Dangling the feeder mouse?

My corn is still a baby, and I have fed him about 10 times. Each time, his strike has become slightly more aggressive.

I have been feeding him either F/T or pre-killed. However, I think I am going to start feeding him pre-killed or even "stunned" pinkies/fuzzies for a little while.

I figure the only safe time to feed semi-live food is when they are still tiny mice and cant hardly bite.

I assume some will disagree with that idea..anyways..

I recently noticed how some people dangle their pinkie in front of the snake.

So I want to start doing that as well.

I have a couple questions though. When you dangle it, why do some people wait a couple seconds after the snake strikes, before they release it? is it good or bad to do that?

Also, as the corn gets older and stronger, do they just naturally start to kill their prey differently (Like a stronger strike with the whole wrap around contriction) ????

please explain/inform...

p.s. Reasons why I want to lay off F/T is because I don;t like having them in the freezer, I think they look gross that way, and I feel like they are fresher and my corn would enjoy them more.

And from a little research I learned that the neck and tail pull method is a fairly humane way to quickly kill the pinkie/fuzzie or mouse.


Thanks.

I wouldn't reccomend dangling it with your hand, at least use hemostats or large tweezers. I had a burm miss and I ended up with 6 stitches for my stupidity.I know a corn snake is not going to inflict that much damage but it is good to get in the habit of being safe. The only time I hold the prey and maby tug for a few seconds after the strike is when converting to dead food, they will think it is struggling and continue to constrict. Some of my snakes I just drop the food in and they take it when they find it.

Well mine is still young, I will definitely use tweezers.

When he gets older, will he do the strike and spin around constricting move thing?

It seems like some do, and some don't. Mine has started constricting a little as he get older, but I think it depends on the snake.

The only problem I see with your plan aside from the obvious arguments against live (stunned or pre-killed satisfying the biggest of these) is that if you get him used to eating live stunned or p/k, he might not convert back to frozen when he gets older... if you're down with pre-killing his prey from now on, no worries, but sometimes corns seem to get 'stuck' on one type and are reluctant to switch, so if you wanted to change back later, it might not be possible.

Baller99k said:

Well mine is still young, I will definitely use tweezers.

When he gets older, will he do the strike and spin around constricting move thing?

Click to expand...

Yup, mine does. He rolls around like a cat with a ball of yarn, it's quite funny actually.

Stick with frozen mate, for the reasons stated above. It's much easier anyway, you don't want to have to be stuck with the responsibility of going to the pet store every 5 days to get a fresh pinkie.