I recently switched all my ball pythons to live food. I have a very small freezer that's allotted for rodents (the top half of a 2-door mini fridge) so when I acquired my big normal who eats medium rats, I knew I would have an issue with space. With 10 snakes to feed with prey sizing ranging form pinky mice (for my baby corns) to medium rats, I knew I would not have space in my freezer for all sizes of prey items. My solution: feed the ball pythons live.

Has anyone noticed that their ball pythons grow more rapidly on live food? My juveniles (400-550g) eat one weaned rat a week and my big girl (2000g) eats a medium rat once a week. Since starting to feed them live, I've noticed their weights jump up tremendously. My problem feeder (my spider girl) wouldn't eat frozen so I switched her to rats. After hovering around 200g for a month feeding frozen, I switched her to live (same size prey) and she gained nearly 100g in 4 weeks. Is this just something strange with my lot or are other people noticing this too?

My only logical explanation is that some of the nutrients are lost in the freezing/rethawing process (like with some human foods) and by feeding live, they are regaining those nutrients. This is just a theory and could very well be wrong. Thoughts?