hey hey, may have just made the jammiest purchase ever!!!!

Hey peoples,

I'm a newby reptile keeper but have had years of aquatics experience, and surprisingly a lot of the habitat/environment experience is quite transferable!

Ive had fluffy, my CbAug10 carolina/normal corn since end of last yr, shes a proper monster feeder and I'm totally in love! I say her, I was "reliably" informed fluffy was a she but I do intend to have her probed for confirmation! Any advice on this would be most welcome! I have no intention of doing this myself!!! I'm in t'Hull in the uk. I have been informed that I over feed her, she's taking, 1 x rat pup + 1or2 x hoppers depending if she's still "hunting" after the first every friday, last measurement put her at 26" but that was at least 6wks ago! She's not noticeably fat, and is active and unrestricted in her movements. VVVVVVVery friendly and alert!

The "Jammiest purchase" I mentioned is a pair of snakes that used to belong to another member here and an ex friend, consisting of Fluffys "sister" (do excuse the overuse of quotation marks but lots of "possibles" in the details!! lol) which is likely going to be coming up for sale soon, once im confortable with its condition PLUS a beautiful snake which some time ago I identified for the previous owner as an Anery Upperkeys, though the Anery maybe dubious as its colouration is lightening as it ages so more likely a ghost! PICS WILL BE FOLLOWING before somebody asks, lol. Both for an undisclosed amount of money (undisclosed as if my other half truely new how much I spend on my animals I would be missing certain vital organs!!! lol) but still far less than i would have paid for the Upperkeys alone!!!! (hope the seller doesnt see that!!! he he he).

From what I can gather the Upperkeys is about the same age as Fluffy but at least half her size, Now I know this is asked often and usually starts a raging bitch fight amongst certain members but as I'm going to do it! What would be the most adviceable process for introducing the Upperkeys to Fluffy? I'm thinking of leaving the two new introductions who have happily lived together for quite some time, in a rub inside Fluffys viv, this would allow them to smell and see each other without contact, obviously with suitable cover and hides inside the rub...Discuss...oh and before the obvious is said I will suitably adjust the Upperkeys feeding programme to allow it to grow to full potential, as at the moment the upperkeys would make a nice stomach filling snack for fluffy!!!

I will stop now as I'm waffling! thanks in advance peoples,

David

The next purchase, preferably before the new snakes arrive, should be separate housing.
For a start there's the question of quarantine. New purchases should ideally be in a totally separate room, use completely different feeding tongs, wash hands thoroughly in between any handling or contact with each snake, and some people also would change clothing too. Why so cautious? If you have aquarium experience, have you ever bought new healthy looking fish only to lose half a tank to whitespot or velvet? Snakes can carry parasites and diseases. Worst case scenario is your Fluffy contracts Crypto from the new snakes and you lose them all. If any of them regurged or had suspicious poop you'd have no idea which was ill. Snake mites are vectors for disease.
Then, you have no idea of their sexes, so you could be setting up conditions for early breeding with the possibility of stress, eggbinding and loss of any female bred too young.
Then, snakes are solitary by nature. They do not seek out or need company. They will compete for optimum hiding places, temperature gradients and this can have an adverse effect on their growth rate and health.
For the sake of saving a few quid you can go ahead and risk your pets lives, but you might find people here who have eithher experienced or heard of problems through co-habbing won't condone it. Some people do cohab successfully, but they are in a minority.
There's never a problem, until there's a problem.

As expected the negativity begins! Ive never lost half a tank to whitespot or velvet! As I always quarantine and only purchase from trusted dealers and buy high quality stock. With regards your broad generalisation on a genera of life, I suggest you stick to the species at hand! You wouldnt give advice on monkeys when somebodies talking about pigs! Now after stating the obvious does anyone have any advice rather than condescending agression?

Hello, name's Katherine. Please for the love of the animals do not co-hab. I rescued a pair that were forced to live together and the female died of severe internal damage due to being force to lay two clutches each year because she could not get away from the male. Yes it took 14 years for her to die, but she suffered those years. So please do not do it, please.

MrPointyhats said:

As expected the negativity begins! Ive never lost half a tank to whitespot or velvet! As I always quarantine and only purchase from trusted dealers and buy high quality stock. With regards your broad generalisation on a genera of life, I suggest you stick to the species at hand! You wouldnt give advice on monkeys when somebodies talking about pigs! Now after stating the obvious does anyone have any advice rather than condescending agression?

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Sorry, but we are sticking to the species at hand. I co habbed (out of neccessity) a pair and ended up losing one of my favorite snakes. Dead. Gone forever. BECAUSE I CO-HABBED.
Plus, snakes do not travel in herds naturally. They do not like other snakes.
If you love Fluffy and want her to live a long unstressed life, you will keep her seperate. Just my opinion, but I liken forcing solitary animals to share living space as cruelty. It can cause then stress, cause illness, and shorten their lifespans. If that is what you want for your Fluffy, then by all means, have at it!

MrPointyhats said:

As expected the negativity begins! Ive never lost half a tank to whitespot or velvet! As I always quarantine and only purchase from trusted dealers and buy high quality stock. With regards your broad generalisation on a genera of life, I suggest you stick to the species at hand! You wouldnt give advice on monkeys when somebodies talking about pigs! Now after stating the obvious does anyone have any advice rather than condescending agression?

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Negativity? Sure! Its negative to torture your critters for however long they manage to survive being co-habbed. The other person spoke of fish because YOU said you had the most experience with fish and they were trying to help you understand snakes via fish talk, sorry if it went over your head. :shrugs: I would give advice about mokeys when talking about pigs if a monkey breeder wanted to get into pigs, it would help them understand things if there were things you would not do with monkeys that also applied to pigs. Which is what the other person was doing. Its called education through example. There was no condensending agression in the first response to your post but you can be sure there is in this one. Do not ask advice if you do not want to hear it. I will be blocking your ID and unsubbing from this thread now as it is pointless to talk to people who want to know if its ok to torture animals (co-hab snakes).

If you know our views why would you ask? You might even get more negativity because you asked when you knew the answer already. Does the person that you are getting them from know you are thinking about co-habbing?

Hmmm. States openly knowledge of the opinions on this forum, and plans to go against all that advice anyway. Then states that one of the new additions is small enough to be a snack for the current resident.

Smells like troll to me.

Mind that I'm totally against cohabbing. But how big is your tank? I wouldn't even think of keeping two corns in a 55 gallon tank, which is the largest tank I have. Happen to have a 300 gallon tank lying around anywhere that you could split into a three-tank tank? Somehow I doubt it.

MrPointyhats said:

As expected the negativity begins! Ive never lost half a tank to whitespot or velvet! As I always quarantine and only purchase from trusted dealers and buy high quality stock. With regards your broad generalisation on a genera of life, I suggest you stick to the species at hand! You wouldnt give advice on monkeys when somebodies talking about pigs! Now after stating the obvious does anyone have any advice rather than condescending agression?

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You "expected" negativity? "Condescending agression (sp)"?

If you have come to this site merely to troll, mister, then I suggest you exit by the same door you came in here. You apparently have a chip on your shoulder and believe that the world revolves around YOUR opinions. You came here "expecting negativity"? Then why come here in the first place then?

There are a lot of good people here who have TONS of experience with cornsnakes which a "newbie reptile keeper" with even a smidgen of understanding concerning what experience means would be wise to pay attention to instead of immediately going into attack mode.

Such friendly advice and reasonable mindedness! Perhaps in future i will stick to actual experience and research rather than hearsay and opinion! The reputation of this forum is well founded abviously!

Expected and received from the outset! perhaps the stupidity you assume is unfounded? Perhaps your agressive and patronising attitude is unsuited to your objectives? Perhaps in future if you obviously overtly disagree with the statements clearly made in the initial post you should at least be reasonable in your objection and not down right nasty!

Obviously........

Everyone on here is talking from personal experience which is why we are against it. Here is my experience http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/showthread.php?t=113024 Granted it is an accident co-hab but how many wouldn't even think twice at this age because they are still babies. Now I feel egg bumps already in her and I worry everyday if she is going to make it through the impending doom.

I really do have to say that if you are going to keep this hostility up I would recommend taking Rich's advice.

Funny part is you keep saying people are being nasty. Do a search for co-hab and you find out that you are getting it very mild eventho you probaby don't deserve it.

MrPointyhats said:

Such friendly advice and reasonable mindedness! Perhaps in future i will stick to actual experience and research rather than hearsay and opinion! The reputation of this forum is well founded abviously!

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I really was just trying to use an analogy in talking about fish to explain the need for quarantine. For corns 6-12 months or longer is reccommended.
Some of the people trying to help you have told you what happpened when they cohabbed. (Experience)
I think you'd struggle to find any experiments comparing single-kept corns against cohabbed. (research)
Can you think of one single benefit to keeping your corns together for the corns?

I had asked for help! Im removing myself from this forum as help is the last thing your interested in giving obviously! Oh and perhaps you should put up a list of bigotry on the front page as it would save those of us who would like actual advice being nieve enough to expect it! WTF is trolling anyway????

In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum.

What exactly are you asking for in the way of help?

How to do something that can hurt your snake?

Sorry, if that is what you have in mind, no help to be had here!!

Then nanci no i am not! I was asking for some advice from those who have sucessfully done it! Actually for those who are listening and not spouting, to back up information ive been given by uk breeders and from ZSL who have several cohabbed corns in their collection! Clearly the assumption has been made that im an idiot! And your (the collective not directed at nanci) opinions are agressively and continuously stated until the alternative is drowned out! Also to refer back making broad generalisations about all snakes is equivalent to making statements about all mammals or all birds!....clearly im wasting my time!