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I just wanted to share my experiences so far with my pueblan apricot milk and gopher snakes as far as the temps and growth rates. I've had my milk since a hatchling....I picked her breed partially for the looks, but also because of the average adult sizes I read about online. I wanted a 3 foot or under snake for space/handling issues. She's 2yrs 8months old now, and 3ft 7 inches long, and still shedding and growing like a fiend. I've actually fed her on the slightly lean side (according to what I've read) due to my schedule.....but I'm a believer in keeping snakes healthy by keeping them warm, so her temps run slightly higher than the recommended temps. She was a small baby, but is now a very healthy looking beautiful adult. I see her reaching 4+ft easily at her current growth rate. I highly suspect the temps have had as much to do with her growth as any feeding schedule or genetics. My wildcaught gopher responded the same way growth wise as my milk...and he was a small juvie as well. I just purchased an Albino Nelsons, beautiful little hatchling, and will share my results as she grows. She's already starting out as an unusually big hatchling, so I imagine I'll end up having to re-arrange the den to accomodate a bigger tank down the road...as I don't see my 20 gallon long being a good long term home for her. I'm not trying to grow big snakes.....I just wanted them about the size I'd read about online. I don't want to under feed them just to keep them from taking up as much space...and I don't want to lower temps because they're thriving, tame, beautiful snakes now....but I'm kinda thinking some of the average size numbers listed on the web are a little mis-leading I really suspect that captive bred snakes are getting bigger as time goes on, because they are fed/taken care of better...and bigger captive bred adults are making bigger babies etc. Any feedback is more than welcome
BTW awesome site here

Pueblans regularly get up to 4ft. High temps don't make the snake bigger. Sufficient temps for proper digestion and regular meals will though.
How high are the temps you are keeping your snakes at?

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Randy Whittington

Randy is spot on here.Pueblans normally reach 4 foot as full grown adults so I am not sure where you read they would only hit three foot etc....
The temps may get them there a bit sooner but won't get them bigger overall.If you want a smaller milk go with a North American sub-species like a celaenops or gentilis or something.
As far as the gopher goes you are looking at a five footer easy.

Good luck there,
L8r

>>Randy is spot on here.Pueblans normally reach 4 foot as full grown adults so I am not sure where you read they would only hit three foot etc....
>>The temps may get them there a bit sooner but won't get them bigger overall.If you want a smaller milk go with a North American sub-species like a celaenops or gentilis or something.
>>As far as the gopher goes you are looking at a five footer easy.
>>
>>Good luck there,
>>L8r
Thanks for the feedback guys In all the research I've done on the net (which has been a lot)....all the care sheets/sites ect said the pueblans would be close to or a little under 3 feet as adults. I think even the care sheet for this site says that. And the nelsons info says around 42 inches for adults.....and since nelsons are supposed to be bigger than pueblans, and my pueb is already over 42 inches, I'm thinking I'm gonna have to at least upgrade the 20L tank I have for my nelson. All the web info said 20L's would be fine for adult puebs and nelsons I'm fine with the sizes overall, just wished I coulda got a little more accurate info off the net. It prolly woulda made a diff in the choice of snakes I have a snake-phobic wife who's been very accepting of the snakes as I told her they were smaller species as adults lol.
My gopher was prolly 2 1/2 ft when I caught him, I kept him for 4 years and in that time he thrived overall in captivity and was over 5 ft and still growing/shedding strong when I let him go. I have no clue how big he could have got. Even tho he was wc he was the tamest, best handling snake I've ever owned. I let him go because I couldn't stand to see him chewing his nose up constantly trying to get out.....that was no way for a wild snake to live. I still miss him lots tho
I usually run my ambient air temps in the mid 90's at the warm end, with ceramic heat emmitters or blacklights (depending on the season) according to my strip temp gauges. And upper/lower 70's at the cool end depending on day or night. I also give my snakes 4-5 inches of carefresh to burrow in too tho. And we turn the heat off at night. I just recently purchased digital temp gauges with probes tho, so now I'm monitoring the heat at the bottom of the substrate....and I've backed temps down some If you guys do some searching on milksnake caresheets/info through google you'll be suprised how off most of the listed average sizes for these snakes are..........honestly I'm going to add about 8 inches to a foot to everything I read from now on
One other thing I noticed is because of my schedule, I wasn't able to feed my snakes quite as often as I read they needed. So I stepped them up a bit quicker to bigger food, so even tho I fed them less, I was hoping they would still be getting the nutrition they needed. I know its the general concensus that smaller food items, given more often, promotes quicker growth. But for me, going from smaller more frequent feedings to less frequent, but bigger ones, (due to my schedule) I noticed the opposite. As I stepped the food size up, they seemed to jump up the growth rate to match. I suspect their bodies were adapting to what they "perceived" to be bigger prey, so maybe they were adjusting their size to better handle the bigger food?
All I can say is snakes sure are fascinating creatures

Shannon,

I've also noticed several places posted care sheets/information sheets that say Pueblans average 3 feet at adulthood. I found that odd, too. Maybe they're talking about average size at maturity/breedable size. I don't know.
I bought a proven breeder (female) from Dave Niles a couple of years ago. When I measured her she was 33", if I remember correctly.
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