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Info for would be corn breeders

ghosthousecorns said:
As long as this thread has gotten, after reading all this I am sure anyone with future breeding plans is going to realize they have to have some kind of plan in place if they should get some non eaters or anything. Or rethink what to do.

Jorge, I've been wondering about this one, I do keep kings- are you saying a baby king can hatch to be a lizard eater, but an adult king will not have the instinct to be a snake eater if it has never eaten a snake? I've always heard if you want to breed kings make sure they are both the same size, not hungry, and that the female is ovulating. Your kingsnakes might never have tasted snake, but they are still kingsnakes
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What I'm saying is that a Kingsnake has a higher probability to eat it's mate, if it's been conditioned to eat other snakes. Your right a King snake, is a King snake, and there's no guarentee that they won't want to eat each other, but I feel a lot better putting two snakes together that have never tasted another snake, and therefore has only ever known rodents to be it's food. We condition animals over time. You would also do right to make sure they are well fed and similar sized too. yet remeber males tend to go off feed during mating season, but hopefully their reproductive drive is stronger than their hunger. King snakes have very rough mating habits sometimes, and you may have to make a judgement call as to whether a male is biting the female to mate with her or to eat her. Still I worry more about the females turning on their mates than the males. Some kings and milks are more known for eating snakes than others. Chain Kings and Speckled Kings are probably the worst. But Florida Kings and Mexican Blacks can also. The mexican species like Alterna and Thayeri aren't as bad. I have a trio of Thayeri that I house together with no problems. I wouldn't do that with Speckelds, or Chains. I have done it with Floridas in the past but these days I'm not so brave, lol.
 
First snakes I ever had Breed for me were both WC and had eaten everything Kings eat but still bred and didn't try eating one another!!!!! I have yet to have 2 kings try to eat one or each other when sex is on their minds. That's not to say they wouldn't ever try. Back in the day, before we learned that we shouldn't keep more than one snake in the same cage, I had several cages with multiple, WC Kings. In fact I have an old polaroid shot of a cage with a Banded Cal. from Brea in Orange Co., an Aberrant Cal. From Temecula, a Blk. and White Banded from upper S-2 in San Diego County, and a 70/30 White and Blk from southeast of Palm Springs. I caught them all over a period of 2 years and they were together for another 2 years or so. Now I am sure to maintain one snake per enclosure. I believe the key with Kings is Too "Keep 'em Fed". I have had the occassional demon possessed king but this has usually been L.g.holbrooki (Speckeled Kings). 45+ years of keeping Calif. Kings have shown me that about 99% of my Kings bite right out of the egg and 85% of my Kings rarely bite unless it is a feeding response. If I get bit, it is usually a feeding response or fear response not aggression. Just last night I fed 7 Calif. Kings, 2 Florida Kings,and 2 Mex. Blk. Kings. Had mouse smell and snake smell all over my hands and the 2 Florida Kings both tried eating my fingers but nothing from the Calif or MBK's.

Shalom,

Pat Glazener-Cooney
 
POCooney said:
First snakes I ever had Breed for me were both WC and had eaten everything Kings eat but still bred and didn't try eating one another!!!!! I have yet to have 2 kings try to eat one or each other when sex is on their minds. That's not to say they wouldn't ever try. Back in the day, before we learned that we shouldn't keep more than one snake in the same cage, I had several cages with multiple, WC Kings. In fact I have an old polaroid shot of a cage with a Banded Cal. from Brea in Orange Co., an Aberrant Cal. From Temecula, a Blk. and White Banded from upper S-2 in San Diego County, and a 70/30 White and Blk from southeast of Palm Springs. I caught them all over a period of 2 years and they were together for another 2 years or so. Now I am sure to maintain one snake per enclosure. I believe the key with Kings is Too "Keep 'em Fed". I have had the occassional demon possessed king but this has usually been L.g.holbrooki (Speckeled Kings). 45+ years of keeping Calif. Kings have shown me that about 99% of my Kings bite right out of the egg and 85% of my Kings rarely bite unless it is a feeding response. If I get bit, it is usually a feeding response or fear response not aggression. Just last night I fed 7 Calif. Kings, 2 Florida Kings,and 2 Mex. Blk. Kings. Had mouse smell and snake smell all over my hands and the 2 Florida Kings both tried eating my fingers but nothing from the Calif or MBK's.

Shalom,

Pat Glazener-Cooney
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Yeah Pat your right, Usually when they are mating they don't have food on their minds, lol. I have had Speckleds eat each other before, and they were about the same size. It was too big to digest and the one ended up throwing it up. That was disgusting! I also had a Cahin King who refused all food, even Lizards, then finally ate a dead Corn snake. I know it's fairly safe when breeding, but I still get nervous.
 
One of the problems I have always had is trying to generalize!!!! As soon as I say the Kings, being well fed, won't eat a mate I'm likely to experience the exception to the generalization!!! I never thought corns would eat another corn and then i found a prized Okeetee hanging out of the mouth of a Anery.!!! When it was regurged, it was dead!!!! That's why I give everybody their own cage now.

Shalom,


Pat G_C
 
So, first thing I'd like to say is...

I thought this was supposed to be an informative topic, not an off-topic and overly heated debate about the right or wrong practises in breeding animals. In my opinion, honestly, you're all probably better off using the idiom "Ignorance is bliss.". This breeder employs a practise you don't agree with... don't deal with them. Wouldn't it almost be more cruel to have an animal you're not going to want to spend the proper time caring for than to just get rid of it? I'm pro-abortion, because if I were to ever get pregnant, I would not want to keep it or even get to the point of being in the hospital pushing it out. Granted, it's a lot of stress to put his animals through the process of laying each year for an unfavourable result, and he could probably even keep the most promising ones to work with a little bit and try to sell... But in the end, it's up to him. I would probably keep them all because I don't mind bite-happy snakes and would definitely try for a couple months to make sellable animals of them, but. None of you will likely affect his opinion or actions for future clutches, so all that this arguing is doing is making an unnecessarily long OFF-TOPIC thread. If you want to debate about the ethics in culling an animal, please, do it in a properly relevant thread so that people like myself can read the threads I want without having to sift through all the junk. I want to read about other people and their reasons for breeding, not an argument about right and wrong. That could go on till Armageddon come. So, please, for the sake of people interested in the original topic, move this debacle of a debate to a dedicated thread.

That said.

ON TOPIC!

My current main reason for wanting to breed my snake, is to prove out her genetics. I have no idea 100% what her genotype is, but she looks like anything from an ultramel anery to a ghost to a phantom to a platinum.... They're just so varied and all look so similar to me, although only one has looked exactly like her, and the only way I could possible find out for sure is to get a Phantom and a Ghost and breed her with each, one year after the other. The results will easily tell me what she is. The more hets I can get on each of the male breeders, the better, because then I can test for anything else that may be unknown. In particular, I think I'd need a motley ghost or phantom, test the theory of het mot. What I'll do with the babies... keep them of course :) maybe give a few away to some friends, try to sell one or two... keep the best looking ones as pets and potential future breeders.

Alas, this won't be for a couple years, she's barely 16 inches long, but she's an incredibly wonderful animal. Very calm, has never struck at me or even poised to strike, is great with young children (my 3 1/2 year old nephew can handle her fine when he's not high on chocolate), and is a vivacious feeder... I think she would produce some great show snakes as offspring, especially for educational purposes.

Would like to hear other people's reasons for getting into breeding/why they want to get into breeding :)
 
I got into corn snakes specifically to breed. I know that isn't the most noble reason, but there it is.

I thought it would be a good geeky hobby, to prove out genetics and such. I also fell in love with snakes.

I don't plan on making money, in fact at this point I would love to break even. Hobbies aren't about money to me but a labor of love.

I understand the risks involved in breeding, and I have to admit that I am more and more worried the closer it gets to having one of my beloved snakes actually lay eggs. You do grow attached to the snakes, as I think you should, and I don't want to see them go through undue stress and I definitely don't want to see one die.

I have had several snakes die on me since I started this hobby, and I think it hardens you. It makes you wonder why you spent hundreds of dollars onna snake with no good genetics only to have it die anyway. It makes you wonder if your well-bred snakes are going to die on you, and how much are they worth in vet bills.

With one snake, a pet snake, it is easy to know that it is worth whatever vet bills come. It is easy to see it as a pet. With 20 or 50 snakes, you can't think the same way. If a snake is born that is inferior, that will cost more time and money, that won't find a happy home, then what are you going to do?
Keep all of them is a good answer until you are up to hundreds of snakes only a handful of them being breeding snakes.

So, I think that breeding does in a way harden you. Reading about egg binding doesn't prepare you for aspirating eggs in your prized female that you have raised from an egg.

I think breeding is worth it for the passion and the joys, though. Seeing eggs pipping- seeing a successful pairing, getting babies to eat and grow, seeing the joy new owners have in their snakes you have sold them... Seeing new morphs pop out of eggs, seeing all the exitement of the corn snake breeding world.
 
Well I see my thread has risen from its peaceful grave... Drakkar, though the thread went off topic the argument was still semi relevant. Lot of threads go off topic just like any conversation in real life where one thing leads to another. Anyway I will stand by what I said back when the thread was still kinda new and I felt like I had stepped on someone's toes.
I don't think anybody should be told not to breed corns just because they are new. Just that if you are doing it go into it with your eyes open and know what it's really like.
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I am seeing a lot of this "you shouldn't breed! You don't know what you are doing!" and I hope the fact I started this thread didn't make people start to feel like it's OK to tell other people that kind of thing. I don't like to see that kind of stuff, if someone seems to need to be educated a little on their corns there are tactful and friendly ways to do this, confrontational and aggressive "you shouldn't breed!" statements are not the answer. I know it hits a strong nerve with some of us but I really don't think it helps and it turns people off to this forum so they go looking somewhere else for herp friends. I really just wanted to show how it isn't as easy as one might think and what kind of stuff can go wrong.
 
Draekaar, I can understand your frustration when subjects go off topic, but it happens. It wasn't planned, but quite frankly, if you look at the dates it's been well over 2 months since anyone even brought up the subject of "Culling". You may have just resurrected it?
 
ghosthousecorns said:
I am seeing a lot of this "you shouldn't breed! You don't know what you are doing!" and I hope the fact I started this thread didn't make people start to feel like it's OK to tell other people that kind of thing. I don't like to see that kind of stuff, if someone seems to need to be educated a little on their corns there are tactful and friendly ways to do this, confrontational and aggressive "you shouldn't breed!" statements are not the answer. I know it hits a strong nerve with some of us but I really don't think it helps and it turns people off to this forum so they go looking somewhere else for herp friends. I really just wanted to show how it isn't as easy as one might think and what kind of stuff can go wrong.
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Jen I have to admit that my first suspicion when I saw this thread was, that it was trying to discourage newbie breeders from thinking about breeding since the markets seemd flooded and breeders are already having a tough time. I don't think that was the intention and though this thread has taken some rabbit trails, i found it very interesting. Having said that, if any of you feel that discouraging new breeders will help the Corn Market, think again. A person wanting to buy a few Corns as pets will maybe buy 5 to 20 animals, but some one interested in breeding may buy much more. The market is like any other, it has ebbs and flows. People get in, and they get out, demand rises and falls, it's all very normal.
 
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