• 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.

What do you think about 'training' corns?

SnakeAround

SnakeAround

Formerly Blutengel
Since last year I pay some extra attention to the muscularity of the females I plan to breed. In the last three months before the breeding attempts start, I take them out about three times a week to daily to handle them and have them exercise a bit, for which I do the following;

I dangle them from their tail down from my hand (I keep hold of about 4 inches of their body) and wait for them to reach up and climb on my arm. I do this like five times each session. I do notice that their is a difference in how easy each individual accomplishes this by the way. Is this idea of mine completely ridiculous or do you think it might help them a bit to get stronger/slimmer?

I ask this because at a Dutch forum I was completely laughed at by someone and I just do not see why that is necessary. I understand that it is not gonna get me a Schwarzenegger snake but why should it not help a bit?
 
Lol I do the corn snake treadmill all the time without realizing it!
And SnakeAround- I don't see why you would be laughed at for that idea. Sure it is different, but I don't see how it could do anything but help for breeding females. I mean, snakes in the wild sure don't sit under hides like ours do, they're always out and about looking for food, so I think if you are exercising their muscles you can't be doing anything but good for them. Especially around breeding season.
 
I did the same thing with a VERY sickly BRB I rescued once our vet deemed her healthy enough. She was rather wasted at first, and I do think the "pull ups" helped a bit. If nothing else, it certainly didn't hurt anything.
 
IMO, ANY moderate exercise (that does not appear too stressful for your pet) is good for snakes. That is especially true since most people don't feed live, so even the exercise of constriction is avoided. Some keepers try to simulate live rodents by feeding f/t rodents on tongs, and playing "tug of war" with the snake. If you have time, and the snake cooperates, it is not a bad idea, in addition to whatever other exercise you offer.

One large breeder (Gourmet Rodents) once (many years ago) kept records of dystocia (egg binding) incidents after a year of feeding live vs. a year of feeding f/t. They did not "play tug of war with the f/t" - too big of a collection. They found much less egg binding after feeding live, and attributed it to the extra exercise needed to kill rodents.

So yes, I believe in offering some exercise to snakes to compensate for the amount that they would normally expend in the wild while finding and killing prey, finding water, thermoregulating, seeking shelter, etc.
 
I need to try the thread mill method sometime! I'm glad peeps over here share my logic, silly Dutch hobbyists!
 
It is good to exercise snakes to an extent. Don't handle them so much that they are going to be stressed out, but moderate handling is beneficial.
 
Kathy, that is a very interesting study! I play tug of war with my girl (my boy just is like "ma, it's dead, stop moving it".
 
It wasn't any kind of scientific study or anything. They didn't have control groups or take great pains to make sure nothing else changed. They just kept records and gave their best guess as to why they saw the results they did.
 
kathylove said:
It wasn't any kind of scientific study or anything. They didn't have control groups or take great pains to make sure nothing else changed. They just kept records and gave their best guess as to why they saw the results they did.
Click to expand...

It still makes sense to me!
 
Buddeh LOVES to swim, it is next to impossible to get him out of the tub once I place him in there. He swims for about 20 mins every 3 weeks. I put about 1 inch of water in.
IMG-20111109-00557.jpg

IMG-20111109-00556.jpg
 
My daughter has her corn snake Gambit using her as a jungle gym, up one sleeve, back scratch and down the other sleeve. Caught her hognose Jack peering at me from her sleeve last night it was just too cute. Slinky is the only one that swims and she loves it.
I lay a beach towel out on the bed and make forts for her to explore with pillows, anything that is a tunnel must be explored. Plenty of exercise for them all within reason.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top