Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Baby corn snake and Petco . . .What would you have done?

Okay so I really wanted a corn snake. I read up, did all my research etc. Everywhere I went that had snakes I looked at them just to see what I was getting into. . . and I fell in love. Unfortunatly the one I found was at Petco and was VERY small. I could not find any pinkies small enough to feed her.
I contacted the store and was fed a line of BS. I ended up turning to a friend that breeds Ball Pythons to bastically nurse-maid my baby snake. Everyone that saw her said she was beaurtiful but smaller than ANY corn they had ever seen even hatchlings.
I have had her for a month now, she is FINALLY 10" long and 4.4oz but is still too small to eat a pinkie. She is being fed "fortified" waxmorms and crickets.
Petco was NO help and did not even response to me for a long time. But they finally did offer to trade her out or refund my money. Of course I am attached to her now and think she is too geourgous to give up. I am keeping her but.
What would you do?
Answers:
If she/he is gaining weight on her/his current diet, I would say you are doing good. Be patient. It will soon be large enough for pinkies.
Write a letter to the manager of the store or to the district office or manager. Explain your situation and Petco's lack of help or a response. Tell them that you are very disappointed in their customer service and the quality of the pets that they sell. Write that you will never do business with them again and you will tell everyone that you meet all about your bad experience with the store.
This should elicit some sort of response from the store, and if not, it will feel good to get all of this off of your chest.
At this point, just keep her. It sounds like you have her care under control.
Petco has one of the best policies in regards to sick animals. Any animal, no matter how minor the problem, must see a vet as soon as the problem is discovered. This applies to all animals that are in their care.
However, it is up to the employees to recognize illness and respond to it. Most large pet stores, Petco included, have a reputation for hiring employees with no animal related experience and they have very poor training programs. This can apply to management as well. So regardless of Petco's policy, if the employees don't act on the problem, the animal suffers. It sounds to me like this is what happened in your case.
Since the store you got your snake from was being difficult, I would have a hard time trusting that your snake would get the care it needs.
I know that one of Petco's policies is that if you bring your new pet to the vet in the first 14 days you have it, and the vet finds a problem, Petco will pay 100% of the vet costs. Usually you must bring it to the vet that Petco uses for their own animals, which is what ever local vet was willing to team up with them. It does not mean the vet is bad, or has an affiliation with Petco as a company.
Read the back of the paperwork you were given when you purchased the snake. This will outline Petco's current health guarentee on your snake.
I would keep the snake, and maybe try to get petco to pay for a vet check.
What would I do?
I wouldn't have gotten a snake from Petco to begin with, and I CERTAINLY would not have asked them for advice!
*As a breeder of corn snakes and we have lots of babies! You do not feed it worms or crickets.
Go to a pet store and ask for pinkies frozen or live. Yes the new babies we have Can eat pinkies. Their jaw do open wide and they can eat them you may not think so but yes they can. You'll be surprise.
Just leave 1 pinkie in with the baby and leave it alone it will eat it. Your baby is 10 inches long Yes it can eat a pinkie.
Have a look at these sites they will help you.
http://members.aol.com/kathandcam/hawkhe...
http://www.kingsnake.com/rockymountain/r...
http://www.anapsid.org/corn.html...
I had the same situation with my snow corn she was so tiny she wouldn't eat pinkies because they were too big I freaked out and I figured I should take her to a friend of mine's dad who raises snakes (pythons and boas) he told me to leave her with him for a month he kept her free of charge and fed her bits of calci-dusted chicken hearts and at the end of the month she was finally on pinkies and growing beautifully.
At 10 inches long and 4.4 GRAMS (Can't be ounces as that would be a much larger snake), it should be able to eat newborn pinky mice. Corn snake hatchlings can easily eat pinkies that seem too large. A good rule of thumb is to feed prey that are up to 1 1/2 times as wide as the snake is wide. And in new hatchlings, you can actually go a little lerger than that. If you're still afraid the pinkies are too big, then you can just feed it the cut off heads of F/T pinkies. In either case DO NOT FEED IT WAXWORMS AND CRICKETS! It CANNOT digest them and the hard exoskeletons can actually cause your corn snake internal harm. Not only are the people at Petco morons, but I would be a little leery of your "friend" that breeds Ball Pythons. If he's the one who recommended the "fortified" waxworms and crickets, tell him to keep them for his BPs. I hope that your little corn snake hasn't been hurt by the misinformation you have been given and that it does well for you once you start feeding it food it is supposed to have. For future reference, go to this site for the CORRECT care of corn snakes.
http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/...

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