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just got pinky on Friday and she hasn't eaten

Pinkysmommy
08-29-2005, 10:57 PM
Pinky is a hatchling and we got her from a pet store. She is very friendly and lovable. The petstore says they feed her every sunday but we tried to feed her and she won't eat. We tried frozen pinkies but she turns her nose from them! Would it make a difference if we tried live pinkies? I don't want her to starve! Also, can you feed them anything other than pinkies? She is small and I can't imagine her being able to eat pinkies yet but that is what the petstore said to feed her. I feel like I new mom whose baby won't breastfeed!!!

DinoNeill
08-29-2005, 11:09 PM
How are you thawing the pinkies? They tend to favor warm food. I just put them in a plastic bag and leave it in a warm cup of water for 15 minutes or so. Live food is a big snake no, no. Cornered food tends to fight back. She may just be shy around her new surroundings too. Snakes are very picky about there food according to some research I've done. Cornsnakes prefer mice over anything.

DinoNeill
08-29-2005, 11:16 PM
Oh and apparently exposing the preys brain to the snake makes them more interested in eating it :/. When me and my gf were getting ready to buy a snake our connection warned us to buy a snake that was at least a few months old and known to eat on a regular basis, hatchlings are less reliable to feed but if the pet store was feeding it weeky without any problems I'd expect pinky should be fine.

PtDnsr
08-29-2005, 11:18 PM
First of all relax. I have a hatchling that hatched in May, has taken one meal of a small pink on 6/30 and is still kicking and happy (although very frustrating to me). How long have you had her? If you got her recently give her a week to settle in (meaning no unnecessary handling, noise, etc) before you try to feed her. If you've had her for a while it won't hurt for her to miss a meal. She could be going into shed and not want to eat or just stressing if it's a new environment. Also if you can post information on your setup it would help as well.

~Katie

DinoNeill
08-29-2005, 11:28 PM
She could be going into shed and not want to eat


So one should avoid feeding they're snake if it's near shedding? Or is it fine if the snake still wants to eat regardless of how close to shedding it is?

PtDnsr
08-30-2005, 12:01 AM
It's perfectly fine for a snake to eat while it's in the shed cycle. I have one snake that will attack f/t with all of her might no matter if she can see perfectly or her eyes are completely blue. I have another that won't touch a thing when she's getting ready to shed. I have another that will eat and then try to shed a day later which usually doesn't work. It usually depends on the snake.

~Katie

Pinkysmommy
08-30-2005, 03:53 AM
I thought you were supposed to handle your snake everyday to get her used to you and used to being handled? If we just got pinky, should we leave her alone and let her adapt? She seems to be doing great other than not eating. She is so friendly that I can't help but handle her and let her kiss my nose.. (she does that all the time! She is drinking plenty of water...I watch her do it and it is pretty cool.

Also, someone posted about warming up frozen pinkies. I do warm them up in hot water for 20 min. How long can you leave them in the tank before you get them out. I don't think snakes would eat cold pinkies??

PtDnsr
08-30-2005, 08:38 AM
It's good to give your snake a chance to get used to their new surroundings and then get used to you handling them. Give her a few days to settle in first and get used to her tank. If I have stubborn feeders that don't want to eat I leave them in overnight with the pinks. My new diffused didn't want to eat at first so I left him in the deli cup with the pink overnight and the next morning it was gone. I have a few snakes that will only eat if they're in complete darkness. Next time you offer food (which shouldn't be more than every 5 days or so) try leaving your snake in with the pink overnight and see what happens.

~Katie

Roy Munson
08-30-2005, 09:48 AM
Live food is a big snake no, no. Cornered food tends to fight back.

This isn't really true for pinkies, and many hatchlings that refuse f/t pinks will be eager to snap up live ones. My two July '05 Blizzard hatchlings (bought "out of egg") ate live for their first meal ever, and then switched to f/t for the next five or six meals. They both recently shed, and refused to eat f/t three times. I left the pinks in the snakes' containers overnight, but they weren't having any of it. The fourth night, I threw them each a live pink, and they gobbled them up immediately. The male accepted f/t for the next feeding, but the female is still balking. I'll have to buy a live pink for her tonight (at 10+ times the cost of f/t).

-Dean

MegF.
08-30-2005, 09:57 AM
Pinkies have no teeth, so are not a danger to your snake. I would follow the advice given. Let your snake acclimate, feed it in the evening in a container in a dark place or put the container in the viv. If it is near shed it might not want to eat, and one of the other forum members had that exact problem. New snake, didn't eat for two weeks, then it shed, and voila! Appetite. So don't worry. Good luck with your kid.

DinoNeill
08-30-2005, 01:41 PM
This isn't really true for pinkies, and many hatchlings that refuse f/t pinks will be eager to snap up live ones.
-Dean

Ah yes...that would be an exception. ( Erm...what if the live pinky craps on your snakes face and it then dies of revulsion?) I've been reading that the scent and temp of the food are really the only major factors that induce a pet corn snake to feed. Do live pinkys just wriggle around like a worm or something?

Gintha
08-30-2005, 02:01 PM
Treasure was fed live hamster pinks in the pet store and didn't like the F/T the first week I offered them to her.. so I took the advice of her vet.. hold the F/T pinks tail in black tweezers (apparently the snakes can't see the black tweezers /shrug) and wiggle it around. Treasure saw that wiggling and SNAP no more pink hehe =)

graffixcs
08-30-2005, 02:03 PM
Ah yes...that would be an exception. ( Erm...what if the live pinky craps on your snakes face and it then dies of revulsion?) I've been reading that the scent and temp of the food are really the only major factors that induce a pet corn snake to feed. Do live pinkys just wriggle around like a worm or something?


You may be surprised, the exception is that a corn will take f/t over live. F/T is prodominantly used as a keepers choice than the snakes (for reasons discussed numerous times), they are hunters, not carrion eaters as a general rule (there are always exceptions in nature)

Feeding a live pinky to get hatchlings started is common practice by many breeders.

Pinkysmommy; As mentioned before, give pinky some time to de-stress before trying to feed, they can survive quite some time when they are off the food. I would also continue to offer f/t pinkies in about a week.

Roy Munson
08-30-2005, 06:03 PM
Ah yes...that would be an exception. ( Erm...what if the live pinky craps on your snakes face and it then dies of revulsion?) I've been reading that the scent and temp of the food are really the only major factors that induce a pet corn snake to feed. Do live pinkys just wriggle around like a worm or something?

Yeah, they wriggle around quite a bit. The other hatchlings I'm raising haven't had live since their first feeding, but after their recent sheds, the blizzards seem to have 'forgotten' that they ate at least six F/Ts before shedding. The blizzards each have had eight successful feedings in the month I've had them, so I wouldn't call them "problem feeders", but they are definitely more finicky than the other six hatchlings I'm raising. Unlike the others, they do not like to eat in separate feeding containers, and they do not like to eat unless it's almost completely dark in their tubs (8qt.).

Treasure was fed live hamster pinks in the pet store and didn't like the F/T the first week I offered them to her.. so I took the advice of her vet.. hold the F/T pinks tail in black tweezers (apparently the snakes can't see the black tweezers /shrug) and wiggle it around. Treasure saw that wiggling and SNAP no more pink hehe =)

This is a great idea. I don't think I can apply it to the blizzes though; they're pretty skittish, and would probably only be terrorized by this method. But if they're still pulling these stunts when they're older, I'll be taking your good advice.

Pinkysmommy
08-30-2005, 07:46 PM
It's good to give your snake a chance to get used to their new surroundings and then get used to you handling them. Give her a few days to settle in first and get used to her tank. If I have stubborn feeders that don't want to eat I leave them in overnight with the pinks. My new diffused didn't want to eat at first so I left him in the deli cup with the pink overnight and the next morning it was gone. I have a few snakes that will only eat if they're in complete darkness. Next time you offer food (which shouldn't be more than every 5 days or so) try leaving your snake in with the pink overnight and see what happens.

~Katie
Can you leave a pinkie you've thawed, overnight? The petstore people told us only to leave it in there 20 minutes..then again, they couldn't even tell us what kind of cornsnake she is!!!

PtDnsr
08-30-2005, 09:27 PM
Can you leave a pinkie you've thawed, overnight? The petstore people told us only to leave it in there 20 minutes..then again, they couldn't even tell us what kind of cornsnake she is!!!
That's one of the first things I'll try. I'll warm it up, then I'll try dangling, then I'll leave them overnight (I usually feed pretty late at night though so it's not in there forever). I've only had the one refuse everything since the end of june - as soon as my mouse order gets here it's off to try scenting :headbang: eh...as long as she eats. Anywho, give it a try. Worst that happens is you waste a pink (which you do anyway if you're only waiting 20 min).

~Katie

Pinkysmommy
08-30-2005, 10:26 PM
That's one of the first things I'll try. I'll warm it up, then I'll try dangling, then I'll leave them overnight (I usually feed pretty late at night though so it's not in there forever). I've only had the one refuse everything since the end of june - as soon as my mouse order gets here it's off to try scenting :headbang: eh...as long as she eats. Anywho, give it a try. Worst that happens is you waste a pink (which you do anyway if you're only waiting 20 min).

~Katie
What is scenting? I didn't know you could get live mice shipped to you?

PtDnsr
08-30-2005, 11:45 PM
What is scenting? I didn't know you could get live mice shipped to you?
Scenting is trying to make the food item smell enough like something else (in this case an anole) that the snake is tricked into eating it. Not necessarily the best way to get a snake to eat because then it usually has to be weaned off of scented foods. It's to be used as a last resort only second to force feeding IMO. I feed all my corns f/t - my Rodentpro order should be here Thursday which means I need to go clean out the freezer. :grin01:

~Katie