First Year Breeding Corns

Hey all, this will be my first year breeding Corns. I've just gotten so excited about breeding them as I read all the latest posts. This time last year I saw an advertisement on KS.com and hubby saw the same ad... before we knew it, we'd made a deal to buy a pair of striped corns (anery stripe female, normal stripe male) and trade mice for a kingsnake. Now I have 6 corns, and I plan on breeding two of the females to the one male.

Just thought I would share my plans/expectations, and see if anyone else wants to chime in with their own plans, etc.

Hermes (my male) is a normal striped corn, and while he was good looking a year ago, he's incredibly good looking now, with his vibrant red/orange and yellow stripe. I think I remember the breeder mentioning that it was het for albino, but don't know for sure.

Athena is the other stripe who I purchased at the same time as Hermes. She's an Anery Stripe, and is nearly patternless over most of her body, with a sort of granite like speckling that I consider very attractive. I don't know if she is het for anything, so when I cross her with Hermes, I expect all Normal Striped snakes het for Anery. It would be nice to discover some hidden recessives.

Aphrodite (Bought from Kathy Love at a local reptile show here in AZ) is a normal het for motley. Kathy told me she was from a Miami line of snakes, and whatever her lineage, she's a beautiful snake with a tan-peach ground color, and orange-brown saddles. Since she is het for motley, I expect to have roughly 50% of the clutch be Motley Stripe, and the rest will be het for stripe. I don't know if there are any other characteristics that she might be het for.

In the future (next year) I'll be adding 1.2 more snakes to my corn breeding. I will most likely end up breeding Athena and Aphrodite to the younger male, and the two young females to Hermes:

Zeus is a very large guy, he's a Snow Hurricane (poor) Motley. He's incredibly beautiful and my most aggressive king (he BITES). He is possible het hypo. When I cross him to Aphrodite half the babies will be Motley, the rest het motley, and I will discover if Aphrodite is het anery, or het amel. When I cross him to Athena, I will learn if she is het amel. All the babies should be motley stripe anery at the least, unless she has some hidden recessives.

Cassandra is a Ghost, possible het amel/Motley. When I cross her to Hermes I should get normals het for stripe/anery/hypo

Hera is Anery, possible het hypo, amel, motley. When I cross her to Hermes I should get all normals het anery/stripe.

I am so looking forward to my future adventures in snake breeding!

Zeus is a very large guy, he's a Snow Hurricane (poor) Motley. He's incredibly beautiful and my most aggressive king (he BITES).

Do you mean corn?

Also, if your striped male is het amel, then half of the babies will be het snow (anery and amel).

I don't have much that is spectacular this year. I hope to produce:
Creamsicles
Normals het anery motley (50% poss het snow motley)
Normal motleys (the parents of these are possible het several things including lavender, opal, snow, hypo, etc. There's no telling what else may hatch out!)
Amels het snow
Snows
Butters (50% het motley)
Butters (66% het motley)
Butter motleys
Striped motleys het ghost
Ghost striped motleys
Striped motleys het butter and anery
California Kings

I meant Corn... last year i just bred kings, and I'm used to saying king more than corn.

My other planned crosses are:

2.2 cal kings
1.1 blotched kings. It's gonna be a fun summer!

I thought you meant corn, but I wanted to make sure.

What color kings are you breeding? I have a desert banded and an amel striped. I am figuring that the babies will all be black and white (assuming the b/w one isn't het for amel), but am not sure how their patterns will turn out. I don't know how the banded and striped genes mix in kings.

As far as I understand that NOT-as-cut-and-dried-as-corns genetics of california kingsnakes, if you cross a striped with a banded you are likely to get all varieties of offspring, with aberrant banded being the likely result.

The Cal Kings I have to breed this year are:

Bishop, a high-white male cal king (het for amel) who will be bred to your average desert b&w banded cal king named Licorice. Her white bands are VERY white, so it will be interesting to see what she is like. Her history is unknown to us as we obtained her late last year. She was either wild caught (super LTC) or someone else's pet. They tried to sell her to a petstore hereabouts, but because they look like a native ARizona variety of Kingsnake, it's illegal to sell or buy them in this state. So through the local herp society I got her as a gift. I believe she is around 5 years old. IF her offspring end up normal banded in look, then they will be given away to worthy students of mine (I'm a high school teacher, as is my hubby).

Jester, an aberrant banded cal king male (het for amel, clutch-mate of Bishop) will be bred to Queenie, who is a "dot dash" Newport locale Cal King.

We bred Bishop and Queenie last year and got 8 eggs/hatchlings. The cutest one, white with a black stripe down the back, died, The rest were all aberrant. Only one came close to looking like a normal banded cal king... and that was a strange one... he looked normal striped for the first fourth of his body, aberrant for the second fourth, normal banded for the third fourth, and the tail was back to being aberrant again. That one came out of an egg that was nearly twice the size of the others. WE expected a twin at the least, but instead got a hatchling who was nearly 16 inches in length!

The Blotched kings are... well... blotched. We bred them last year and got 8 hatchlings (9 eggs, one was a slug) The prettiest (of course) was bright red with a tiny black stripe down her back... she died for no apparant reason before she ever ate. The rest, except for one, appeared to be mostly just ... well ... blotched... but one looked like it might turn out to be patternless. He had a very faint dark on dark pattern.

Jeeze, you caught me in my talkative mood.

I love your snakes' names! I have several greek snakes myself!

srry thats kinda off topic

Sasheena,

I was wondering how your breeding attempts have turned out. Most of the ones I wanted to breed turned out pretty well. I had a couple of disappointing clutches (the ones I was most looking forward to, of course). I had a mishap with my first king snake clutch, as well. Somehow, I managed to know off the nest box and the eggs fell on the floor. The five that actually hit the floor didn't make it. I felt SO bad. Anyway, 7 from that clutch still look good. My king was also nice enough to double clutch for me...9 fertile eggs in the second clutch. Maybe she knew I felt guilty for dropping her eggs

Anyway, I was just wondering how things are going for you!

Well, I am getting ready to breed my corns that I have this next coming breeding season and wanted to get some helpful tips on what and how to do it. All I know about my snakes is that the one I think is female is Anery...I'm not sure on if she is het for anything. And the one I believe to be male is Amelanistic..not sure on hets. Diamond is the female and Bindi is the male hopefully. I've had them both sexed last year at a reptile show in Indy and have two other times had Diamond sexed both confirming hopefully that she is indeed female. I'm just hoping also that Bindi is male. He would be the only one that is old enough to breed to my females. I also want to breed Bindi to Rose who is a normal and possibly to Zoe who is also a female/hopefully and a normal as well.

My questions would be what type of bedding/substrate to use for the nesting box and should I put it on the warm end or cool end of the enclosure? What would be my likely outcomes if I breed a Anerytheristic female with Amelanistic male? And Amel with a normal corn snake? And in two more years if Kasper-Silver Queen Ghost corn is a male like I am hoping what would I get with breeding him to my Anery female and to my two normal hopeful females? I also wanted to find out what are the best temps to keep the incubators at and what type of substrate to use for the incubator? And the humidity levels to keep them at? I also wanted to find out how long it takes for a snake to lay eggs on a average basis and how long it takes before the eggs hatch? And what need I do after they hatch? Do I need to seperate them right away from eachother into different containers and what kind of containers should or could I use that wouldn't take much space up? And how long do I need to wait before feeding the new babies and how long should I wait before putting them up for sale? Ofcourse I will end up keeping at least 2 of them. I think that is all the questions I have for now. Thanks for any replies.

My hope to be female is over 4 yrs old and my hope to be male will be over 2yrs old once breeding season comes. My two normals that I am hoping to be female are also just over 2 yrs in age. Is this old enough to breed? And what weight should they be before breeding for their first time?