Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a hatchling snow corn that aet a f/t pinky, shed, ate a second f/t pinkey but has totally refused everything since. I have tried f/t, cut off head and squeeze out brain fluid, rubbed with fence lizard, offered small live fence lizzard. Tommorrow I will offer live pinkey and if that doesnt work then a small anole. I am not hopefull of any of these working. I know that they can be difficult to start feeding but has anyone had one stop feeding after it started? Temp. is 90 degrees in hot end and 80 at cool end. Other hatchling eats like a pig under same conditions. I know that some just arent destined to make it but it just seems odd that it already started eating.

Any suggestions?

I had a similar problem. Here's what worked wonders for me. Snakes can't resist...

Hold the snake in one hand (not directly behind head; give it some decent neck wiggle) and the pinkie in the other (use a tweezers, forceps, or pliers). I hit the holding instrument with a butane lighter to sterilize first.

Then, wave the pinkie in the snake's face. Eventually it will strike. Once it does, it instinctively starts to swallow. On my son's king snake the other day, it ate it right down. I slowly let go of the pink when it was halfway down. With my milk the other day, it kept doing it, but always spit it out. After a half dozen attempts with the milk, I cupped the milk with the pink and covered with a hide. Came back in a couple hours to a missing pink and a snake with a lump. I think the pink now had enough of the snake's scent on it to make it go back and eat.

If it doesn't strike after waving/wiggling in it's nose, you can gently slap it on the neck/tail with the pink to aggravate the snake.

I had a LIVE pinkie in with the SAME finicky king snake and it did NOTHING with it. In fact, the pink tried to suckle the snake. It was very disturbing...

Good Luck,

Walt

"the pink tried to suckle the snake"
That is very funny.lol
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1.0 Albino Corn "Lucky"
1.0 Snow Corn "Snow"
0.0.4 Southern Ringneck "Collar", "Bc", "Lazy", "Biggie"
1.0 Green Amevia "Gizard"

Cornsnakes don't need 90 degree temps... mid-70s to mid-80s are what they do best at. That having been said, there are a gazillion different remedies for nonfeeding or formerly feeding hatchlings, none of which work for all snakes. Best you can do is try em all and see what works. (The oddest one I've heard of recently is tuna scenting...)

-Kat
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"Oh, you've read a book? How quaint." -my sister

>>Cornsnakes don't need 90 degree temps... mid-70s to mid-80s are what they do best at. That having been said, there are a gazillion different remedies for nonfeeding or formerly feeding hatchlings, none of which work for all snakes. Best you can do is try em all and see what works. (The oddest one I've heard of recently is tuna scenting...)
>>

When it was suggested to me I thought, "no way" but I had been force feeding my snakes for a couple of months while alternating through the different feeding techniques and gave it a try.
I obviously had nothing to loose.
It jump started two non feeders.
You just let the pinkie soak in a little tuna fish juice (water juice only not syrup). Throw it in with the non feeder and leave them alone for a little while.
For the next couple of feedings I just used a little less juice.
The first time I soaked the pinkie in the jucie for a little while.
The next feeding I just droped it in some juice and pulled it right back out.
The following week I just dipped the head in the juice and the next week nothing.
They are still eating and have never missed a meal since.
They will always be in my "pet" collection. I would be worried to breed them. I would hate to produce more non feeders.
Pistol Pete, one of the snakes it worked on.

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Corn snakes and rat snakes..No one can have just one.
"resistance is futile"
Jimmy (draybar)

Draybars Snakes

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>>Cornsnakes don't need 90 degree temps... mid-70s to mid-80s are what they do best at. That having been said, there are a gazillion different remedies for nonfeeding or formerly feeding hatchlings, none of which work for all snakes. Best you can do is try em all and see what works. (The oddest one I've heard of recently is tuna scenting...)
>>
>>-Kat
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>>"Oh, you've read a book? How quaint." -my sister

Temps are too high. Cool it down a little, and it might start feeding on its own again. It isn't all that too unusual for a snake to eat once and stop. This is why most breeders don't sell snakes as "feeding' until they have taken at least 2-3 unscented pinks on their own.

Strangest scenting story to me is the one that a well-known breeder got some non-feeders I gave him to eat pinks by rubbing them on worms. MOST of the clutch started feeding that way for him. THAT was strange to me....

to finally hear some one say that.... i was worried my snakes had it bad because both the corn snakes where being kept in the warm side being 85 to 87 and the cool side 74 to 76, and they were doing fine..... then i had changed my set up a bit and fixed it to where the warm side was 88 to 90 and the cool side 78 to 80, now... both snakes have refused to eat for 2 feedings.... so i switched everything back to the original set up and going to wait a few days.........
i was thinking winter is coming i need to warm them up better....LOL ...... i forgot they have heat pads, if they get a chill.....

dont try too hard, youll stress the snake. try once a week
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jake

my addiction:
2 normal ball pythons (lazlo and izzy)
1 amelenistic corn snake (mazy)
0.1 blizzard corn (blizz)

Temps are not the only variables that tell a corn that winter is on its way. Photoperiod is another, and as the amount of sunlight in the days decreases, snakes instinctively begin to shut down for the winter.

If this particular hatchling is nearer a window than your other snakes, it may well be being affected by the shorter photoperiod, when the others are not as of yet. If so, try moving the snake away from the window to see if that helps.

Good luck!
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Darin Chappell
Hillbilly Herps
PO Box 254
Rogersville, MO 65742