Quote Originally Posted by Argentra View Post
Ok, I have read that female corns should be at least 300g and around 2-3 years old to be bred. I also know that my candycane female is about 2, weighed in at 346g earlier this month (and she's still not on full sized meals after hibernation), and was loosely measured at 3'8".
Sounds like she's ready to go!

My question to all you experienced corn breeders is this: When should I start pairing her up? She came out of hibernation on Jan 25 and is now up to weanling size mice, fed every 5 days to get her back to speed. Should I do anything differently with her?
By now you could be feeding her normal sized meals to help her pack the weight on. Her system should be all in order. I usually feed my females one large mouse every 5-6 days instead of every 7. Once they've locked up I start to decrease prey size as they get larger. As for when to pair her up, some go right after brumation some don't. I start pairing up after post brumation shed.

She, and the male I intend to pair her with (my snow) are currently in QT and should be out around March 10th since they are both great eaters and have shed for me perfectly with no signs of other troubles.
Also, HOW should I go about pairing them? The snow is pretty calm, at least compared to her. Should I put him in her tub or the other way around? Or does it really matter?
Once they're out of QT, by then they should be ready to go. I usually put males into the females' cages. Though I used to have this crazy male who would go bazerkers if you took him out; so with him I put the female into his cage. Some also put them into a different tub all together so they can check for "evidence" of successful copulation.

Sorry to ask so many questions, but I'm a total newbie to all this. Any other suggestions or comments on breeding would be quite welcome! Thanks.
Make sure you have a lay box ready to go and incubation set up ready to go. I also pair up three times (or three times that I know they locked up). Three locks seems to be the magic number. I put them together then when they're done separate for 3 days and repeat this until there are at least three confirmed locks.

Good luck!