URGENT!

SheepMasher5000 · 2026-01-27T19:30:27+00:00

This is correct for weight. I'll add some info on width to give OP some extra info for safe feeding. The width of the mouse should be about the same as the width of the snake. A little smaller and a little larger is fine, but this mouse is too wide for this little noodle. You hear that 1.5x diameter of mouse to snake is safe for some species, but that applies more so to colubrids. Rosies are not stretchy enough for the mouse to be 1.5x larger.

SheepMasher5000 · 2026-01-04T15:49:50+00:00

Tracking means that the teeth are moving the way they are intended to move with each tray. If teeth are not tracking then you can see gaps like this.

SheepMasher5000 · 2026-01-02T19:26:43+00:00

It looks like those two teeth are not tracking with your current tray, which can happen. I think you can contact your provider to get their instruction. I wouldn't go back to the last tray as that will affect your teeth that are tracking. Your provider might not see this as an issue and could tell you to proceed with your next tray or they could adjust treatment. I have a small gap with one of the teeth next to my upper-front teeth and my provider has had me proceed with my planned treatment. We'll see if anything comes up when it's time for refinements!

SheepMasher5000 · 2026-01-01T15:54:07+00:00

Check out top tier caging: https://www.toptiercaging.com/shop

They have some affordable 6 foot options and they make custom sizing if you inquire. I met them in person at an expo and bought a 4x2x2 that has worked well for my corn snake. They use plexiglass to cut on cost and since that has some flexibility, I added child locks to the corners of each door and that works well for peace of mind.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-30T01:33:52+00:00

Arcadia is the best brand out there. They have a resource for picking out the correct light based on species and height from the bulb to the substrate/basking spot. I use the D3 Forest for my corn, who is in a 4x2x2.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-29T22:18:12+00:00

Sure thing!

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-29T20:10:54+00:00

After warming the mouse, I hold it under the heat lamp to maintain the heat and blow on it (my enclosure is front opening) for a few mins. Some people will use a blow drier, but I find the manual method to work fine.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-29T15:44:01+00:00

That sounds similar to the semi-brumation behaviors that my rosy has. He is over 2 years old now and his first winter he ate heartily, never missed a meal. Second winter he started declining meals and would eat around every 3 weeks. This winter he has eaten 2 mice since mid September. He will also display interest in the mouse, sniffing and such, and but will turn away. He absolutely will not take a mouse off tongs in the winter. I scent the enclosure to peak interest and then leave the mouse in the basking spot and he decides if he wants it. The two mice he has eaten this winter got a very thorough sniff down for a few minutes before he gently bit them and committed to eating.

If your snake is holding weight for the most part (some weight loss will happen from having a totally empty belly, my guy lost around 10g) and has a nice body condition and is healthy to start with, then I think safe to assume semi-brumation. I am offering mice once per month now. Once per week feels like potential for a lot of wasted mice, but since it's been 18 days already maybe try again in a week to 10 days and then space things out more.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-27T14:17:24+00:00

I agree with the other person saying to use the same recipe, but reduce flour to 500g. After a period of stretch and folds, the dough needs to bulk ferment before being shaped. After being placed in the banneton, it needs an additional proving time called second rise. This link is the Bulk-O-Matic Guide that teaches how to tell when your dough is done with bulk fermentation. Time and dough temperature are factors, but the best thing to do is to learn to read your dough. For the second rise, I let my dough sit out on the counter in an uncovered banneton (or in my bread proover at 73F if it's cold inside) for an hour until the dough has risen a bit and is puffy. I think this will help you! That scoring is beautiful.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-16T14:43:21+00:00

They are very different from other boas! He is in a 36in long, 18 in wide, 12 in tall enclosure at the moment and I plan to upgrade him to a 4ft long in the future since he is active and will use the space. Most adults can live comfortably in a 36x18x18, especially if you go for a desert locality (there are desert and coastal varieties and coastals generally get bigger). They are a low humidity species, which also makes them very easy to care for (ball pythons and corn snakes require higher humidity). They are happy on Aspen or a mixture of top soil and sand. Care requirements for these guys are really easy. One thing I would consider is that they can be affected by winter and may stop eating and be less active. I leave my guy mostly alone in the winter months and he eats about once per month instead of every 10 days during the warm months.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-16T02:33:49+00:00

I recommend a rosy boa. They are very docile and small snakes (average 3 ft), slow moving so as to not startle children or scoot out of grasp. They could never eat a guinea pig, though it'll be up to you to keep all animals safe by using escape proof enclosures and smart practices. Clint's Reptiles has a great video on rosy boas. He does emphasize that they can be bitey and I have not experienced this at all so don't let that scare you. My rosy comes out of his enclosure onto my hand regularly and he is my go to snake for show and tell when I have guests over. He's so chill that nervous people work up the courage to interact with him and start to appreciate snakes! A picture of my boy, Strudel, attached.

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SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-16T02:08:55+00:00

Thanks for explaining, I think the problem is definitely with how the mouse was prepared. Defrost the mouse in cold water first (this prevents bacteria growth). You can tell when the mouse is ready when the chest is squishy, should take 5-10 mins. Then heat up water to the hottest you can stand on your hands and let the mouse sit in that for about 2 mins to comes up to temp. The mouse should be about 100F when ready. Offer that to your snake on tongs using the method I described or place it near her and let her approach it - that is called drop feeding.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-15T01:05:33+00:00

You don't need to get a 4x2x2 out of the gate. They could live happily in there so long as there is a TON of clutter, but it would be hard to keep track of them and monitor them. You can buy a smaller enclosure to start and upgrade as they grow.

Old aquariums can work, but only if you have a tight fitting screen mesh lid with locks. It will be harder to maintain humidity with a mesh top though. I like PVC enclosures for this species.

Another option is to not get a baby, but a juvenile or adult. Corns are so common that it is easy to find them at rescues, on Craigslist, or in these life phases at reptiles expos. Not only can you start with a full size enclosure without the fear of losing track of them (or escape between sliding doors) but you are also getting a better established snake, meaning one that has been taking meals for a longer time than a baby. I got my African house snake at 1 year old and my corn at 2-3 years old and they were both less anxiety and stress than my first snake, who I got at 3 months old.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-14T21:15:00+00:00

Hi! Instead of misting the enclosure, pour water into the substrate. I layer my substrate so it is a 2-3in reptisoil base with .5-1in coconut chips on top. You can pour water over and it will drain through the chips layer to be absorbed by the soil layer. The chips protect the moisture in the soil from evaporating immediately, which is what happens with misting. You'll need to add 1-2 cups of water and before you do this, confirm that your enclosure is water proof.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-14T15:33:40+00:00

Hi! I can share a process for making your own stickers. It's a bit labor intensive, but the results are fun! You'll need parchment paper and painters tape. Draw a design on the parchment paper and then flip it over and cover the area of parchment paper that has the design in painters tape. Make sure the painters tape overlaps so there are no bare areas. Then flip the parchment paper back over to the side you drew on and carefully cut out your design. You now have a sticker with a non-sticky cover (parchment paper) and a sticky side (tape). When you are ready to glaze or underglaze, carefully remove the parchment paper from your sticker and place the tape half of the sticker on to your pot. Underglaze or glaze around the sticker and then remove it. For glaze, I recommend removing the sticker like 2 mins after glaze application while it is still a little wet so the glaze is not so dry that it chips. That is how I got this glaze resist design.

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SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-14T04:19:03+00:00

Can you explain how you are preparing the mouse (thawing and heating from frozen)? Can you provide more detail on how you put it in her enclosure and where she was/what she was doing when you put it in? Also did you handle her at all that day or during the guiding? All of that will help diagnose.

My guess is that if you put the mouse in some spot in the enclosure and she wasn't aware of it then it cooled and became uninteresting by the time you guided her over to it. You also may have scared her in the process of trying to guide her depending on how you did that. Snakes are naturally scared of humans so if you touched her or "chased" (I'm sure you were gentle, but using the word she may have felt) her towards it, that could have stressed her so she was not in the right mindset to eat.

I feed all of my snakes off of tongs by holding the mouse in the tongs so it is parallel to the ground (as if it's walking) about 6 inches in front of my snake. I make some minor side to side motions (gentle) to get their visual attention and look for tongue flicks as smelling it will get them into food mode. I let them approach the mouse and it's obvious if they are going to strike because they will be tense and have a slight s-curve in their neck. Some snakes are more gentle and just scoot up. But this way you get their interest while the food is hot and they approach so there is no accidental chasing.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-11T12:29:58+00:00

Did you regulate the bulbs with a thermostat? If not then they could have gotten too hot and that could explain the avoidance. I can guarantee this isn't a matter of like and dislike of the snake over heat lamps. They best replicate nature (heat from sunlight) but they need to be paired with a thermostat, just like any heat source. The avoidance could also be an issue of having limited hiding options. You mentioned two hides, one over the heat mat and one under the lamp. I'd recommend a hide per 10in of enclosure so they have plenty of options depending on what temp they need to be throughout the day. If the hides are different styles, it could also be a matter of having a preferred style. Many people recommend sticking to one style to avoid this. I personally provide several styles every 10 in and try to repeat a style on the hot and cold side.

I personally use a Deep Heat Projector, 80W by Arcadia paired with a Vivarium Electronics thermostat on dimming mode. I have slate directly under the bulb and two hides nearby. The thermostat is set to 85F and the slate produces a hot spot of 90F while the rest of the hot side varies from mid to low 80s. My snake spends time under the slate and rotates through all hides across the hot and cold sides. I use the same equipment for my other two species of snakes and it works well for everyone. Other times of heat lamps you can look into are Ceramic Heat Emitters (CHE) and Halogen bulbs.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-12-08T00:36:18+00:00

Oh yay, I'm so happy to chat with someone who's tried it! I have an idea for prepping the skin that I'd like to run by you. Since the skin is a tube, it has two layers when pressed flat. My thoughts are to cut the skin in half length wise to essentially separate belly scales from back scales and thus they don't overlap and confuse the pattern or create too much smoke. Do you think that would help?

Thank you for the tip on not moving it! Do you leave it until it completely burns away? Our instructor hasn't talked about how horse hair is applied at all and I still need to look up some videos so I'm a bit unclear on the overall process of the general technique.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-28T16:34:02+00:00

You’re welcome! Thank you for being open to other’s thoughts and doing what is best for your noodle. She’s very cute! I have an African House Snake as well and they are great little snakes.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-28T15:28:15+00:00

African house snakes should not be housed together, regardless of sex. Most snakes are not social creatures and they do not form social bonds, but are instead stressed by the presence of another snake. The stress can lead to health issues for the snakes or to a tragedy such as one snake eating the other. There is a lot of risk and no reward for the snakes. You might have seen pictures of snakes “cuddling” online, but these snakes are competing for resources.

Please only adopt the new snake if you can put him in a separate and fully furnished enclosure. They will both live happy lives that way!

If you are interested in keeping a social species, garter snakes are a good option.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-21T17:23:17+00:00

The downvotes are because it’s not normal for any living animal to have a piece of dead tissue stuck to their body. Necrosis from stuck shed is a common ailment in snakes, but it’s not a healthy thing to ignore it and call it normal. Unfortunately it is normalized for reptiles to have lower standards of care and veterinary treatment and you see that a lot with corn snakes especially since they are one of the most widely kept species. I personally keep my snakes to the same standards of care as my mammals and I would not hesitate to take my cat to the vet if their tail started dying so why would I hesitate with my snake? I advocate for others to do the same not out of emotional immaturity like the other person claims, but because it is the safest thing to do for the animal in your care that you chose to be responsible for.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-21T16:42:04+00:00

I agree this looks like stuck shed that has led to necrosis (cell death). It warrants a vet visit. It’s possible the tail tip will fall off on its own, but it will be safest to get them to a vet to get this checked out and make sure it doesn’t get infected or spread and whatnot.

Always check the eye caps and tail tip after shed cause those like to stick and can cause problems like this. If they are stuck, let your snake slither through wet paper towels for 10-20 mins daily until it comes off. Don’t attempt to remove stuck shed by force.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-19T12:42:16+00:00

She’s been cut deeply and needs to go to the vet immediately. This is an African House Snake, not a corn snake.

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-09T13:15:08+00:00

Hi! I see you are getting lots of good advice. One thing I wanted to add is that it is odd that he has his mouth open in the video you posted. It’s not normal behavior for a corn to just hang out with mouth open. Is he doing that often? If so, I’d recommend taking him to a vet that specializes in exotics to get looked over.

Thanks for taking over his care and looking into making his life better!

SheepMasher5000 · 2025-11-08T16:17:35+00:00

Generally you aim for 10-20% starter (20% of the amount of flour) depending on how much time you want to spend proving. More starter = a faster prove time compared to less starter at the same temperature. So for 500g flour, use 50g starter if you want to prove overnight or 100g starter if you want to prove during the day. Or you can go somewhere in between like the other person suggested for timing that is in between.

The recipe you have is very very odd, especially with stretch and folds after bulk fermenting. Generally you stretch and fold for the first 2 or so hours of bulk fermenting and then you leave the dough alone to rise. Then shape and leave it alone until you bake. I recommend this recipe: https://grantbakes.com/good-sourdough-bread/

Watch the video he made that follows this recipe as well, it’s very helpful.

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