• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

Switching from frozen to live?

bahab

bahab

New member
Hello everyone. I have my corn snake that could be a few months old that only eats 1 frozen pinkie/week. One thing that concerns me is the way it eats the pinkie. There is no grasping of the frozen carcass; it opens its mouth, looks like it's biting for a second, and starts to swallow. I really want to switch to live pinkies, but I am wondering since it may have been fed frozen all its life, could there be any complications as to feeding live?

I am worried there would be a situation where it will swallow a live pinkie that might be able to hurt him from the inside if it doesn't bother to kill it. My main reason for wanting to feed live is to keep its ability to kill and defend itself. It doesn't seem to use his body at all when it feeds so is that possibly because it knows it's already dead in a way? I tried to tug n' pull the frozen pinkies away from him to stimulate aggression to fight but it just keeps holding onto it with its mouth. I need advice/opinions :eatsmiley
 
My male corn sometimes did this until he was 4 or 5 months old, other times he striked. I have always fed him f/t and always strikes now, but I do tease him a bit and shake the pinkies so he does not become lazy. I only fed him once live and he striked badly, didn't kill the pinky and started swallowing it alive. The pink just choked after a few seconds.
I have seen many young corns just swallow right away with no intention to strike. I guess as they age they start striking if you tease them. If you just leave the dead pinky there on the viv/feeding deli I guess they are not that interested and just swallow.

I wouldn't feed live prey bigger than a fuzzy, even under close supervision (although at fisrt I thought of switching to live prey when mice were old enought to be kept alive a while longer). Sooner or later your snake will probably get scratched or biten. Better prevent this and the extra cares/infections it could cause.
 
I do not consider myself an expert. Therefore, take my comment with a grain of salt: unless you intend on releasing your pet into the wild, I don't see why it matters if (s)he is aggressive?
 
There's no reason to feed live, when your snake already readily eats frozen/thawed.
You are putting your snake in danger by switching to live feeding.
Even if the snake does strike and coil it's prey, there is always the chance that the prey will fight back and injure, or possibly end up killing your snake.

These snakes are not in a natural environment. They are in an enclosure, with no means of escape.
That also means, that if you put live prey in with the snake, the prey has no where to run, to get away from the snake, so it's only option is to fight, or die.
When an animal is fighting for it's life, it can do severe damage.
Do you really want to take that chance of having a large vet bill to care for an injured snake, or possibly end up with your snake dying from injuries sustained from the rodent?

My advise, is keep feeding frozen/thawed mice to your snake.
 
A lot of young snakes (on pinkies) don't constrict when they go for the mouse. When they move up to larger mice, they usually start. I have one that's two years old that rarely constricts, she just grabs the mouse from me and starts eating.

Let your tiny snake put on some weight, feed it what it already eats. When it gets up to fuzzies or hoppers, if you want to see it constrict (assuming it's not by then), wiggle the mouse a little after the snake has taken it. Once they've decided they want the mouse, they're not going to give it up.


And here's this tasty treat (*graphic*) :

http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/showthread.php?t=139996
 
That is ok... That is a perfectly fine way for the little snake to eat... I have one adult that does the same, and some of the other constricts.. if he's eating he's fine!
 
bahab said:
Hello everyone. I have my corn snake that could be a few months old that only eats 1 frozen pinkie/week.
Click to expand...

What does he weigh? If he is still on pinkies and is pretty small, you may want to up his feedings to every 5 days. Here is a pretty decent feeding plan that will help him grow. And, this may be a dumb question, but you are feeding him frozen then THAWED pinkies, right? I have heard of people trying to feed them mousicles, still frozen.

Munson Plan
 
I have 3 snakes. They are all more than 2 years old. 2 are corns and one is a ball python. ONLY my ball strikes and constricts the mouse before eating it. My corns just find the head and start to eat.

It's not a big deal if your snake doesn't strike and constrict.
 
Oh no I thaw the pinkies real good before I feed him :) Nice and warm.
I checked his weight a few days ago and it was at ~23/28g. Your guide recommends fuzzies at his weight. Maybe I'll do 2 pinkies for him to finish the rest of the food I have and I'll start on that. It just started to shed, so he will not be eating for a while. Random question: If it is about the weight I describe, could you guesstimate the age of my corn snake?

Thanks for all your advice. Very good input!
 
Depends on previous feedings and how the shop/breeder where you got it (? not sure if you sad the gender) was feeding it. Just as a guide, mine is turning 6 months and is at about 24-25gr. So I guess yours should be maybe around 7 months or 8?
 
If you're feeding frozen/thawed, please stay with that! Safer for the snakes in the long run. I've got a variety of feeding responses. Some take them from my fingers and swallow, the others viciously rip them from my fingers and flail them around, and others snatch it quickly and coil it. But it's always peace of mind knowing my snake won't be harmed by a live mouse.
 
Your corn is a 2014, if you want to make up a "birthday," Mid June is when most of mine hatch. Agreed a pink a week is not enough, just be careful moving up in prey size. The Munson plan is a bit aggressive, I stay to the smaller side of prey items.
 
Our corn snake (Legolas) is about 70g, he never constricted his food either until our last feeding. Last time my husband decided to wiggle and drag the mouse all over the feeding bin for some excitement. After some pulling while latched onto the mouse, Legolas actually coiled around the pry, and stayed coiled up for a few minutes afterwards.

Once your snake is bigger, maybe you can wiggle the thawed mouse around a bit to trigger its instinct to constrict.
 
If you think about what a corn snake does naturally, it makes sense for a hatchling not to strike and constrict. If it comes across a nest of pinkie mice in the wild, or even young fuzzies, it's not like they're going to escape very quickly. My snakes started constricting when they were about 2 years old, both of my adults, with no prompting from me.

I agree with all the others about the reasons not to feed live if it can be helped! And I agree that your snake was probably born last summer, and that a "light" version of the Munson plan has served us well. :)
 
I raised a gopher snake for 15 years. He got a bad intestinal parasite and was fed live for about 12 years and vet said that more than likely it came from live mice and freezing kills most of the parasites.

Brian
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top