Prey Size Increase?

[Jay_Bunny]

I got Zim on December 5th, 2006. He's been on Fuzzies since I got him. He is at 50g and is around 2ft long now. Should i increase his prey size to hoppers? He's about as big around as a crayola marker, maybe a little less.

[Rapture]

A hopper would be a good size IMO. With corns an other coloubrids, you can safely feed prey items up to 150% of the snake's girth at its widest point.

[Jay_Bunny]

What sized prey does a fully grown corn snake eat? I've never seen a full grown corn so I don't know how large in girth they get. I know they can get up to 5ft long but thats about it.

[joepythons]

A hopper would be a good size IMO. With corns an other coloubrids, you can safely feed prey items up to 150% of the snake's girth at its widest point.

I disagree with your last sentence here.You can cause a young corn snake to regurge or to choke(death) if the prey item is to large.They are not as bad as ball pythons though.

[Jay_Bunny]

I normally feed a prey item that causes a slight buldge at the thickest point of the snake. Of course, I have no hopper here at the house to check to see if it would be an ok size. And a 30min drive to the petstore just to buy one hopper is kind of silly.

[joepythons]

What sized prey does a fully grown corn snake eat? I've never seen a full grown corn so I don't know how large in girth they get. I know they can get up to 5ft long but thats about it.

I have a large male corn(eats small rats) and my 2 adult females(eat weaned rats) that i will show you some pics as soon as i go take a few.Be right back

[joepythons]

Ok here is Prince my largest corn snake.They do get larger then he is now though.I will also post a pic of his food size and what my females eat also.

[joepythons]

Now here is a pic of the sizes of food items my adults eat.Now the females are capable of eating larger meals but i reduce the size of the prey item during breeding time.The rats on the right is for prince,the left is mera and sylvias.

[joepythons]

I normally feed a prey item that causes a slight buldge at the thickest point of the snake. Of course, I have no hopper here at the house to check to see if it would be an ok size. And a 30min drive to the petstore just to buy one hopper is kind of silly.

Have you tried switching him over to frozen thawed? I have never had a problem getting mine to switch over. This way you could buy in bulk and save money and time.

[Rapture]

I disagree with your last sentence here.You can cause a young corn snake to regurge or to choke(death) if the prey item is to large.They are not as bad as ball pythons though.

Just quoting something I read about corns a pretty good while ago.