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Should I Use The Munson Plan?

Peanut Lover

Peanut Lover

New member
Hello Everyone! I have a 17 inch corn snake that is 17 grams (I just bought a weighing scale). I think that he might be under weight? I think I can see is spine! Does this sound like he is underweight? :confused: I have no idea how old he is.

I have only be feeding him 1 pinkie a week and I am about to move him up to 2 pinkies a week. I don't care about how big my snake gets, I just want him to be healthy (and not starving). I feel like the Munson plan looks like power feeding.

Any suggested alterations to the plan? I was going to do the same type of feeder per weight but do it once every 7 days instead of every 4-5 days or whatever it says. Any advice helps! Thanks!
 
A pic would help, but it's not unusual to be able to see the spine if the snake is tensed up or moving around.

The Munson Plan is a good starting point, but you can tweak it if it doesn't work as expected - each snake is slightly different.

One pinky every five days is pretty standard for hatchlings. I'd see powerfeeding as one every 3 days. If you feed two every 7 days, that averages out at 1.5 every 3 days which isn't much better than the powerfeeding scenario you want to avoid. Plus feeding two pinkies at a time is probably going to overtax the digestive system of one so small - I'd see it as a regurge risk.

I'd go with increasing to one every 5 days and see how he does. You can always increase again if you need to in a few weeks.
 
Yayyy that's good to hear! Well I feed him a pinky 1x a week right now. When/how is the best way to increase his meals?
 
Looking at those pics I agree with Lennycorn - he looks absolutely fine.

The general guideline is that (until on large mice) the food needs to leave a lump in his belly for 24-48 hours after eating. If the lump goes down sooner, that's a good time to try moving up a size.
 
I use the munson plan but i feed every 7 days, even when it says to do it every 5 days and my snake still looks healthy. When he gets older i might give him a mouse every 14 days.
 
Lennycorn said:
No!... use your plan and refer to his.
Click to expand...

lol, even though Dean hasn't posted here in .. years.. his name has gone down in infamy!

to the OP: I'm inclined to agree with the others who posted already. The Munson plan arose because Dean (Roy Munson) grew his snakes up very quickly and everyone wanted to know his feeding plan. I have doubts that raising snakes up very quickly is the safest and healthiest thing for the snake though. Under feeding is healthier than over feeding.
 
In fairness, Dean agreed at the time and the Plan as it exists is the "revised down" version. I'd say that it would promote sensible growth in most Corns, but given their individual metabolisms, it could be over- or under-feeding for some.

It's always best to keep your eye on your own animals and tweak feeding regimes as required. For example, most of my adult Corns are fed once every three weeks over the winter unless they have some sort of health problem or are still recovering from laying. That's just what works for me.
 
Sorry! As with most other things in life, Corn-related matter are rarely that clear-cut :)
 
I feel like as long as the snake (even a very young snake) gets an appropriately sized, nutritious meal (none of those skin and bones petstore mice) once every 5-14 days it will most likely not starve. A temperature gradient allows the snake to control their metabolism to a certain degree, so while a snake kept at high temps will use more energy and therefore need more food, a snake allowed to choose an area of its enclosure with lower temps will conserve energy and thrive on less food. My 09 gets a large hopper or small adult every 7-14 days. I've never kept a particularly strict schedule and he is just over 3 feet and about 280 grams. I think "underfeeding" is less dangerous than overfeeding or power feeding, so I wouldn't worry too much as long as your snake is eating nutritious mouse meals.
 
bitsy said:
In fairness, Dean agreed at the time and the Plan as it exists is the "revised down" version. I'd say that it would promote sensible growth in most Corns, but given their individual metabolisms, it could be over- or under-feeding for some.
Click to expand...

I've never personally followed the plan, but it's gotta be a good one. It's stood the test of time! I remember Dean advising as well that the plan worked for him, but it was not the ONLY way to raise corns. Very sensible. For the record I'm smitten for Dean, wish he would come back. ;)
 
In the beginning I tried to follow the plan but after a while I began just feeding once every 7 days and weighing once a month then using that weight and the size of the snake VS the sizes of feeders to find what to feed each snake. The plan in a great guide and really is not power feeding. Do you know I got accused of powerfeeding some snakes just because they were breeding size by 2 years of age? I only fed one snake more often than every 7 days and I only fed him every 5 days for 6 weeks, then every 6 days for 6 weeks before saying phooey and doing just every 7 lol. Much easier to feed the same day each week then worry about who eats when! Except with my biggest I have to keep track of which week is his no eat week. When I can not remember I just give him a hopper ;) Whilke my records are not the best my snakes look good!
 
I like to just feed everything once a week also. While it may grow the babies up faster to feed them a little more often, it can do some harm to keep giving a snake food every 4 or 5 days if it is a bit overweight, and it does not do any harm to grow them up slower. I'm also cautious about bumping up food sizes. I'm not in a hurry to get my snakes up to "breedable size" as it sometimes seems some breeders are, in a sort of race to be the first one with the next big morph. This is my hobby to relax and not a big business to me, so I do things my way which is slower. Many of my females don't reach what I consider a breedable size even as 3 year olds. If used carefully with a good eye for snakes that are losing their figure it doesn't hurt to feed more often, the problem is when people use it as a cookie cutter formula for all their snakes, and they may think everything is fine for a long time until the day they get an eggbound female that was simply grown up too fast and overfed.
 
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