Where to look for feeders, and how much weight loss is too much?

[scalypasta]

I posted a thread in here a week ago about Pretzel the chocolate morph, but I was asking completely different questions, so I figured it would be appropriate to separate this thread on its own.

The breeder was feeding Pretzel live, alternating between mice and rats. I really would prefer to switch him to frozen, but so far, he's not interested in frozen mice in the slightest. He's about 4 months old and was just under 130 grams when I picked him up from the breeder on Saturday Jan 30, and since I arranged it 3 weeks prior he'd forgotten I was coming and fed Pretzel that Thursday before I picked him up. I weighed Pretzel on Sunday Jan 31, when he was a little under 130 grams. I tried to feed him f/t the following Thursday, one week from his last meal, and he wouldn't even smell the mouse. I tried warming it through the water-submersion-in-a-Ziploc method, and wiggled it around, but he wasn't interested.

I weighed him again Sunday Feb 7 after I'd fixed a heating issue a few days prior, and if my scale is correct he lost 7.4 grams in a week. I tried to feed him again that night but he still wasn't interested. Today I bought a live mouse for him after an hour of lying through my teeth to local Petco staff, who hate selling mice and rats as feeders and will look for any way to get out of it. He took the mouse eagerly, so at least he has eaten. There are only so many times I can go to the same store with the same lie before they catch on, though, so I need to find other places to get live feeders.

I have two questions. Firstly, if he continues to lose weight in this second week now that he's eaten, is this significant enough weight loss to consider internal parasites? Or at least warrant a vet visit? I was going to take him soon anyway, but I wanted him to be comfortable in the new environment first so that he wasn't having more stressors all at once than he needed.

And secondly, where should I look for live feeders? I'd like to have at least a couple places on hand so that I have backups in case of an emergency. But the closest Petco (the one where I spent an hour convincing staff I was buying the mouse as a pet) is 30min away and the only pet store in the area to carry live mice, rats, reptiles, etc. The others in the area only carry fish and/or adopt out shelter cats and dogs. I could check feed & seeds and have thought about looking for other snake owners, but where do I find them? And what other places should I check?

I do have one guy who breeds his own feeders willing to sell me some mice now and then, but his next litter won't be ready for almost a month.

[Prognathodon]

If you can tell us where you are (your profile is only showing the state), local-ish people may be able to help with specific places/suppliers.

A more general idea is to look for smaller regional reptile/herp shows. If you can find one, or a more feeder-friendly shop, you can make a holding tub fairly inexpensively, and buy several mice at a time. I was doing that when I had three on live (got two switched to f/t), as my less expensive local supplier is less conveniently located than the PetCo (which is feeder-friendly, but in NE Illinois).


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[scalypasta]

If you can tell us where you are (your profile is only showing the state), local-ish people may be able to help with specific places/suppliers.

Hammond, about 45 minutes north of New Orleans.

There are more pet stores in New Orleans, but the traffic is such a hassle it takes an hour to get anywhere. I'll go there if I have to, but I'd prefer to stay this side of it.

The herp shows are a good idea though, Baton Rouge and New Orleans both have them. It's about the same distance either way, by the time you account for traffic.