Sorry that I am late in responding Jonathan, I've been out of town for a few days.

i have to say that your post is very informative.

Thank you!

most of the other breeders that i have heard from are all huge fans of the small deli cup approach. personally, i have always tried to keep my reptiles as pets. by this i mean spacious cages that have at least some semblance of being a natural setup.

Well, I think you pointed out the main word on who the deli cup method is generally adopted by, "breeders", and one of the primary reasons for this is for space although there are several other reasons. You can easily keep 10x the amount (or more) of hatchlings in small deli cups versus shoebox tubs. There's a lot of breeders that produce large amounts of hatchlings that in no way could keep all of those individuals in shoeboxes with the amount of space required for that. Plus, keeping in deli cups allows for already packaged snakes for shipping, so that's a win-win.

To me, and this is just my own personal mindset, is that deli cup keeping severely limits the activity of the hatchling as well as being able to offer choices for the hatchling to explore and determine what it likes to do.

Even though I definitely have enough animals to easily produce 500 hognose every year, I instead choose to only breed as many animals as I can keep in shoeboxes so that I can offer them something a bit better than just a deli cup to be kept in.

i traded for a western hog conda female awhile back. i put her in a larger cage, and she stopped eating for 3 weeks. i moved her to a small cage with the same hides and such. within a week of moving she ate. i wonder if this is from her being used to the small container the previous owner had her in?

It's very hard to say what was/is going on with that particular individual as there can be so many factors in why some snakes can be transported and put into a new environment and do well while others respond negatively. Like you mentioned, it could be that she was already conditioned to being kept in small surroundings and that gave her a certain seclusion and privacy that she was raised into needing. It could also be other factors as well, from environmental changes such as temps (ambient room temps as well as housing temps), unfamiliar smells, more or less surrounding activity (ie people walking by more) and even the change of mice used to feed, some just smell different than others. Of course all of this is a huge checklist to go through, but these are things that can definitely trigger negative responses such as a normally feeding snake into a non-feeding one.

Having mentioned the difference in mice, I have found that I have some hogs that are very picky when it comes to what f/t mice they will eat. I do breed my own mice but I also have to purchase f/t mice from other vendors because I don't always produce enough of my own for all of my snakes. Well, this one particular vendor that I used to buy from for years always sent me mice that actually had a smell like they came from people that smoked, the bag and contents always smelled like an ashtray. Now, I'm not saying they were contaminated with smoke or anything, but they did have a particularly strong odd odor to them. Anyways, the majority of my snakes never had a problem eating mice from this particular vendor, but I've always had 5-10% of my collection that simply refused those particular mice, I'd put one in and 2 hours later it would still be there completely being ignored by the snake or even completely avoided with the snake not going anywhere near it. I would then pull that mouse and offer it one of my homegrown mice and those would be instantly devoured right off the tongs. So that tells me that some individuals have much stricter preferences than others. Obviously, not all mice are created nor preferred equally.

kind of related... i acquired a sub adult bp a month ago. i put her in the same size cage that i have my other bp's in. she didn't eat for 3 weeks either. i spoke with the previous owner, switched her back to a small tub like he had her in, and 3 days later she ate. i have raised hatchling bp's to adults in the same size cages though and never had issues.

Again, we could be talking about conditioning or a matter of personal security that is preferred by the individual. While I have 3 balls myself, I keep mine in fairly limited sized tubs although I do plan to change that just to see how well they respond to larger accommodations, but they've always done well in their "cramped" quarters. Could that all change if I double their capacity? I guess I'll find out once I finally make that transition.

But in regards to my hogs, I've received a lot of hogs over the years from breeders that I knew were kept in deli cups, in fact, were shipped in what they were raised in, but I've never seemed to have an issue when introducing them in larger surroundings, in fact, it's always fun and interesting to see them take a vested interested in exploring their new surroundings and ultimately deciding on what they like, whether that's burrowing in the rabbit pellets, finding security under the water bowl or deciding to spend their time in the moss hide. Regardless, they are usually very active and I've never felt that any of my newly acquired snakes ever had problems adapting to the shoeboxes.

seems to be a pattern. i am not sure if it's from what the snake is comfortable with naturally, or if it's a matter of the size they are used to from being raised as hatchlings.

And of course that is the million dollar question, what specifically are these individual snakes responding to positvely and negatively. We as keepers have to be especially observant and fully understand that care sheets are often generic guidelines that work for the majority of animals kept by those specific breeders (considering that not all care sheets are identical), so with that in mind, we have to try to figure out why some individuals are "going with the program" and make the necessary changes to accommodate the individual.

have you ever experimented with cage size and eating frequency?

Oh definitely! In regards to cage size, I have found that the adult females I keep in larger enclosures are often far more active and will readily race towards me or the food source more so than those kept in smaller quarters (considering that we're talking about relatively same-sized females). They almost tend to be faster and more of a handful than those in the smaller tubs. Is this because they have more room to get more exercise? Perhaps. Either way, my way of thinking is that even if you dedicated an entire bedroom to just a single hognose, it's still a far smaller enviroment than they will ever have in the wild, so if possible, I at least try to give them the biggest tubs I can house them in and I believe I see better results because of it.

As far as feeding goes, I definitely go against the grain of my peers and probably underfeed more than overfeed. That's not to say that I starve my snakes, I just don't feel the need to keep pushing food in their face every couple of days. Snakes, like every animal out there, is an opportunity eater, in other words, when presented with food, they'll usually gobble it down simply because they don't know when their next meal will come, it's the feast and famine way of the world. So what I do is simply walk into my snake room every day and see which snakes are cruising their tubs and the others that choose to hide and rest. I usually feed once a week but there are those that are actively moving 3-4 days after eating which in my mind means they are looking for food, that's when I offer it to them on a more frequent basis. For the others that are less active, they are usually waiting for me when it comes time for the weekly normal feeding day.

There are many people that feed a lot more frequently than I do and their animals raise up and mature faster than mine do and that is their choice to do so and many of them have a lot of success doing that, it's just not my style in doing things.

I've witnessed plenty of inactive overweight burned out snakes in the 20 years I've been keeping reptiles and I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that reptiles in the wild are built to be very active while also partaking in the whole feast and famine way of the world. In captivity, they lose a lot of the ability to be as active and only in the cases of extreme neglect does the famine part come to pass, and only then is it pure famine until the point of death.

I still have my original lavender kingsnake that I've had for 20 years, she's lean fast and mean. I only feed her about once every 2-3 weeks and that is usually an adult mouse. I attribute her longevity due to the fact that I've never overfed her and that she's always had enough space in her enclosure to keep her fairly active which keeps her lean. When compared to other captives, she might look a little thin, but then again, how many fat snakes do you see in the wild and how many keepers actually have a colubrid that is 20 years old?

Anywho, that's what works for me!

that is a beauty in the pic! red albino conda?

Thank you! Actually no, that's a Pink Pastel Anaconda, 1 of 2 that I produced earlier this year from pairing a 100% het Pink Snow (Axanthic & Pink Pastel) male to a 100% het Pink Pastel Superconda female. Out of 6 eggs, we got 2 male Pink Pastel Anacondas and 4 Normal females that are 66% het Pink Pastel and all 6 are also 50% het Axanthic.
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Troy Rexroth
Rextiles

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