day for 10-15 min to get him used to me except after he eats (i wait 48 hrs) and during shedding time, which he's had 1 so far with me. It can be a problem to get him out because he slithers away once I reach for him, however onces he's out he seems to settle down and explores my arms and fingers while flicking his tongue like he's happy. Should I be continuing this routine with hopes he'll settle down or do something different? Would it help to put a piece of my clothing in or something? I feel like I'm not making much progress with him as he still seems scared of me. Any help would be appreciated :)
 
Just still young. Both mine do the exact same thing. It starts slow. When I first got them, I would put my hand in the tank, and they would hide. Now they stay put and I can even touch them without them moving, but if I act like I may pick them up, off to the races... As I understand and have seen, these snakes calm a ton as they "grow up". Mine have started, but I still have a ways to go. As for mice, I believe the general rule is only feed them food that is no bigger then the biggest part of your snake. Just keep at it and dont get discouraged. Sounds to me like you are doing everything correctly. Jon
 
Just hang in there; totally normal. And, some snakes are just different; I have one that is very social who slithers around throughout the day if people are inthe room and comes to my hand to get out of his tank, and another who hides often but does come out at night. He use to bolt when we'd reach for him, but no longer; he's gotten use to us and is now totally relaxed. Once out of his tank, he's just great. I think handling your anery daily like you are is good (perhaps handle for 30 min. or so if you can each time), as time passes and the more you handle him, he'll settle down for you.
 
Corns are naturally most active at times of low or no light - dawn, dusk or overnight. They're not often active during the day, so what you're seeing is normal behaviour for them.

Over the next few months you might find him getting more confident about being out and about in daylight. But it has to be said that most of mine spend the day napping.

It's also normal for them to be reluctant about being picked up and then calm down once they realise that it's only the big pink blobby thing that sometimes has food!
 
Something that might help you see more of him is to put a bunch of leafy vines in his viv. I use suction cup silk vines on the sides and back, pretty much covering the entire side, and then take one of those scrunchy silk vines and fold it into a U shape, then make serpentine bends in it, and lay that around the sides and back. You can also put out a couple toilet paper tubes, or a paper towel tube cut in half, with the opening pointed at the front of the viv, in addition to the hides he already has. Babies _love_ perching in vines where they can wee you but don't think you can see them.
 
My guys love their silk vines, got mine from a craft store. My snow behaved like that when I first got him. He doesn't run away from me any more, but he still hides when I come into the room.
 
Thanks for all the information. I increased his outing time to 20 minutes starting yesterday, but I cut it short today because he was all curled up in my hand for about 5 min and once he started moving I put him up after another 5 minutes cause he seemed stressed. I also have been just sticking my hand by him for a minute or so without movement. so he can get more used to it.

I'll definitely have to check into getting some silk plants and a probe thermometer.

Here's his current setup for now though:
13e3cd4c.jpg
 
I like them to have more cover, like this:
 

Attachments

  • Wiring 007_800.jpg
    Wiring 007_800.jpg
    254.5 KB · Views: 86
I'll be sure to set something up.

Does anyone elses corn stick it's head up in the air out of it's hide? Is this normal or should I be concerned about a URI? I haven't seen any bubbling from the mouth, but then again he just ate a few min ago and is very actively exploring.
 
That posture is very typical for corns. All of mine pretty much poke their heads up like that. Like you mentioned, it CAN be a sign of a URI, but there are others as well, such as mucous, "clicking" sounds when they breathe, etc. But absent any other signs, this is normal behavior.

One other thing I thought of as I read the posts, was that it also helps to make the snakes feel secure if you tape some kind of background to the back of the cage. I also put something around the sides, too - sometimes I just tape paper to the outside of the cages. That way they don't feel like they're in a fishbowl and feel more secure.
 
If the snake was eating fuzzies fine at his previous owner, they simply were not too big for him. If they had been too big, the snake would regurge them. From your description of his length and the picture, I'm sure he can handle at least peach fuzzies (with only a bit of hair). Snakes can eat prey's about 1.5 times their girth size. It's better to feed one appropriate sized meal then a couple of smaller ones, it will fit in the stomach better, because multiple items always line up. I have had some snakes that would regurge most of the time when fed 2 prey items, but never when fed 1.
 
I would rather not power feed him though. When I got him fuzzies were at least 2-2.5x the largest part of his body.
 
Weird that he did not regurge the fuzzies then. But 2-2.5x his girth would be too large indeed.

Power feeding is feeding too much and / or often, not feeding to large prey.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top