• 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.

my male is suddenly not holdable

F

Firefur

Member
Okay so i got my snakes a few months ago and they were all sweet as can be when they shared a tank, after the unexpected egg fiasco i separated them. but i cant hold one of the males now. he's always been the most flighty shakes his tail, bit me once when i first got him, but i think he was using his mouth as an arm because he let go as soon as he'd coiled up my arm and hid in my shirt. now however i cant get near him getting him out of his cage to hold him takes for ever and while i can successfully get him out he's become a whip worm he used to just slither up my arm now he trys to get away. it's like he's afraid i'm going to eat him or something. i originally moved him to a smaller tank but removed the other two and shifted things around putting my gravid female into the hospital tank i'd put him in is it possible that since he found their normal tank empty he thinks something happened to the other 2? because he wont even come out of his hide. any suggestions?
 
no even in full blue i could put my hand in there and he'd slither up my arm. i have never seen him act like this
 
Could it be the change? Different smells around him? Are you washing your hands with something different.. that might smell different to him???
 
No same hand sanitizer same everything although we did put new moss in the frog habitat but i cant see that changing anything unless it's changing the smell of the house slightly.then again there is construction going on in the house 2 doors down so maybe that's disturbing him but why aren't the others effected?
 
Did you empty and clean the viv he returned to before you put him in? If so, maybe it smells unfamiliair and he does not feel safe now.
 
I've had similar things happen with one of my everglades rat snakes. When breeding them I would put the male and female together for a few days at a time. After separating them both got cage aggressive for a couple of weeks. It seems to me that they became accustomed to movement and distractions around them from the other snake and as a result, they were very easy to pick up and handle during this time. When there wasn't anything around them they got used to being alone and probably liked it.

It only took a couple weeks of handling them to get them over their aggressiveness by handling them almost daily. As long as I don't let them have very long periods of solitude they are very docile.

This led me to the idea of "taming" aggressive snakes by cohabbing them for a few days at a time to help them get used to distractions. It always seems to calm them down and I'll be able to split them up as is appropriate after a couple of sessions.
 
I recieved two cornsnakes yesterday via someone that I met here.
They both are kinda itchy when it comes to being handled, and I dont handle them that often because im letting them get used to their new habitats.

Maybe because theyre used to having another snake in there, or they are used to the smell of the other tank, thats why hes being aggressive?
 
Firefur said:
no even in full blue i could put my hand in there and he'd slither up my arm. i have never seen him act like this
Click to expand...

I think his behavior sounds like he might be in some kind of grumpy shed mode as well. One month of owning a snake isn't really long enough to fully experience all the ranges of behaviors it can exhibit.

I have a 5 year old male who doesn't have a history of acting oddly in blue. The other day my friend wanted to hold him and he just looked POed, like he was going to snap at one of us. He was hiding under all of his substrate.

Even though I haven't had problems with him in the past being snappy ever, we decided to leave him alone for the time being.

Lo and behold, within the week there was a fresh shed in his tub and he was back to his normal self.
 
no it's not time to size his food up and now i think he's actually getting worse, i tried to take him out to feed him yesterday and he struck me six times, ran away and atually tried to escape my hand several times once i got him out. it was like he had never been heald before, how do i fix this? it just seems to be getting worse - at least he's eating though. also he bit me when i went to put him back i havent seen him this riled since my roommate first brought home the kingsnake, and she took the kingsnake down to la with her in may. any ideas?
 
I would just say give him his space.
If he doesnt want to be held, dont force him.
It sounds like he used to be a good natured snake, so maybe he just needs some alone time to get used to his new tank while the transition (from cohabbing to being single), is taking its toll on him.

Instead of taking him out normally like you do, leave him alone for an entire week.
Then gradually try and reach in there to play with him.
If hes trying to shed he might be nasty to you.
If hes overly hungry, he might be nasty to you (which in this case you should probably try feeding him something a little bigger than you normally do).

Gluck.
 
Your first mistake was sharing a tank..Never ever put two corns together. They are solitary animals and only come together to mate..
 
bfreewally1 said:
Your first mistake was sharing a tank..Never ever put two corns together. They are solitary animals and only come together to mate..
Click to expand...

not to be rude but i'm aware of this, please dont take it the wrong way but they came that way and the things i had read up to that point actually said it was fine. also the reptile vet i found up here said it was fin as long as they were all female (which at the time i thought they were) and in a big enough cage. which i then provided them with. they are now separate and have been since mid may. so i don't think the fact that they were cohabitated for the first few months after i got them is an issue at this point. i moved him back into the old tank that they had been co habitated in their whole life and now he's going nuts he was fine before. so could it be separation? i cleaned the tank before i put him in it alone. so i have know idea what is up with him the other two are acting like their normal selves.
 
Not to be rude either, but like I said never put two corns together. Doesn`t matter their sex and the cage size. Your reptile vet obviously gave you the wrong info.
 
i am aware of this also and switched vets that however is neither here nor there the problem didn't start until after i separated the snakes so at this point it is a moot point. any ideas on what has the male so pissy of late?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top