Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I know someone will say "just examine them physically", but I dont trust physical appearance 100% in deciding a snake's gender. My large obsoleta is definitely a male but I think if most people saw the smaller one they'd say "well it could be female or just a lesser male", unless they have greater expertise in looking at almost identical tails. My snakes are WC and I'm not in the habit of probing them, at least not until they're willing to hold still. So if I put one in the male's tank and he takes great interest I assume it's a female. If a male immediately starts checking her out and gets the heebie jeebies would you deduce it has to be female?
I also have an emoryi and a pewter corn that love each other very much. They are always together and have mated several times, however it is the female that is sexually assertive and the male who plays hard to get. Does this sound likely? I have only the emoryi's tail to judge that he's the male while the corn could go either way (my breeder friend cracked her tail and said "I don't see anything so I guess female". What about the behavior though? I have 6 snakes in one tank that are visibly 3 males and 3 females (water snakes have sexual dimorphism) and completely ignore each other, but the females could be gravid for all I know because it takes so long. The obsoletas are the same way since the male's initial reaction.

Len

The only way that you will know for sure the sex of your snakes if you haven't seen them mate or lay eggs is to probe the animals. Visually examining the cloaca is not going to do you any good. The hemipenes are inverted. On some of my snakes, I could tell by just looking at the tail, but not on all of them. You can also try doing scale counts, but there are still animals who's counts will fall into a gray area where you just can't tell. If probing is done correctly, you get the right answer every time.

The fact that your snake takes interest in its new tank mate doesn't really amount to much. Any time I put in a foreign object (branch, rock, new water bowl, etc...) into my snakes' enclosures, they become more alert and usually tomgue flick the hell out of it and investigate. I think it just breaks up the monotony of a boring life in captivity.

Like Elaphe said above, probe your snakes. If they don't hold still, have someone hold the upper body of the snake for you or have a more experienced person do it for you. I suppose you could do scale counts too, but that's a pain in the butt and not always 100%.
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Diego

Diego & Tiffany's Zoo:
SNAKES
0.1.0 Boa Constrictor
1.2.0 Corn Snakes (Different morphs)
1.1.0 Hypo Everglades Rat Snakes
0.1.0 Amel Pacific Gopher Snake
2.1.0 Sonoran Gopher Snakes
0.1.0 Amel Sonoran Gopher Snake
1.1.0 Mexican Black Kingsnakes
1.1.0 California Kingsnake
3.2.0 Rosy Boas (Mexican, Temecula, & Bagdad)
1.1.0 Kenyan Sand Boas
0.1.0 Indonesian Dwarf Pacific Boa
1.1.0 Cape York Spotted Pythons
1.1.0 Western Hognoses
0.0.1 Lyre Snake
0.0.1 Glossy Snake
0.0.1 Shovelnose

LIZARDS
2.0.0 Bearded Dragons
1.0.0 African Fat-Tail Gecko
0.1.0 Merauke Blue Tongue Skink
1.4.2 Leopard Geckos
1.0.1 Yellow Niger Uromastyx
1.1.1 Chuckwalla
1.4.0 Banded Gecko
0.0.1 Gold Dust Day Gecko
1.1.3 Sandfish
2.0.0 Desert Iguanas

AMPHIBIANS
1.0.1 Green Tree Frogs
1.0.0 Bubbling Kassina
0.0.1 White's Tree Frog
0.0.2 Gold Frogs
1.0.0 Fire Salamander