Dan:

As far as differences, I’ve read that easterns are known to brumate in large groups in the water of old wells. I’ve heard that some easterns have been known to feed on some odd non-warm-blooded prey from time to time. I’ve read that western foxsnakes are more likely to be found in open fields than easterns are.



That being said, I’ve raised both types (species, subspecies, whatever) and they both seem to have thrived under the same conditions. I’ll tell you what’s worked for me.



Hatchlings feed voraciously first on live pinks then quickly and easily switch over to thawed. They grow rapidly and are pretty feisty. They will tolerate a reasonable amount of handling. I give both the juveniles and adults a deep layer of soft substrate. They will plow through this endlessly and later on it seems to minimize the amount of destructive snout pressing they do. This can seriously damage their heads due to the great pressure they use. So I see a deep substrate layer as a cheap health insurance policy for your foxsnakes’s nose.



Once they have been brumated they become very temperature limited on feeding. In other words snakes that have been brumated won’t eat when it gets too hot. I usually don’t brumate them until they’re 24 months old. So you skip brumating for the first two winters. During this time they will grow very rapidly. When you are no longer able to maintain an ~ 85 / 75 degree gradient in their cage the adults will probably stop eating. This isn’t a bad thing. Just feed them often in the cooler weather and don’t get upset when they start refusing food in the summer. If you manage to trick them into eating anything too big during the hot weather you do run the risk of regurgitation. This is quite dangerous in the long run and could seriously harm or kill your foxsnake if it happens repeatedly. They probably will resume eating for a while in the fall but brumation is getting close so be sure not to go too far into the fall or you may shorten the brumation too much. As is commonly noted in the popular herp husbandry literature you can stop feeding on Halloween, turn off the heat on Thanksgiving and in my treatment of foxsnakes turn the heat back on after St. Patrick’s Day. My basement reaches a low temperature of between 40 - 45 degrees in the winter. I’m really not sure what minimum temperature or duration of cold is necessary for foxsnakes to allow fertility. I have heard from some folks down south that they couldn’t get it cold enough for foxsnakes to breed down there.



The foxsnakes are very agressive breeders and I have observed that male/male combat increases the intensity of male courting response. Needless to say this can definitely work to your advantage if you want to time breeding to fit a schedule or to allow you to witness mating. Once the male is interested in the female he’ll chase her around the cage in an endless ribbon of flying foxsnakes. Once he’s latched onto her neck or body with a love bite he’ll be able to anchor himself to her for the actual copulation. It should probably be a miniseries on the Animal Channel.



Clutch size for me has been around ten. I’ve used room temperature incubation in a perlite or vermiculite medium and hatching occurred in 54 days.



They’re not the tamest ratsnakes and they can be kind of sneaky. A few days ago I was handling one of my female easterns and as she calmly crawled along my forearm she latched on with her mouth open almost 180 degrees. No gratitude for the fine care I’ve given her prospective offspring. Such is gratitude.



They’re not gaudily colorful but they are pleasing to some (me included). The eastern males do get a nice reddish coloration especially during the spring. Maybe it’s a mating display? They don’t get enormous so they don’t take up a huge amount of space.



If you have any questions, please write and I’ll try to point you in the right direction for info.

John

[ Show Entire Thread ]