Quote:
Originally Posted by Tyger9791
wow i'm surprised the snake even ate the crickets
|
The issue isn't as black and white as most people think:
The Guide to Owning a Cornsnake by Jerry G. Walls, T.F.H. Publications, Inc.
"Although the Red Rat Snake feeds on a variety of prey animals, ranging from frogs and lizards (and even insects) when young to rodents, bats, and birds when adults, your Corn Snake does not need much variety at all."
Caring for Corn Snakes by Melissa Kaplan
http://www.anapsid.org/corn.html
"While the Elaphes feed on everything ranging from fish to frogs to rodents to mammals, wild Corns start off feeding on small invertebrates and vertebrates, such as crickets. "
Wild hatchling corn snakes will eat what they can get, including crickets, worms and grubs. That doesn't mean those are a healthy diet, but they do provide protein that allows the neonate to get strong enough to catch better quality prey. I doubt that a cricket has enough nutritional value, especially one not gut loaded, to maintain a corn snake, but a pet store owner who doesn't know that corn snakes are ratters probably doesn't understand gut loading much better.