You may have read my post here where I described in detail the horrific events that unfolded as I attemped to feed my newly adopted ball python for the first time.

The hunt for frozen feeder rats was on. There are several online dealers but most charge ~$50 shipping so when ordering for one snake, it's outrageous. I found one company that had a decent price considering the small quantity, so I emailed them. They had a power outage which wiped out most of the rats and wouldn't be able to fill orders till later this month. I was on Craigslist looking for "reptile" stuff to see if there were any animals needing a good home or stuff that I might be able to use when I stumbled upon a post by someone close by who sells frozen rats!!!

I sent him an email and found out that the frozen small rats he sells are half the price of the live rat I purchased previously. I tell him I want to pick one up last weekend to see if he'll take it and that fell through, my fault. I felt bad and told him I'll pick up a bunch and if Zeek won't take F/T, I'll take the loss. So I went there today and it's been 17 days since I offered him food. A few days after I fed him the first time I had him out and he looked like he was going to try and swallow my finger. He didn't bite but he moved towards my finger and started that jaw motion of eating something large. It may have been a yawn but when I pulled my fingers into a fist he followed the finger he had targeted, then gave up.

He has paid a lot of attention to my actions since the first feeding. The previous owners fed him one small rat every two weeks. I see that most people here feed once per week. I think he wants food once a week.

Because it's been 17 days since I offered him food I was more concerned with him eating than my own personal reservations. I got the frozen rats but asked if I could buy one small live rat as well in case he won't take frozen, I want to be able to feed him.

This rat breeder, who is in the San Francisco Bay Area, is a cool guy. He totaled out the frozen rats that I was getting and it came to $45 but he was going to charge me $40 to give me a deal. He didn't have any frozen fuzzies that I was asking for so we went to his rat rack room and he pulled some then threw them in the C02 tank. He then boxed up the small live rat that was never figured into the cost and didn't add anything for it. I originally gave him $40. After he boxed up the live I threw another $5 down and he asked what it was for. I said he never included the live in the total so I was still getting a deal. Basically I paid for the frozens I got and got a free small live for free so it was still a deal. I went there with the intent of rounding whatever the cost was to the nearest $10 because he was definately doing me a service, but he rounded down.

When I get home I have a bag of (10) rat pups and (10) smalls and a bag of (20) rat fuzzies that were C02'ed but not frozen. I put one small in a sandwich bag and put the rest in the freezer. I take the rat fuzzies in the Home Depot bag and transfer them to a Ziploc freezer bag. Once I get them in there they start moving again! They were sealed with C02 for 10 minutes. This guy did say that young rats were humanely killed by just freezing because the C02 didn't work on them well. That was true.

I take the frozen small rat upstairs to the closest bathroom. I fill the sink with warm water and weight down the bag with the rat. After running a bunch of errands I come back and pull the rat out of the water. I place it on a stack of paper towels to let it dry. I pad it down and get it as dry as I can that way, then I pull out the blow dryer to warm it's head. As soon as it's not cold anymore (About the same temperature as me) I go to open the top of Zeeks cage. He's already got his head out of the hide inspecting my actions. I take some tongs from the kitchen (Have a pair of hemostats on order) and grab the rat by the scruff of the back and bring it towards the cage. (I'm feeding him in his enclosure this time as recommended by just about everyone here) I lower it into the tank and put it close to him. I wiggle it around and back it up and he immediately starts to follow.

I lure him till a good portion of his body is out of his hide then I have it "dance" around a bit and he gets into striking position. BAM! A perfect strike, got it right on the face. For a few seconds while he's constricted on it I shake it a little more to make it seem like it's struggling. He stays locked up tight on the rat for about 45 seconds, removing the last ounce of life this dead rat never had. From introduction of the rat to the enclosure to when the tail disappeared in his mouth it was about a grand total of five minutes.

He kept his jaw askew for a little while long, sniffing the air like a madman. I think he was still hungry. He stayed in the same spot where he took the last gulp for a few hours. I'm going to start offering him food once a week so hopefully that fills him up properply. Unfortunately it takes too long to thaw out a frozen one to be able to get a second one in there to try that this time.

I am so happy he took the frozen rat. Not only was it so much easier for me, I have nine more in the freezer for him. Hopefully it wasn't just because it'd been 17 days since something was offered. Time will tell but I am excited.

Here's an obligatory picture.



Now who could forget about that live rat I bought as well. I have been tossing the idea around in my head to breed my own rats so I was hoping I would be able to keep it. As soon as Zeek swallowed the frozen one I went down to Walmart to get a few things for my new pet, Lunchbox Jr.