Reptile & Amphibian Forums

We have a 2 yr old Motley Corn who has been a good aggressive eater since he was a baby but now he has not eaten in three weeks. Do Corns have a metabolic slowing in the winter where they brumate like Bearded Dragons? His fecal exam was negative. Should we be worried? He's always eaten two frozen pinkies or two fuzzies per week. I hate to offer live prey because then he will want it all the time, and I prefer frozen because it kills parasites. We are wide open to suggestions. Many thanks,
Nancy and Josiah Latthitham

This probably isn't related to the problem but it seems that your feeding schedule is too slim. A 2 year old corn snake should be fully grown, is yours? If so, then adult mice are a more appropriately sized prey item. Frozen/thawed mice are fine and 3 weeks of inappetence is not a concern. With both your snakes and beardies, monitor temps closely. If not planning on properly brumating the temps should be the same. You may have to increase the wattages or thermestats if your room cools in the winter. In addition to cooler temps, another possibility if a male is an early onset of breeding season, in which he is thinking of other things.
If your snake isn't at least 4 feet by now it is further evidence that you need to reassess your feeding schedule.
Do you have a gram scale? If a reptile loses 10% body mass then it is time to consider intervention and if not done already, it is time to visit the vet.

Thanks for your thoughtful response.

Slick is 4'2" and has grown steadily since he was a baby. His temps in his cave range between 80 - 90 according to the digital probe we have in there. The undertank pad I had in there was pushing it up to 100 at times so I switched to an overhead ceramic heating element on a lamp stand so I can adjust the height to tweek the temp range with the weather. He comes out every night and is quite active. When he eats his two fuzzy mice it seems like they barely fit in his mouth, and then they look so huge going down. Not only is he long but he's really thick so I've been worried about overfeeding him or that his prey items were too big. I'd hate to switch to live since he's happily eaten frozen/thawed his whole life, but I will if needed to stimulate him to eat again. But it sounds like three weeks with out eating is nothing to get all alarmed about. So do you recommend just continuing to offer him a frozen/thawed mouse every week until he eats? Thanks again for the help. I appreciate it.

Sounds like a good plan.

A general rule of thumb is offering prey items with the same girth as the fattest part of the snake. A little bigger or a little smaller is fine too