What to feed baby Corn Snakes?

[Sunny Side Up]

I have 4 adorable newly hatched baby Corn Snakes! We all are especially glad to have had these hatch since the Mama snake died a couple of weeks after she laid these eggs.

The babies are one week old and have all shed for the first time. Which is when I was told to begin to offer them food. But what things could/should a baby corn snake eat?

Even a newborn pinkie would be too big at this time. Today I put some crickets in with them but so far they haven't eaten them. What else could I put in with them for them to eat?

 

[ladycrotalus]

Newborn pinkies are not too big for them. My neonatal rat snakes, took newborn pinks with no probs. I would remove the crickets, they can eat the snake. You can also chop the pinkies up and even offer a mouse tail. But i never needed to.

 

[paddock36]

We used to feed my DH's baby corn snake pinkies. We bought them frozen 3 in a pack at petco and the snake had no problem eating them. Thawed out first of course.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

So far they haven't eaten the crickets. Neither have the crickets eaten the baby snakes. I really don't think they could, these are really little crickets, about the size of a grain of cooked rice.

I will look for a place with newborn pinkies & offer the snakes some. The pinkies I have here are already too big, they're already getting some fuzz.

Someone mentioned giving mealworms, and also finding a rotting log to break up and collect termites & other bugs to give them. What do you think of that?

 

[RiverOtter]

NO bugs!!

Just born pinkie mice. If you're going to breed snakes regularly, set up a 10 gallon tank with a breeding trio of mice and you can freeze pinkies in the right stages.
You can also buy frozen pinkies at most petstores. If the snake won't eat the warmed up pinkie, try rubbing it with an anole as corn snakes also eat lizards. Also, you can set a large water dish in there with a stick so the snakes can easily get in and out and let a couple of guppies swim round in it. Most corn snakes aren't really fish eaters, but some of them do really like them.

 

[FireTigeris]

everyone else is right= crickes can also eat scales

 

[Sunny Side Up]

I checked the baby snake container this afternoon and all the crickets were gone, but I don't know if the snakes ate them or if they ate each other. There was just one head left, and some black ants crawling in & out of the air holes.

I found another local pet store with newborn pinkies. I was skeptical about the snakies' ability to eat something that size, and said let's just put one in the container & see if it disappears. Well, one of the snakies started to swallow the pinky right there in the store! So I bought 3 more and brought everyone home.

The storekeeper also advised me to keep each snakie separate from each other, so that the ones that fed wouldn't be tempted to eat another pinky too soon. She also said that they might eat each other if kept together.

So now they are each installed in their own container, those reusable plastic food containers with a snap-on lid. I drilled air holes in the tops & sides, added a section of paper-towel core for a hiding place, and a bottle cap of drinking water. One more snakie ate its pinky at home, the other two still haven't eaten. I am keeping track of their shed & fed dates by writing them on the lids with a Sharpie.

The storekeeper said that if any pinkies aren't eaten by morning I can freeze them and serve them next week.

I do have a couple of tanks in which I'm breeding feeder mice for the adult snakes, I guess I'll have to watch for new births and serve or freeze them while they're so small. The parent snakes were just our pets, I don't intend to breed more on a regular basis. But since Snakey, the mama snake, had laid those eggs in their tank, I wanted to try to incubate them just to see if they could hatch. Now we're enjoying the adventure & interest of trying to raise new baby snakes.

Thank you everyone for your imput & advice!

 

[treldib]

When the mother Corn died was she really skinny? After laying a clutch of eggs a female Corn needs A LOT of protein and calcium to regain the huge amounts of lost weight and energy...it sounds like you don't realize how large of a prey item a snake can swallow. Go as big as possible and if its too big, the snake won't eat it. Simple as that. Starvation is one of the most common reasons for a snake's death in captivity. Also...get them in an enclosure at least half their length. My baby corns ALWAYS get set up in 20 gallon sized Rubbermaid tubs.

Happy Herping!