Accidental Breeding Dekay's Brown Snake

[David339]

I woke up today and noticed little snakes in my dekay's brown snake tank. I do have two adults but didn't know the sex of them. I know they don't hurt each other but will they eat the babies? I plan to separate the babies from the adults asap anyway.

[Veronica]

Congrats on the babies! They give live birth, which is really cool. (I only found this out recently after a co-worker's dekay gave birth.)

And I agree that you should separate them, the babies are about the size of their prey after all.

[Veronica]

Oh, and make sure you show us pictures of them :D
(Maybe someone can chime in on this, but you might also want to separate the adults for a bit to give the female a break)

[Andy_G]

Separate the babies, and separate the adults as well to stop this from reoccurring.

[David339]

From what I read about them online they online give birth once a year so hopefully the adults don't need to be separated. I will get some pics when I'm moving them. I only have one spare tank atm. Moving the leaf litter/bark and stuff in tank I saw about 7 babies. I was reading they can have up to 22 in one litter! That's a lot. Not sure how many I have, The adults were in the substrate so til I start digging there is no telling how many babies I have. I won't be able to do that til this afternoon unfortunately. I'm excited but not sure what I will do if there are 20 or so babies.

[craigafrechette]

You should definitely separate the adults. Snakes aren't social animals and shouldn't be cohabitated.

[David339]

There were 9 of them total. I searched pretty thoroughly, digging through the substrate and everything.

https://i.imgur.com/zgSFUUJ.jpg?1

https://i.imgur.com/zgSFUUJ.jpg?1

You can't keep these together? I know that for most snakes but read a lot about people keeping multiple of these in one tank. I also read about people finding these 2-3 together in the wild. I have rough green snakes and worm snakes that I have 2 per tank for each of those species. I know the green snake care sheet I read was saying you could house multiple together but to have a bigger tank obviously.

[craigafrechette]

There were 9 of them total. I searched pretty thoroughly, digging through the substrate and everything.

https://i.imgur.com/zgSFUUJ.jpg?1

https://i.imgur.com/zgSFUUJ.jpg?1

You can't keep these together? I know that for most snakes but read a lot about people keeping multiple of these in one tank. I also read about people finding these 2-3 together in the wild. I have rough green snakes and worm snakes that I have 2 in a tank also... I know the green snake care sheet I read was saying you could house multiple together but to have a bigger tank obviously.

I may be mistaken. I know of a handful of species that cohab well, this may be another I wasn't aware of. Apologies if I'm wrong.

But moving forward, you're likely to have more babies if they continue to be housed together.

[Bandit]

That's pretty awesome. If it were me, I'd separate them just due to the size difference. I've heard of these being kept together before, and I wouldn't imagine there are many issues as they usually eat worms, slugs, etc. And you're right, they can often be found in groups under logs and stuff.

On a side note, are you sure they aren't Red-bellied Snakes (Storeria occipitomaculata)? That's the impression I get from those photos.

[Veronica]

I agree that they look more like red-bellied snakes. What color is their underside?

[David339]

They have a white colored underside. Definitely not a red bellied, I have one of those in his own tank. That one has an orange belly. They are about the size of a dime coiled up. They are pretty delicate so I didn't try to do a lot of pictures and that's my flip phone camera. They are grey colored on top and you can just make out the two sets of dotted lines down the back. From the side view of the head you know it's a dekay's. They were in my tank containing two dekay's brown snake so that's all they could be. Reading on my state herpetology site they have a darker colored topside as juveniles. One of my adults I had from it being a young snake. It started with the ring around it's neck and only had 2 of the dotted lines on the dorsum. The neck ring went away and it got another row of dotted lines on either side of the dorsum as it got older. It's funny because my red bellied snake doesn't have a gray dorsum like I see in most online pics, it's brown with a dark red head and 3 cream color spots making a triangle. They do look similar but I don't mix species. I do like being able to have multiple in one tank. The adults and babies are in separate tanks. I only had one to spare atm. I'm inclined to split the adults as I'm going to have a bunch of snakes if I don't. I'm not too sure what to do with the 9 lil babies I have now but I'm going to try and get them grown a little before I decide and I'd feel too horrible letting my garter or ring-necked snakes eat them.

[ClockwerkBonnet]

Those baby snakes look really cute!

[Veronica]

Heh, I guess I didn't realize the babies had rings on their necks. Learn something new every day!

[Bandit]

Actually, I take that back. I looked up some photos of neonate Dekay's, and they look just like that. I'm almost shocked how much the neonates look like Red-bellied snakes.

[David339]

storeria dekayi - dekay's brown storeria occipitomaculata - red-belly
They are very similiar snakes. The red belly is more nocturnal and the dekay's gets a lot bigger.
My dekay's was somewhere between 8 to 10 in before it lost it's ring, he was brown though. I believe red bellies have the ring as youngsters and then it turns to the three cream dots. My red belly was an adult when I got him.

[Bandit]

Yeah, they are very closely related. Around here, they get around the same size, but Dekay's are far more common.

[David339]

2 of the babies were dead when I got home from work today. I guess they haven't been eating? They won't eat out of tank. If you drop a worm in front of them they run away. They do seem to scurry around after you take em out of tank. I spent a lot of time just getting them to crawl around the tank just to find worms. I'm getting the right size, I made sure to see them eat today. That's with earthworms only. With slugs, I never get to see em crawl on the side of the tank. Unfortunately those are not as easy for me to produce. I do have adult slugs that I'm hoping to get to breed. My red-bellied snake is also a slug hunter and the box turtles love some slugs too. I plan to go heavier on what I give them now and spend more time making sure they eat. I'm currently out of baby slugs. I should maybe split the babies up too. I was thinking multiple small spaces versus what they are in now so they can find food easier. I'm not losing the other 7. I'm not too happy I lost 2 but I don't know that I'm going to be keeping them all. Out of all my many reptiles and amphibians (40 something), I have only had one frog get hurt 2 times. He is fine and I still have him.

[Veronica]

Have you tried pill bugs? I've heard of some worm snakes eating those, so maybe a dekay's would.

[David339]

Yeah, I have had those in there. I have dwarf white tropical isopods in there. I read that Red-Bellied snakes eat them and they are closely related snakes. No further deaths. I spent at least an hour yesterday just making sure they would eat. Also I have tiny snails in there, I haven't noticed them being eaten. The adults will, I find the empty snail shells. They have specialized teeth that allow them to pull snails out of their shell. Once my slugs start producing I should be good. The one slug I was able to put in there today didn't last 30 seconds. I need to setup a beer trap for these.

[David339]

So far so good, I have to put at least 20 baby worms in there per day. Baby slugs are definitely the way to go. They respond better and will eat those right away. Worms they search all over for and don't always go for them. I have adult slugs... would it be worth trying to scent the worms by rubbing them on a slug?

[Miloxwoods]

Hi! Do you still have any available i have been looking for captive bred babies! If so i would love to purchase them!

[David339]

Hi! Do you still have any available i have been looking for captive bred babies! If so i would love to purchase them!

Sorry I'm not on the forum daily but saw your other post and commented about it there.