What size food?

My 14 year old son has just been given a 7 year old female Carolina corn as her owners were no longer able to take care of her.
I did a lot of research before agreeing to take her on and spoke at length with the owners about her care. I was quite surprised when they said she was fed on medium rats every 14 days that was much larger than I was expecting based on my research.
She was due to be fed today and we followed what they said they did. Defrost overnight and placed in viv this morning.
She has tried to eat it twice that I have seen from both ends of the rat and both times she has got 1/4 of the way and given up/spat it out.

Any thoughts gratefully received.
She is about 4 foot but I'm not sure how much she weighs. She seems to have settled in well and is happy to be handled.

I suspect their "medium" rats were actually more like weanlings. Every company and pet store has their own definition of each size, and sometimes they vary quite a lot. The medium mice I could buy at local pet stores are quite a lot smaller than the medium mice I would order from my go-to rodent suppliers. This is why most of us rely on weight in grams to determine feeder sizes for individual snakes. Metabolisms can vary, but for the most part non-breeding adult corn snakes only need about one large/adult mouse (~25g) every 10-14 days. Weanling rats, are typically around 30-50g and have slightly higher caloric density than mice of similar size, mostly due to larger muscle mass (you will often hear they are fattier, but this is a myth).

If you're able, share some photos of your son's new snake. If she is not looking pudgy or too rounded, two weanling rats per month may be fine for your snake's metabolism. I would suspect it might be a little too much, though, and excess fat stores can hide even in some very trim-looking corns.

Thanks for your advice.

I have just weighed the 3 “medium” frozen rats they gave me and the smallest is 162g and the largest is 265g!

I have managed to add a photo to an album but not sure how to get it to show on this message. I will try and do a link to the album.

http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/album.php?albumid=2394

Thankyou again.

I have just attempted to weigh and measure her.
Weight is 942g and length is approx 4 foot 4.

So am I right in thinking she is quite overweight? She does have a bit of a bulge at the tail which I have read is a sign and I would also say she is more rounded than she should be.

And if so how is the best way forward to help her slim down?

She definitely looks to be overweight and the rats they gave you seem way too large. I'm no expert so I'll let others with more experience recommend you a feeding/exercise plan to help her to lose some weight.

it's not unusual for a corn snake to weigh 900 grams, I've seen some larger. However they were in the 5 to 6 foot long range. At 4 foot 4, 900 grams seems a bit overweight. (My snake is currently about 4 feet 2, and he weighs about 440 grams.) I feed him a 30 gram mouse every 14 days.

I would suggest, you feed something in the 30 to 40 gram range (Mice or Rats). This would be a large or Jumbo Mouse, or a Very young rat, perhaps a Pup or weanling. (Look around online at various mouse and rat distributors, you can get an idea.)

It's unlikely you'll be able to go to a local pet store and find exactly what you want, and they mostly carry only a certain number of items and sizes, but you could always talk with them and see if they'd be willing to stock what you need.

The 30 to 40 gram Suggestion I am giving you may be smaller that what the snake has been eating, but should be appropriate from it's 4 foot 4 length, and it probably needs to lose some weight anyway.

Thankyou for all your advice.
I managed to source 30g mice at the local pet shop and fed her one last night and she ate it fine.
So if we go on a 14 day feeding schedule and make sure my son gets her out regularly for plenty of exercise. Will that be enough to help her slim down slowly or do we need to be doing more?

that should be fine