Crickets?

bump ineffective?

That sounds like the book that is read by some of the worst petshops in the nation! Although some pet shops DO feed crickets and reccomend them to customers, crickets are NOT acceptable food for baby cornsnakes. They have a hard exoskeliton that can cause blockages and kill them. That is, if you can get a baby corn to actually eat a cricket....

I have heard its a bad idea to feed corns crickets. We took our hatchling to the vet because he would not eat and our vet said put extra small crickets in for him as that is what they start eating in the wild. Our vet works with reptiles so we followed his advise and Luke seems to be doing good with them. we are still trying the pinkies too and will stop the crickets as soon as he will eat a pinkie on a consistent basis. I am definitely no expert as this is our first corn snake so this is just my experience.

BooBoo18 said:

we are still trying the pinkies too and will stop the crickets as soon as he will eat a pinkie on a consistent basis.

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What specifically is going on as far as it's willingness to take pinkies, and what do you mean by consistant?

I'm worried that the above statement is reversing the cause and effect. If your snake is eating crickets, that may be the actual reason it's not taking pinkies regularly. You really want to cut out the crix and get it onto straight pinks right away. Both from a nutritional standpoint, and because you want it to imprint on F/T commercial mice as early in life as possible.

Lyion- I'm sure that wild baby corns eat insects and arachnids of several species when young. Lizards are also grabbed, and lizard scenting is an often used trick for reluctant feeders. For captives I would stay away from insects for the reasons I mentioned above. Even taking the nutritional argument off of the table, captive snakes have an annoying habit of sometimes imprinting on a certain food. I'd rather just feed what will work for it's entire life...

starsevol said:

That sounds like the book that is read by some of the worst petshops in the nation! Although some pet shops DO feed crickets and reccomend them to customers, crickets are NOT acceptable food for baby cornsnakes. They have a hard exoskeliton that can cause blockages and kill them. That is, if you can get a baby corn to actually eat a cricket....

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Thanks Starse ^^ I thought it wouldn't be good for them, and I would imagine the feet could scratch the poor corns . When I do breed, I'll try to stick with pinkies ^^

BooBoo- Also just curious. How long had the hatchling refused to feed when the vet told you to use crickets?

We have had the hatchling for about two/three months. He was a month old when we got him and had tried feeding a f/t pinkie, f/t pinkie with head smash/ f/t pinkie head/ dancing pinkie, live pinkie, tease feeding, rubbed the pinkie on a gecko (the gecko was not happy) was even thinking about force feeding when we brought him to the vet. We tried something different every 5 days the only time we got some type of reaction was the pinkie we dipped in tuna juice. He attacked that one but did not eat it. We read through the feeding thread and tried the suggestions made there. I'm pretty sure if it was on the feeding thread we tried it. We also called the breeder for suggestions which did not work either.

We really want him to get onto the f/t pinkies he had eaten f/t for the breeder so he has eaten them just wont eat them for us. The crickets were not tried until he was with us for about 2 to 3 months and refusing to eat pinkies and we took him to the vet. I did ask him about the crickets as I had read they are not good food items and the vet told us to get him eating something and continue to try to get him on the pinkies which is what we are doing now. Our biggest concern at that point was he appeared to have been losing weight.

I would be happy with any other suggestions any one might have to get our little guy eating f/t.

Do not feed with crickets!

Well- You're off in unexplored territory as far as my knowledge is concerned. Here are a few things that come to mind, but I'm kind of shooting from the hip here.

As far as I know, nobody has maintained a corn for any significant length of time on insects. I believe you are on a very short stint of borrowed time right now, so don't lose the urgency to keep working the mice. In the meantime make sure you are gutloading with the widest variety of quality feeds you can and make sure you are getting supplemental calcium to your snake...

Have you tried cricket scenting the mice and/or vice versa?

Are you 100% sure your cage, hides and temps are in order? The main reason I ask is that you said it fed for the breeder. It's less common for a snake who has already eaten f/t to then refuse to eat if everything else is good.

Are you keeping track of the snakes weight? It might be a good idea, especially if you decide to try stopping the crix for a while to help force it onto mice.

That's about all I have. Hopefully more suggestions will come in. Keep us posted and best of luck...

Scott

I say as long as your snake is captive bred, you should stick with feeding it apropriate sized mice.
No crickets needed at all.

Thanks Scott we are still trying the pinkies every 5 days I will see about getting the pinkie rubbed with cricket and try that tonight. He is in a 5.5 gallon glass with uth on repticarpet and aspen has two hides one on the warm side and one on the cool with a branch for some climbing if he likes. Temps are with a probe are at 80 to 85 on the warm side.

^^ I don't plan on feeding Xia anything but the best and even if it was safe, I wouldn't feed her the crickets as I'm sure they aren't as nutritional as mice. I was mainly curious and wondering for hatchling sake. TY

BooBoo18 said:

Thanks Scott we are still trying the pinkies every 5 days I will see about getting the pinkie rubbed with cricket and try that tonight. He is in a 5.5 gallon glass with uth on repticarpet and aspen has two hides one on the warm side and one on the cool with a branch for some climbing if he likes. Temps are with a probe are at 80 to 85 on the warm side.

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I would let the snake go 5 days without any food being offered before trying the cricket scented pinkie. Let it get hungry, then do everything to maximize your chances.

Rub the outside of the cricket on the pinkie then squish fluids onto it as well (you can also F/T the cricket if you are not comfortable smashing a live one). Feed at dusk, hopefully during a time when it's active. If it has been eating crickets in it's cage I would start out that way for now, and not use a seperate container. Scent up the mouse and slide it in there as quietly as possible. Then leave for a while and see what happens...

Best of luck!
Scott

starsevol said:

They have a hard exoskeliton that can cause blockages and kill them.

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To add to this ... Aside from possible digestion problems (due to the exoskeleton), crickets are high in Phosphorus. Just as too much calcium is problematical ... so is too much phosphorous. Thus, with crickets, there would be a requirement to supplement with calcium (containing D3).
That said, crickets should not be fed to Corns.