Shedding

hondo-dan · 08-10-14, 10:16 AM

I'm kinda new to milk snakes and was just curious how often they usually shed while still pretty young.

Jim Smith · 08-10-14, 10:36 AM

Hondo-Dan,

I keep pretty good records of my Hondurans and so far, for the first year or so, they tend to shed around every 25-30 days. As they get older 18+ months, their growth slows down quite a bit and they only shed every 40-50 days until they are full grown, then they shed every 4-5 months.

hondo-dan · 08-10-14, 01:25 PM

Awesome. Thanks for the info Jim. Supposedly mine hatched out the end of last year, but the guy I got him from was only giving it one pinkie every two weeks so he's still pretty small (about 16") I've had him for a week now and fed him two pinkies on Friday which scarfed down just fine. It looks like he could probably handle something a bit bigger this week. Any thoughts or suggestions on helping his growth. I'm not so sure he is as old as I was told but so long as he's healthy, that's all I care about.

hondo-dan · 08-23-14, 10:13 PM

My little hondo is about to shed for the first time since I've had him. Kinda excited to see how he does.

sharthun · 08-24-14, 05:04 AM

Looks like he could handle a couple fuzzies. Great looking snake!

NewSAHSnakeMom · 08-24-14, 08:49 AM

Your snake looks about a couple inches smaller than my Blaze and he eats 3 fuzzies a week, just as a reference. He's a Sinaloan milk snake, we don't know his age and guess him to be about 19 inches or so. Oh and we are just guessing he's a he, he always goes to hang out on my boobs lol. I am no expert though. I'm going on gut instinct, research, and this forum's aid.

hondo-dan · 08-26-14, 06:12 PM

So Bo, as you can see from the picture above, was looking about ready to shed. So I put a small container with damp paper towels in his cage. He spent the better part of two days in there. Now he doesn't look so "blue" but he definitely hasn't shed yet. Even his eyes don't really look cloudy anymore. Should I be concerned? Is that kinda normal? How long does a snake usual stay in blue before shedding?

sharthun · 08-26-14, 06:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hondo-dan

So Bo, as you can see from the picture above, was looking about ready to shed. So I put a small container with damp paper towels in his cage. He spent the better part of two days in there. Now he doesn't look so "blue" but he definitely hasn't shed yet. Even his eyes don't really look cloudy anymore. Should I be concerned? Is that kinda normal? How long does a snake usual stay in blue before shedding?

No worries! After the eyes clear, it usually takes 2 to 3 days to shed.

hondo-dan · 08-26-14, 07:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sharthun

No worries! After the eyes clear, it usually takes 2 to 3 days to shed.

Cool. Thanks for the help.

hondo-dan · 08-29-14, 04:51 PM

He did it! Bo shed a nice full shed Wednesday night. Thursday he got two small fuzzies for dinner. He seems to be selling in well.

sharthun · 08-29-14, 05:23 PM

Congrats!