Common Name(s): Corn Snake, Red Rat Snake
Latin Name: Pantherophis guttatus guttatus
Ease of Care: Easy/Beginner
Native To: Southeastern United States
Adult Size: 3 to 5 feet
Life Span: 10-15 years
Clutch Size: 12-24 eggs
Appearance: Normal, wild-type Corn Snakes are very colorful with distinguished saddles down the snake’s back and the name-giving checkered “maize” pattern along the snake’s belly. With that description said, Corn snakes are extremely variable in pattern and color with more and more designer morphs being created every year. Where the wild type are normally red in color with black outlines around the saddles, some of the genetics available today can create pink, black, lavender, and red snakes with stripes, patternless, motley, and many more pattern and color variations. The combinations of pattern and colors are endless and that is one of the things that draws so many breeders to these amazing animals.
Temperament: Corn snakes are great beginner snakes because of their temperaments. They are very docile snakes for the most part, and those snakes that are more defensive as babies normally calm down very quickly with regular handling, proper caring conditions, and proper feeding schedules. Not only that, but these snakes have very small teeth that can do very little damage other than slight penetration of the epidermis, so no serious bite issues are ever really a problem no matter how big the snake gets.
In The Wild: In the wild, Corn snakes are known to be Crepuscular animals that tend to be mainly terrestrial in nature. With that said, these snakes are very adept climbers as well and have been found beneath tree bark and in low-lying limbs as well. But, for the most part, these snakes can be found residing under rocks, tin, and other natural or artificial cover during the day where their main food source, small mammals, reside as well. Corn Snakes main food staple in the wild consist of small mammals, birds, and lizards which lends reason to why they spend most of their time on the ground and under cover. Their most notable residence in the wild is the Okeetee Hunt Club, where many of the original specimens were captured and reproduced in captivity to create the amazing captive stock we have today.
Caging: Adult corns can be housed in a 20 gallon long tank with a secure lid. These snakes are agile and adept escape artists so a tight fitting screen lid is vital to making sure your snake stays in its cage. These snakes also do great in rack systems. This apartment style of keeping multiple animals is the chosen method by breeders for its proven reliability and ease of cleaning and maintaining a healthy environment for the animals. This breeder can also attest that this method of keeping Corn snakes is also great if you have regular guests in your home that would rather not look at multiple snake cages everywhere, allowing your hobby to be less visually invasive on your home. When using a system like this, try and make sure you’re using a minimum tub size of approximately a 32qt tub to make sure your snake has enough floor area to be comfortable.
Lighting: No special lighting is required, although it has been shown that lighting cycles that mimic the normal sunlight hours of the different seasons (shorter hours in the winters, longer in the summers) can be beneficial when trying create breeding cycles for your snakes. But, since these snakes are mostly nocturnal or crepuscular, a UVB lighting system is not needed, but can be used for your pet Corn snake.
Temperature & Humidity: Another reason why Corn Snakes can be such great pets for beginners is because of their ability to handle semi-fluctuating temperature and humidity conditions. The ideal conditions for your corn snake are to have a hot side and cool side of the cage with a floor temperature of 85-87F on the hot side and 75-78F on the cool side during the day. This temperature differential allows the snake to choose a comfortable set point to regulate it body temperature. At night, a 5-degree temperature drop on both sides is best. Finally, humidity levels should hover right around the normal levels of a home (40-55%) and should be monitored as well to make sure the snake doesn’t develop a skin irritation or respiratory infection from being in too humid an environment. These levels should be elevated, however, or a shed box that is more humid should be provided for the snake as it goes in to shed in order to make sure the snake sheds correctly and remains healthy.
Feeding: Feeding your Corn Snake properly is vital to continual, healthy growth of the animal as well as maintaining a snake that is content and more easily handled. When Corn snakes are babies, they should be fed pinky mice every 3-5 days. Make sure, and this rule applies for the entire life of the snake, that food items are no more than 1.25-1.5 the width of the snake’s body. This is a good general rule of thumb to make sure you are providing your snake the properly sized food item that won’t cause the snake to regurgitate and strain itself more than one big meal is already going to. As the snake grows, feed larger items as needed and when the snake hits the Fuzzy Mouse – Hopper Mouse sized food items, begin feeding the snake less often (every 5-7 days) until it reaches an adult size, at which point feeding the snake every 7-10 days should be maintained for the rest of its life. Depending on the full adult size of the snake, it is recommended to feed an adult Corn Snake a Large Adult Mouse as a food item for an average sized snake.
Sexing: Sexing corn snakes is much like any other snake and there are many different ways to sex corns, but the only 100% reliably way is to have somebody who knows what they’re doing probe the snake. Other ways to sex the snake include the length of the tail with males having longer, thicker tails from vent to tip in order to store the inverted hemipenes that are absent in females. Females will have a shorter, more quickly tapered tail than males. Another way to sex young corns, and this should be performed by somebody who knows what they’re doing in order to make sure the snake is unharmed, is to “pop” the snake in order to invert the hemipenes on a male or nothing on the female. This method is used by most breeders for young corns, and the tail length method is normally used for adults. But, as stated at the beginning, probing is the only 100% reliable way to sex a corn snake.
Breeding: Breeding corn snakes is a very straight forward process and very rewarding endeavor for any Corn Snake owner. Corn snakes normally reach sexual maturity by their 3rd year, but the rule of “3” is very telling as well. The rule of three is another rule of thumb that says the snakes are of a breedable size by 3 years old, 300 grams, or 3 feet long. When the snakes are at sexual maturity, it is safe to breed the females by putting them through a full breeding season. The most important parts of the breeding process include brumation which is the period during the fall and winter months that a artificial winter is created for the snakes by lowering the temperature and shortening the daylight cycles to put the snakes in to a brumating state much like hibernation. The snakes should not be fed during this period and should be eased into brumation by dropping the daytime and nighttime temperatures slowly over the course of about a month in order to insure that the snakes don’t have undigested food that could rot in their stomachs. Brumation should last for about 2 months before the snakes are slowly brought out of brumation by raising the temperature and lengthening the daylight period over the course of two weeks. The snakes should then be fed a few food items before they go into their first post-brumation shed. After the shed, the males should be introduced to the females’ cages for mating over the course of a few weeks. This can be a very exciting time and there are few thing more interesting to a snake owner than watching the courting rituals of these beautiful animals and seeing them lock up to produce the next generation. After pairings have occurred over about 2 weeks, the males should be removed and continue to feed the animals weekly as normal. Some snakes will refuse to eat during this time and this is not uncommon, so don’t stress too much about it if your snakes don’t eat during the breeding season. If a female has been fertilized she will go into a pre-lay shed approximately 2 weeks after copulation and you should be able to see the ovum’s developing towards the rear half of her body. When she goes into this pre-lay shed, I normally like to put a plastic shoebox full of damp sphagnum moss in her cage with a hole cut in the front of it to allow her to enter and leave the box. She should lay her eggs in here and it is good to check her cage every 1-2 days to make sure you don’t miss the eggs. After the eggs are discovered, it is best to remove the eggs gently, making sure you don’t roll them or flip them because the snake inside can drown based on the orientation of the egg. I like to place a pencil mark on the top of the eggs to let myself know which side is up. After the eggs are removed safely, they can be carefully separated and placed in a lidded container filled approximately 2/3 of the way with Hatchrite, Vermiculite, or Sphagnum moss medium that is damp enough to keep the eggs hydrated, but not so damp that mold will grow on the outside of the eggs. At this point, some people use a incubator to keep the eggs at the proper temperature, but our favorite and most reliable way is to find a dark, warm corner of a closet and place the eggs here. The temperatures need to remain in the upper 70s or lower 80s for proper egg development. The eggs should hatch in approximately 10 weeks depending on the incubation temperatures, bringing the next beautiful generation of Corns and Corn genetics into the world!
Care of Young: Caring for the young is very simple. Place each snake in an individual container with a dish of water and paper towels or aspen as bedding to make sure they do not eat each other as cannibalism has been documented, although not frequently, among corn snakes. They should be kept at the same temperatures as their parents, and the babies should shed in about 1 week after they hatch and can begin feeding soon after. I have personally never had a baby not each pinky mice for me, but if problem feeders do occur, scenting the pinky with a lizard or toad can be used as well. After the babies begin eating they can be kept just like any young corn snake and fed every 3-5 days. Most breeders like to make sure the babies have eaten 1-3 times before offering them up for sale in order to make sure problem feeders have been identified and that the snakes are healthy and ready to go to their new homes!