Feeding, live and learn

[nickdolin]

Had an interesting day today with my BP.

As I was coming home from work today I stopped in and bought some food for the snakes. When I work out of town I stop on my way back because the closest place for mice/rats is about a 30 minute drive otherwise. Knowing that it wasn't time to feed Thor until Thursday I bought a mouse anyway because keeping 1 isn't a problem.

So I come home with the mouse in a box that's in a tied plastic bag and within a second or two Thor is out of his hide and smelling around the holes in his viv as it was obvious to me he could easily smell it even after being in the room for mere seconds. I thought, well, maybe he is hungry, I'll attempt a quick feed and if he doesn't strike right away I'll just try again later. So I place the box with the mouse in it on top of his viv and by now he is really moving around and active, again telling me that this guy is hungry!

Well, I take the box off of the top of his viv and begin to take his lid off, with him staring directly up patiently awaiting. I take the lid off and he opens his mouth and begins to strike but only moves 1-2 inches as I believe he then realized that I wasn't the mouse. He pulls back in the viv and stares at me as if to say, "Sorry, I thought you were a mouse". I put the mouse in and boom, strike right away and no problem eating the mouse. Problem is the mouse was smaller than usual (another problem living in my area, limited supply mixed with inconsistent size of prey).Soon after eating he continued to look up at the lid of his viv and has kept that pose on and off during the day/evening telling me (or I think he is telling me) that hey I'm still hungry. At this point I begin to think that the lid may still smell like mice so I take it off and clean it up, however, he has still spent much time in his hunting pose.

Long story short (for those skim reading ) 2 issues arose today...

1. No more pre-scenting by placing the rodent (in box) on top of the viv as I believe he smelled the mouse and when I took the lid off he saw my heat and began to strike (luckily I believe he realized it wasn't a mouse) but quickly pulled back.

2. I need to keep a closer eye on the size of the mice I receive as from what I can tell the guy is still hungry. He was last fed on Thursday with a 25-30g mouse (he is 225ish) which I thought was a decent sized meal. The mouse toady was likely 15-20g. Should I try small rats or should I begin trying 2 mice? He looked more than willing after eating 1 that he'd like to have another...

[bman123]

Why not order some frozen?? You will always have them ya know.

[don15681]

you can try to get him on rats. mice will also work. I have a normal female ball that weighs 3960 grams and she is a mouse eater. I also breed africian soft furs which are a little larger than mice. she prefers mice over the soft furs. when feeding a snake a live item, be careful and watch the feeding. if the snake grabs the rodent where the rodent can bite the snake, just stick something long in the rodents mouth until it's dead. I use the 18 inch tongs that I feed with.

[chapskis1]

How often are you feeding your snake? Maybe you mentioned that, but I didn't notice it. If he is about 225g, then you should be feeding him every 5-7 days.

I probably wouldn't go with more than 15% of his body weight at one feeding. Do you have a Petco or Petsmart nearby? They usually sell frozen. That way you could try out a few before putting in a big frozen order online (almost neccessary to buy in bulk to defray shipping costs).

Or, you could buy 4 or 5 mice at once, and freeze them yourself. I think there is a sticky on here somewhere about humanely euthanizing mice with a cooler and some dry ice.

Either way, I would definitely recommend trying to get him on frozen. Safer and definitely more convenient.

I was very lucky and my BP ate frozen the first time I ever fed him (even though he had been eating live for the breeder).

Hope this helps.

Good luck!

-- George

[Evilme5229]

Hahaha. Not to knock on the ppl who feed their snakes f/t or prekills, but I find alot of ppl pushing for that. More and more its becoming almost comical. Everyone has their preferences.

Another thing, you also proved another thing people call a myth on this forum. In the last week I was reading a thread and they said its a myth that feeding in the enclosure does not lead into more tagging; that the snakes know the difference. ::shakes head::

I do agree in feeding in the enclosure only when your snake refuses to eat. Otherwise, make a small setup for him to feed him in. This will prevent a lot of the "feed me seamor." Sounds like you almost got tagged.

You said it yourself the mouse was small. Sometimes the stores only have small ones and thats when its time to double up. Feed him two small mice and he should be fine. You should be feeding him weekly anyway. I know my friends snake would keep eating if he let them, sometimes when feeding in the enclosure you will run into that problem of the scent of the mouse staying around.

[nickdolin]

I had posted earlier that I tried f/t for a month with no luck, even when using several different tips/methods mentioned on here.

I may start feeding outside of the enclosure as I do that with my Corn and I've never had a problem with her.

I had fed him on Thursday (which had been 6 days since his last feed) and this happened on Tuesday. I'll go to a 5 day schedule (smaller meals more often method).

[BPelizabeth]

Ugh....it kind of drives me crazy that F/T is pushed so hard with some of you. I don't mean to call some of you out....but just saying. I respect that some of you feed F/T...pls respect that some of us feed live. They both have different pros and cons.

Feed him what he will take. Not power feeding! But he should probably have more based on what he weighs. (not sure if you know). He was definetly still hungry. I do not go with the 15% as it seems waaaaaaayyyyyy to small for mine when you work it out. So I go with the widest part of the body. But in your case...if they are small....depending on his size...go with 2 or 3. You might also think about starting a colony...if getting them is unreliable. Where I am at the store is like 40 minutes away so we make the trip once a week....which is fine with me. I get to play w a bunch of reptiles while I am there....lol

One of my snakes that is still under 500 grams will take a jumbo mouse...and two adults. But she is a total pig. After all that she will still look at you like....where is the next one. Egads I know I need to switch to rats but that is just a little scary still to me....lol


And sorry Evil me...I still think it is a myth about feeding in the cage. We have done this since about the third feeding on my first snake.....never had a problem. It is almost like they have a calander in their enclosure somewhere. Saturday comes and they are ready for it.

[rabernet]

I do agree in feeding in the enclosure only when your snake refuses to eat. Otherwise, make a small setup for him to feed him in. This will prevent a lot of the "feed me seamor." Sounds like you almost got tagged.

He would have had the same response if he'd had the animal in a separate feeding tub and had the mouse pre-scenting on top of it - not sure that's a strong argument for feeding in a different enclosure.

I feed 50 snakes in their enclosures. I've NEVER been mistaken for food, and I don't handle any one animal more than a few times a week for routine cage maintenance.

[rabernet]

Ugh....it kind of drives me crazy that F/T is pushed so hard with some of you. I don't mean to call some of you out....but just saying. I respect that some of you feed F/T...pls respect that some of us feed live. They both have different pros and cons.

Feed him what he will take. Not power feeding! But he should probably have more based on what he weighs. (not sure if you know). He was definetly still hungry. I do not go with the 15% as it seems waaaaaaayyyyyy to small for mine when you work it out. So I go with the widest part of the body. But in your case...if they are small....depending on his size...go with 2 or 3. You might also think about starting a colony...if getting them is unreliable. Where I am at the store is like 40 minutes away so we make the trip once a week....which is fine with me. I get to play w a bunch of reptiles while I am there....lol

One of my snakes that is still under 500 grams will take a jumbo mouse...and two adults. But she is a total pig. After all that she will still look at you like....where is the next one. Egads I know I need to switch to rats but that is just a little scary still to me....lol


And sorry Evil me...I still think it is a myth about feeding in the cage. We have done this since about the third feeding on my first snake.....never had a problem. It is almost like they have a calander in their enclosure somewhere. Saturday comes and they are ready for it.

What she said - both about live feeding and feeding in the enclosure!

[redstormlax12]

People aren't pushing F/T onto him. There telling him because its an easy solution to his problem. Buying frozen you can get a consistent size rat/mouse unlike what he is experiencing at the pet store.

These people weren't pushing F/T on him because they believe feeding live is wrong, but because his problem would be easily solved by ordering the F/T.