Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi guys,

Ive been keep corns and kings for sometime now. It bouts time I give my hand at attempting to breed them. I've been looking for someone in the Baton Rouge, LA area to show me the ropes at properly sexing a snake, as I've heard probing isn't something that should be done by a novice alone. If anyone knows of someone in that area I'd appreciate some contact info.

In the meantime, I was hoping some of you experience ole timers could tell me my 10 year old MBK sex by visuals. I know some of you experienced guys might be able to. I picked him up at an expo, labeled as male, but it was a small expo and of course everyone can make a mistake at sexing. I noticed two prominate "lumps" or "bulges" posterior to the vent on both sides. Are these the hemipenes?

Thanks a ton guys!

i think that snake is too big to pop. The guy who sold me my milks, A DMV, pushed a straight probe up the clacoa (sp?). He said if it goes far its a female. Im in the dark like you, but thats what a veterinarian told/showed me.

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2.1 Thayeri
1.1 Nelsoni

Yeah I figured he'd be too big to pop at this point. According to all the info I read a males musculature is too strong when developed. As for the probing, from what I've read 8-15 caudal scale length is male, nelow 8 female. I'd really would want someone to show me how before I even attempted on my own though.

When probing - if it goes far it is a male, not a female.

While mis-sexed snakes are common, usually the mistake is the other way - females that are labeled as male, not males that are labeled as female.

A large percentage of breeders sex by popping - and it seems that a large percentage of them are not very good at it.

But when sexing by popping - it only gets labeled male if they see the hemipenis - in which case it is a male. If they don't see the hemi-penis, there are two possibilities -

It can be a female, and thus not have them.
It can be a male, and they simply failed to get it to pop out.

You MBK looks male to me, but I've been wrong when looking at tails before. If it was labeled male, it probably is. That probably means it either probed or popped male - a female will never pop male and a female will very rarely probe male (I believe they can if they are damaged).

-=-

My little brothers corn popped female at the show we bought it at (september last year). But it had a male looking tail to me - so a couple months ago I probed it. It probed female on one side, but I checked the other side and it probed male. Went back to the side that probed female, and it then probed male - so the resistance I felt wasn't as far as the probe could go. Sperm plug maybe? It's less than a year old, about 20 inches long - but I've heard of them breeding that small, so maybe.

Anyway - if the dealer did any kind of checking other than just a wild ass guess, males sold as female are more common than females sold as males.
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3.6 L. getula californiae - 16 eggs (Cal. King)
1.1 L. getula nigrita (MBK)
1.0 Pantherophis guttatus guttatus (Corn)
0.1 Pituophis catenifer catenifer (Pacific gopher)
3.3 Elgaria multicarinata multicarinata - 14 eggs (Cal. Alligator Lizard)

That picture is kind of dark. Could you take one with a lighter back ground like holding it in front of a white paper? It does look a lot like a male but I've seen and had female kings with tail shapes a lot like that. Some females tail tapers right away (after the vent) but some are thick then taper. Most males are thick (like that) after the vent and taper very gradually and have longer tails. If you could get the entire tail in the picture it would make it easier too.

Here's male and female Cal kings.

Male

Two females

Hope that helps.

Either your vet is wrong or you missunderstood what he said to you...

When you are probing a snake you are looking to identify the presence of inverted hemipenes... When probing you insert the probe and if it goes in far (indicating hemipenes) then it is a male.. If the probe only goes in a few scales (indicating the lack of hemipenes) then the snake is a female.

Some snakes are fairly easy to sex just by looking at them and some are more difficult. If i had to guess by looking at thet photo of your snake i would say I am about 95% sure it is a male.

~ Mike Russo