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wots the worst piece of reptile advice you've ever been given??

In the last year, I had someone tell me that all you need to care for an adult boa constrictor is a tank, a heat lamp, and a rat once a week.

Also recently encountered someone who is thoroughly convinced that housing a hatchling ball python, a baby red tail boa, and a large adult ball python ALL in the same tank is a good thing (when I pointed out how wrong he is and the many reasons why, he declared they snuggle up together and are happy and that's why I must be wrong).

Oh, and recently encountered a guy who calls himself a boa breeder, but insists cedar is a GREAT substrate. After all, he's used it for so and so many years, and his animals aren't dead yet!!

Ah... And you shouldn't use ANY sort of particle substrate for ANY reptile, because they WILL get impaction and die!

A heat pad WILL crack your tank, cook your reptile, and burn your house down no matter what precautions you take.

If you use any sort of substrate that holds any sort of moisture (i.e. soil or cypress mulch) for a corn snake, it WILL get sick and die.

(In fairness, the person who told me these last 3.. Her heart is in the right place, she just refuses to admit that she might be mistaken!)
 
This is not snake related, but I was just told by a well meaning teenage pet store employee that it was time to introduce vegetation into my leopard gecko's diet. I hope I'm not wrong as after searching the web I've seen this information in a few places, but it was my understanding that they are strictly carnivores and you feed their prey the healthy fruits and vegetables. My girl has cleared the matter up for me because she has ZERO interest in anything that doesn't twitch or crawl. As for cornsnakes, I've been told numerous times they don't need a heat source. I make sure they each have one side of their tank heated to the high 80s. Sometimes it's hard not to get caught up in scruples when it comes to reptile care.
 
One of my coworkers just told a bunch of other staff that bearded dragons will pick up on who in the building is the most "take-charge" and only like them and will hate everyone else.
 
I got told, by a guy at the NC herp society no less, that corns only had three gene types. Amel, Anery, and normal. Anery and amel were on the same locus and so a normal corn could only be het for amel or anery, both was a snow.

Every other morph was just selective breeding from those three genes.
 
I was told once that all snakes continue to grow their entire life and that my Ball pythons would get as big as Retics if I fed them every week. This same person was feeding their adult ball python one mouse every other month. I rescued him, fed him every week and now he's a nice healthy 2300 grams. I hope he doesn't get 20+ feet. I don't have room for that. HA!
 
hookpits said:
I was told once that all snakes continue to grow their entire life and that my Ball pythons would get as big as Retics if I fed them every week. This same person was feeding their adult ball python one mouse every other month. I rescued him, fed him every week and now he's a nice healthy 2300 grams. I hope he doesn't get 20+ feet. I don't have room for that. HA!
Click to expand...

Well, snakes do grow their entire life. If a Ball Python lived to be 300 or so it may attain the size of a Retic! LOL
 
Duae said:
I got told, by a guy at the NC herp society no less, that corns only had three gene types. Amel, Anery, and normal. Anery and amel were on the same locus and so a normal corn could only be het for amel or anery, both was a snow.

Every other morph was just selective breeding from those three genes.
Click to expand...

I know exactly the person you speak of, and this is why I do not belong to the NC herp society.

Worst statements I have ever been told (Without repeating the common things like grow to the size of the tank, feed crickets etc)

1)Iguanas NEED to eat crickets and pinkies. Also, they can live loose in your house without any additional UVB or heat.

2) Snakes can randomly change their gender

3) It is perfectly acceptable to keep different species together

4) When arguing with said person about keeping boas/balls/corns and kings together she said that all her boas were tested clean and couldnt transmit disease and that her kings wouldnt eat the corns because she rubs the king snakes sheds on the corn snakes. ???

5) Told by a petshop employee while chatting about local places to pick up large rabbits and small feeder goats: You should feed stray puppies and kittens to your burms. it will cut down on the population of unwanted animals and feed your snakes at the same time. They were completely serious insisting that if I humanely dispatched of them first it would be fine.

6) Snakes need the exercise of killing their prey and the mental stimulation of hunting. THEY DONT WANT TO BE FED THEY WANT TO HUNT!

7) Pine shavings are totally fine for snakes as long as its the finely finely shaved stuff.

8) Sure you can put that hatchling bearded dragon in the same cage as an adult male!

9) Milk snakes are called milk snakes because they nurse their babies. (seriously.)

10) Red eyes mean its venemous

11) Pythons and boas are the same thing and can interbreed, look we have RTB/ball python mix babies for sale.

12) All snakes have mites and they live with them just fine.

Lucky number 13) Local petstore had a stripped cali king for sale as a "reverse stripe corn snake" for $300.
 
heatwave said:
I know exactly the person you speak of, and this is why I do not belong to the NC herp society.

Worst statements I have ever been told (Without repeating the common things like grow to the size of the tank, feed crickets etc)

1)Iguanas NEED to eat crickets and pinkies. Also, they can live loose in your house without any additional UVB or heat.

2) Snakes can randomly change their gender

3) It is perfectly acceptable to keep different species together

4) When arguing with said person about keeping boas/balls/corns and kings together she said that all her boas were tested clean and couldnt transmit disease and that her kings wouldnt eat the corns because she rubs the king snakes sheds on the corn snakes. ???

5) Told by a petshop employee while chatting about local places to pick up large rabbits and small feeder goats: You should feed stray puppies and kittens to your burms. it will cut down on the population of unwanted animals and feed your snakes at the same time. They were completely serious insisting that if I humanely dispatched of them first it would be fine.

6) Snakes need the exercise of killing their prey and the mental stimulation of hunting. THEY DONT WANT TO BE FED THEY WANT TO HUNT!

7) Pine shavings are totally fine for snakes as long as its the finely finely shaved stuff.

8) Sure you can put that hatchling bearded dragon in the same cage as an adult male!

9) Milk snakes are called milk snakes because they nurse their babies. (seriously.)

10) Red eyes mean its venemous

11) Pythons and boas are the same thing and can interbreed, look we have RTB/ball python mix babies for sale.

12) All snakes have mites and they live with them just fine.

Lucky number 13) Local petstore had a stripped cali king for sale as a "reverse stripe corn snake" for $300.
Click to expand...

i facepalmed something fierce through all that. As a former Petsmart employee, i was actually never formally trained on how to handle the snakes and other lizards. Our bearded dragons, for instance, were fed greens, minced carrot and grape mixes. as far as i know, juveniles don't require those greens that early in their lives. So naturally they'd not even touch the stuff. We also were not allowed to handle any reptiles and animals unless we were cleaning their "boxes" that they are kept in.

i must admit, i was told that all lizards require a uvb bulb to help them digest food. its been almost 4 years since i worked there so most of its a blurr now. I DO know however, that if i went back in the past with the knowledge i have now, i'd slap myself for the stupid things i assumed.
 
the people I saved Puck from were feeding him crickets and tried to convince me he wouldn't eat dead food. I got him home, next day he jumped on a thawed pinky like a starving man on a steak.
 
"Crickets are a good treat for Iguanas."

"My ball python and corn snakes love each other I could never separate them!"

"Blue tongued skinks should eat canned cat food."

"Tortoises don't need water. They can inhale it and get pneumonia."

"Tortoises don't need anything but lettuce."
 
BeckyG said:
Worst advice I've ever gotten:

Corns need UV light--pretty common bad advice.

Corns need a playmate so they don't get bored.

Corns can't digest fur so they regurgitate it. This is normal, and no cause for worry.

Corns eat eggs then regurgitate/spit out the shells.
Click to expand...

Hi, Just out of curiousity/not arguing... I know black(rat) snakes do eat eggs. I've kept chickens and this is true. I've also seen them raiding eggs from our bird houses. I haven't witnessed the regurgitation of shell. I've always assumed that a wild cornsnake would possibly eat quail eggs however I'm not inclined to give any of my pet corns eggs. I still wonder if wild corns do in fact eat eggs.
 
Growing up we had corn snakes prowling our barn. Had no idea whether or not they were eating eggs or the unending supply of rodents. Most likely the rodents.
 
yeah I would guess mostly the rodents. Funny I'm in my fifties and I have seen lots of wild snakes and wild critters but I have only seen a wild corn snake once in my entire life - and I am a person and was a child who hunted for snakes and other wildlife(to see them). Red is a cornsnake hatchling that I found in Virginia last fall. A local herp enthusiast just sexed him for me a week ago. We thought he was a female. I used to think that black snake hatchlings were wild anery corns. Red's saddles were sooooo dark when I spotted him that I thought he was a black snake hatchling. On closer inspection that faint blood/rust color caught the sunlight...You'd have thought I won the lottery when I found him. LOL! He's a great little pet even if he did strike at me when I first reached to pick him up. He hasn't shown any attitude since and he ate for us immediately.
 
LGRIGG, I was one of those kids that hunted snakes all the time. Or should I say, I found them all the time... and I have only every seen 2 wild corn snakes. We called them chicken snakes where I grew up. Unfortunately I was ignorant and killed the one in my barn, instead of catching it and taking it into the woods to release it...
 
I grew up in Louisiana. As far as I know it isn't illegal there... In fact, many people I know there still believe that the only good snake is a King snake, and that all others are "poisonous".
 
The field collecting rules vary state by state and also species by species.

NC has harsh rules on certain species, but others with no, or fewer, restrictions.
 
as to Florida.... leave the wilds in my home state alone! :( :cry:
they have it hard enough with all the invasive snakes people release.
 
Good to know! Thanks. I didn't know that and don't typically hunt and collect wild animals. We have property in VA and will most likely move there at some point. We're up on the deer/turkey/bear hunting and fishing regs and we don't even hunt game. I do love to fish but stick to fishing in NC. Mostly we just cruise around on the four wheelers and take in the woods, river and wildlife in VA.
 
I had to research when I moved up here, that's why I had to get a non-natural morph color. to prove to any authorities I didn't capture it from the wild.
 
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