Corns living together?? Yes or no?

Originally Posted by Roy Munson

I should also point out that many would say that you have an ethical obligation to give the same quality care to your $40 pair of anerys as your $2000 pair of cinders. I have to say that I would agree with these people. My cheap pet store normal gets the same care as my cinders.

I've actually agree to that, and say this, when I sell/give away my pets, I normally give them away to people I believe will take good care of them and sell them to others since I feel once you make an investment you're more inclined to give better treatment

Originally Posted by Roy Munson

I guess what I don't understand about this question is that it is no more difficult to house them separately than to keep them together. Even space limitations aren't really an issue. Two corns kept together require the same floor-space as two corns kept apart. I've done it both ways, so I know. In fact, I think it was tougher keeping them together because I really had to give them a lot of time to get out of hunting-mode before I re-introduced them after feeding, when each snake still smelled like their prey.

You raise an interesting point, that maybe you can answer for me.

Currently my snakes are in the same bin 40 gallon tank... with bedding etc. I have two separates bins when they eat. a 20 gallon and a 10 gallon for each snake (feed in the same bin pretty much every time) The bin is cleaned if a mess was made by the rat/mouse. The feeding bins have no bedding and is just glass. I put the snake in 1st and he reacts like he knows its time to eat, I then give them about 1 minute alone in this tank to reset itself since it was just moved and then place the food in. Sometimes I feed two mice or 1 mouse but regardless, after they have ate and are sticking their tongue out and their stomach muscles are no longer pushing the food down like when they are swallowing it, I pick the snake up and put them back into their main cage. At this point they move around into their normal positions with little interaction with each other.

I tried to spell out everything I could.... Would you imagine my feeding ritual has something to do with the lack of aggression in their main tank?

Originally Posted by zwyatt

...breeding for more docile snakes, which I have already argued is not necessarily the case with most breeders...

Hah! More like it is probably the case with ZERO breeders. Corn snakes are a very docile species already. I can't speak for all corn breeders, but I'm guessing that most feel as I do: temperament is an absolute non-consideration when determining pairings. Some breeders of more aggressive and dangerous species select for temperament, but it isn't necessary for corn snakes.

I like hatchlings that are feisty right out of the egg. In my experience, feisty hatchlings are HUNGRY hatchlings. I'm not sure why there's a correlation between defensiveness and feeding-response, but there seems to be one.

Originally Posted by jazzgeek

What's not to understand?

regards,
jazz

LOL, 1st. I wasn't sure akin was word you were looking for and I didn't know the def of tautological. Now that I''ve looked up tautological, my point was before I would't have an opinion on the matter and probably would tell them i've done it fine for years without a problem, while now I would say be careful if you do because bad things could happen

Originally Posted by zwyatt

By definition, selective breeding (in this case on one trait - cohab tolerance) cannot occur unless selection is occuring. In this case, you are either selecting for cohab tolerant snakes or you aren't.



Darn, I've got to go to class for a while. Don't have too much fun without
me!

However once you start selecting breeding you could be changing over variables that could effect the outcome of your plan. Simply put just by sticking corns together you could be at that point changing around whatever breeding criteria you are looking for, but I dont think that matters for our conversation

Originally Posted by HaisseM

You raise an interesting point, that maybe you can answer for me.

Currently my snakes are in the same bin 40 gallon tank... with bedding etc. I have two separates bins when they eat. a 20 gallon and a 10 gallon for each snake (feed in the same bin pretty much every time) The bin is cleaned if a mess was made by the rat/mouse. The feeding bins have no bedding and is just glass. I put the snake in 1st and he reacts like he knows its time to eat, I then give them about 1 minute alone in this tank to reset itself since it was just moved and then place the food in. Sometimes I feed two mice or 1 mouse but regardless, after they have ate and are sticking their tongue out and their stomach muscles are no longer pushing the food down like when they are swallowing it, I pick the snake up and put them back into their main cage. At this point they move around into their normal positions with little interaction with each other.

I tried to spell out everything I could.... Would you imagine my feeding ritual has something to do with the lack of aggression in their main tank?

Well, my guess is that their lack of aggression is due to the fact that corns just aren't normally that aggressive anyway. I don't feed my snakes in their tubs, so it's a similar process to yours, but they are returned to solitary quarters. I would recommend that you give them at least 20-30 minutes after eating to get them out of "hunting mode", before you re-introduce them to each other after eating. On several occasions when I cohabbed I saw one snake bite another after it smelled prey on its cagemate. It never amounted to anything-- I never even had to intervene-- but it scared me. This points out another pain in the butt that I didn't like about cohabbing: I had to feed all cagemates at the same time. Returning a just-fed (and mouse-stinking) snake to an enclosure with another hungry corn in it is not a good idea.

As long as your 40gallon tank is a long one (with max floor-space), your two probably have enough space to pull off cohabbing. Of course, I'd rather see them in separate 20s, but...

Originally Posted by Roy Munson

Well, my guess is that their lack of aggression is due to the fact that corns just aren't normally that aggressive anyway. I don't feed my snakes in their tubs, so it's a similar process to yours, but they are returned to solitary quarters. I would recommend that you give them at least 20-30 minutes after eating to get them out of "hunting mode", before you re-introduce them to each other after eating. On several occasions when I cohabbed I saw one snake bite another after it smelled prey on its cagemate. It never amounted to anything-- I never even had to intervene-- but it scared me. This points out another pain in the butt that I didn't like about cohabbing: I had to feed all cagemates at the same time. Returning a just-fed (and mouse-stinking) snake to an enclosure with another hungry corn in it is not a good idea.

As long as your 40gallon tank is a long one (with max floor-space), your two probably have enough space to pull off cohabbing. Of course, I'd rather see them in separate 20s, but...

Thanks for the input, I'll keep them in their feed bins for a longer period of time, since I don't watch them after they go back into their cage, I'm not aware of any biting that may or may not have happened.

...whereas those of us who don't cohabitate know for certain that no bites have occurred. EVER.


Well, SOMEONE had to say it!

And when Maizey regurges, I don't blame Jake by mistake...(He'd really hate to go ten days with no dinner!)

Nanci

Okay, first of all... I cannot believe we're even having this discussion YET AGAIN.

SEARCH FEATURE.

Originally Posted by HaisseM

Susang, i wanna make a point I think is interesting. I hear people talk so much about how cornsnakes are solitary by nature and in the wild they don't live together like they do in the same cage, but if we're going to have the arguement they are solitary in nature then why feed them dead food?

I don't think those two points have anything to do with each other at all. Living alone or together has nothing to do with eating dead food. Period.

Originally Posted by HaisseM

Also at this point in the evolution of cornsnakes aren't they one of the most common place pets (meaning for generations they have been peoples pets and at some point the dangerous while still there aren't as strong as they once were?

Evolution? Are you kidding me? Corn snakes in captivity for 50 years or less does not count for jack in the big picture that is evolution. That is rediculous. There are very few "domesticated" animals that have actually been taken the majority away from their wild counterparts. Livestock and dogs. There isn't a single "domesticated" or "tame" reptile in the world. Every one of them is still capable of doing exactly what they do in the wild. That is why there are scores of "pet" burmese and reticulated pythons living wild in the Everglades after "for generations being bred as people's pets". By the way, those animals, even the ones that are still in captivity, are still potentially dangerous. My burmese python could kill me, and I know that. If corns were big enough, they'd be capable of it too. Breeding them in captivity doesn't change that this early in the big scheme of things.

If you'd like to read more about evolution and corns, go here to this thread that a few of us very actively participated in for several months two years ago: http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/sho...ight=captivity . 16 pages' worth of good discussion on the topic of corn snake "evolution" in captivity. You don't have to agree with either side, but it's a good discussion.

Originally Posted by HaisseM

I say this because with the PROPER care I would imagine two corn snakes living together would be ok (this may or may not hold true for 2 males or 2 females living together because of the aggression i've read about during mating session)

So 2 males is not okay because of aggression, 2 females are not okay because of aggression, but a male and a female is fine for a 15 year old novice to house together so instead of aggression during the breeding season you get the female accidentally becoming gravid? That's smart.

Originally Posted by HaisseM

Common reasons for not cohabing corn snakes

1. disease (Keep them disease free and you won't have to worry)
2. throw-up (Yea you won't know which one threw-up but wouldn't the real concern be WHY they threw-up?
3. Eatting one or the other (doesn't proper feeding take care of this)
4. corns are solitary by nature (at this point aren't we taking them out of their natural setting) plus how many generations have corn snakes been pets?
Look at some of the Vivs people put their corn snakes in (from babies to adults) talk about not being in nature

1. Nobody's perfect, and mistakes happen. Sooner or later, your snake will get sick. Of the people here that have been keeping snakes for awhile, I'd be willing to bet that we've all had at least an RI or something at some point. So are we irresponsible and bad owners?

2. To learn WHY one threw up, you'd need to know which one it came from. Maybe they're SICK? To me, a regurge is a bigger display of poor husbandry in adult snakes than a simple RI or parasite.

3. Why risk it? If you're housing them together in the first place you're already ignoring the advice of the majority of the members here, so who's to say the feeding size/amount is correct? Maybe you know better than all of us on that topic too.

4. I'll agree that keeping a corn on newspaper in an aquarium is not natural (nor am I saying it's harmful if done correctly), but how is ANY enclosure or substrate natural? There are walls somewhere, right? And at that, how is housing two corns together making ANYTHING any more natural?


I don't normally blow up on people on here but holy crap, read and take some advice from the rest of us before dispensing garbage. I'm not right all the time, no, but I'm not going to act authoritative and give a whole column of bad advice to a 15 year old who doesn't know not to listen to it.

Originally Posted by MooreSnakes

I guess co-habiting would be okay if you really wanted too . . .
But personally I believe that it is safer and healthier for the snakes to be kept apart and if you are going to buy another snake you should put the money in for another enclosure.
Whenever I sell snakes I tell people that they could cohabit if they really want to, but I wouldn't recomend it because of the problems it could cause.

Because you don't cohab yourself, I feel I can say this without you becoming offended, as it is not my intent to offend you....

but housing two snakes together "because you really wanted to" is the stupidest reason for anyone to do it. That's just code for "too cheap to buy a second UTH, cage, and water bowl". Just because you really really want to house them together isn't going to fix or prevent all of the potential problems involved. Your snakes are not going to say "let's leave a little sign on this mouse when I puke it up to identify which one of us it came from. I wouldn't normally do this, but since our owner really really wanted us together I'd like to avoid causing him problems"

The only "good" reason for two snakes to be housed together is if the intent is to breed, and that's ONLY a good reason if the owner/keeper knows what they're doing and is intending for that to happen in a safe, know-how-it-works environment.