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Nonfeeder success!!

it's great you got the babe to eat!!

it frustrates me when people don't take the time to find out WHY the snake isn't eating. i understand some large-scale breeders don't have the time to get all the non-feeders started, and what usually happens is they offer them free to a good home, or else very cheap.

big breeders like that usually have their temps and everything under control, but it's a different story when the owner/keeper is not willing to try.

we had a situation last year with a pair of Anery hatchlings that we sold to *what we thought* was a good pet store. turns out they're idiots, just like the rest. sorry to generalize, but come on.

basically they took both snakes and put them in a 10 gallon viv, TOGETHER, with other snakes (i think an amel and a snow) from a completely different breeder/clutch. they called us about a month later saying the babies wouldn't eat. which i found very strange, as they had eaten like little monsters for us! i asked them what their set-up was, and the said they're all in the same tank with a couple other corns, and a ceramic heat emitter for a heat source.

WELL DUH!!! i started in on them about co-habbing the snakes, and they snapped right back "well OBVIOUSLY we separate them for feeding!"

and cue the cohab lecture...yadda yadda yadda. they were very rude to me on the phone, and i'm honestly not sure what happened to the snakes. it breaks my heart, but you can only do so much.

don't know why i just wrote all that, but i am very glad your snake ate for you! good luck with the snow as well, that snow is GORGEOUS!
 
Squamish, I know what you mean. It's really irritating when people just don't even try... Obviously, the breeder (small scale, he only had ONE clutch of corns, and this season will be his first time with more than ONE clutch [and still only 3 or 4]) didn't put any effort into it. He only offered the very basic, live and f/t, without even giving scenting a try. And he obviously didn't take into consideration whether he could have been doing anything wrong, care-wise... Probably didn't bother checking his heat, or even bother taking into consideration that maybe his lack of hiding places or even a burrowable substrate was having an effect.

It bothers me to no end. Honestly, I'd rather have had to pay $20-30 apiece and have them be hearty eaters because the breeder put effort into fixing the problems. It's nice to have gotten such a good deal on healthy animals that just needed a nudge in the right direction, but it's really sad to think about the incredibly unfortunate reason I was able to get such a good deal...

I just hope it made him rethink his care regiment, when I was able to do in one week what he couldn't do in 3 months.

Oh, and these two still need names! Anyone have ideas? :p
 
Love the somewhat 'chalky' look of the snow and the intense orange spots on the amel are promising for the future!
 
Considering how easy and cheap it is to care for corn snakes correctly, why oh why would you do it wrong?

Sigh.

I just bought a lavender from a girl who was cohabbing it with a larger snake, in a 10 gallon. I know her from school, and I like her, but she is clueless about snakes- despite having a couple.
This is a beautiful lavender, but SKINNY. I asked her what she had been feeding it.
Six pinkies at a time. The snake looks plenty big enough for hoppers (if she wasn't so scrawny). Why was she feeding it pinkies?

The pet store never had live hoppers in stock. And she only feeds live.
(I know several local mouse breeders and two pet stores that have cheap f/t of all sizes.)

Sigh.

I try to not let it get to me, but SERIOUSLY? The internet is full of plenty of info... and she has my phone number. She has the resources to do it right.

But, I have to give her credit for selling me one of the snakes in order to give her other snake more care (and its own viv).
 
Blutengel-- Thanks for the comments. I'm looking forward to what they grow into, with how nice they already look! :)

Naagas-- You really have to wonder sometimes, I know... That's horrible about your schoolmate, but hopefully her getting rid of the one is a sign that she's pulling her head out of her bum and will improve the other's care...

Just today, a customer came into the pet store looking to get 3 live pinky mice. My manager mentioned she had just a tiny corn snake... (Might I mention here, the last time my manager saw the snake was when she bought it in AUGUST. I'm sure we all know how much a corn can grow in 7 months.) So I asked the customer how big the corn was, if she was feeding it THREE pinkies at a time, but it wasn't big enough for fuzzies?

She informed me that her HEAD wasn't big enough for the fuzzies. And that she tried a frozen (so--this snake DOES take frozen, but she feels the need to feed live??? ... I didn't even bring it up, but still) fuzzy once, but changed her mind and decided not to do it again because... Get this... It stretched the snake out! OMG! I asked her if the snake had regurged the fuzz... No. But she didn't want to make the snake go through the "pain" of eating such a big meal again... HUH?

So I went on to explain that the bigger meal is HEALTHIER. It doesn't hurt the snake to eat an appropriately sized meal; in fact it should eat something that makes a lump. I pointed out that if the food item isn't making a lump anymore then it's too small.. "Well, that's why I'm feeding her 3 pinkies instead of 2." Uuugh...

I didn't even bother discussing the live issue with her... But I did tell her exactly why bigger prey is better than several smaller items, asked her to take a look at CS.com, and even suggested she weigh the snake and take a look at the Munson Plan to get an idea of what it should be eating... So I guess I can only cross my fingers and hope.

At least she wasn't trying to feed it crickets. One of the interns at the store and I were talking to a customer once, and the customer asked what tiny baby corn snakes eat... The intern said "At this size, they eat crickets!" Oi vey. I'm just glad I was standing there and able to set the record straight.

People... Sometimes, really! At least, another customer made up for the first later in the day. She came in for crickets and frozen pinkies for her beardies and her daughter's corns. We got to talking after she almost bought a corn snake book, and she mentioned that she always hits the internet and looks for sound advice when she has issues with or questions about her herps. I went ahead and wrote the links to CS.com and BD.org on a piece of paper, along with the titles of Don Soderberg's and Kathy Love's books... She was excited and sounded very eager to go online, check out the sites, and maybe order the books... Now THAT is the kind of person I like. One that actually gives a crap about doing the best by her (and even her kids') pets. It's just such a shame that they're so few and far between...

Anyway, sorry about the rant. Guess I got carried away. :p
 
I'm really glad to hear you had such an awesome success with TWO babies!! I got 2 non-feeders at a show. Spent $14 for them. They were a (SUPER CUTE) bloodred het hypo (And maybe pied, since i got my pied from the same guy a year before, and her diffusion is KILLER!) and a sulfur. The bloodred was really picky, but slowly she started eating regularly. The sulfur didn't want anything to do with mice, lizard scented mice, lizards, chicken scented, or other assorted methods i tried.

But I still have my blood, and she's just awesome. :]
 
Thanks, Sacred! Sucks about the Sulfur, I bet s/he was a beauty, too... But at least you got the one going! :)
 
Naagas said:
Taylor- crickets, seriously? Ha. Lucky you were there.
Click to expand...

I know, right??? I'd like to have seen the look on my own face. I imagine it was some mixture of horror and "What the hell have YOU been smoking???"

What made it worse was, after I corrected the intern and she walked away, I got to talking to the customer... Her son used to have a snake he fed CRICKETS. Then he moved up to a bigger snake that ate EARTHWORMS. Then, finally, he moved up to a HUGE snake that ate mice. Now that was horrifying. I'm not even sure I want to know what kind of incredibly unfortunate snake the first two were.. Probably a corn snake and a ball python! At least she learned something... And she later assured me that was 20 or 30 years ago, so at least it wasn't some recent horrorfest. :p
 
It amazes me every day at work, how many people come into the store wanting to get something for their animal, having done no research what-so-ever on the animal in question, and when told what they wanted for it is the wrong thing, they tell me that I am a liar and have no idea what I am talking about....
 
Thought I'd post an update about these guys. Both are still doing great, and eating everything in sight. The Amel even ate in blue today! :) (Sucks for the ferret--she was going to get his pinky if he decided not to eat... Heh!)

Both of them weighed in at 13 grams today. I believe they were around 6-7 grams when I got them? Forgot to write it down... But the point is, they're growing!

So, here are a couple pics, taken at last week's feeding. By the way, these two still don't have names! I suck with names... If anyone has a suggestion, I'd be happy to hear it. :)
61286_141918_Large_nLAjUL2iRIsP1q5.jpg

61287_141920_Large_BtQeC8BdS1OpsUb.jpg

61287_141921_Large_URpEeUzSkP.jpg

Sorry for the crappy lighting on that last one. Flash washes him out, and I guess my camera's neat "super macro with LED light" feature just doesn't quite cut it... :p

Thanks for reading! :)
 
I am so thrilled for you! I just got my non-feeding PetCo snake to take a pink and it made my week! :D

I kind of think they should be Romulus and Remus. ;)
 
Thanks! Congrats on your success, as well, Jessica! Love the names... Definitely on the list! :)
 
You've got a gopher, awesome! Me have two!

Is the snow a regular snow or maybe also diffused? I love that powdered white look on them!
 
Thanks for the comments!

Blutengel, yep, and I love the little guy! He's a whopping 83 grams now. He was 27 g when I got him last October... My little boy is growing up! <3 Here's a shot of him from last week...
53363_141914_Large_h5u6bcxlHAx6.jpg


On the Snow, I don't believe there's anything else going on--at least visually. He has belly checks, so he's not diffuse. They are supposedly het charcoal, but that's it for known genetics. I was told their dam is blizzard het anery, and the sire's lineage is unknown beyond being homo snow, though he looked a lot like he might be homo diffuse... No visible pattern, pretty stark white. Lovely snake, but tough to say what's going on genetically. :)
 
Thanks, Deserae!

Blutengel, your female is stunning! My little guy's temperament is great. He can be a little flighty sometimes, but he's never struck and he's never actually hissed. He really doesn't have any of the Pituophis attitude I've always heard about...
 
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