am I starving my snake?

[Gpoop]

I was looking at some videos and photos of ball pythons and it seems like everyone's baby is fat and short yet mine is really long and not fat at all. This is my first snake so is it possible I'm not feeding him enough or big enough prey?


Here's some pics. He hatched on Oct. 8th and these pics are from last Wednesday. He weighs 164 grams and his last meal was on Saturday which was a rat fuzzy at 20 grams

[toyota89]

How often do you feed?

Sent from my Droid RAZR M using Tapatalk 2

[Raven01]

164g snake x 0.1 = 16.4 gram prey to 164g snake x 0.15 = 24.6 gram prey.

So, you are feeding right in the middle of suggested prey weights as near as I can tell.
Personally, I think juveniles tend to lack the over-stuffed sausage look that you see.
Since juvies are growing so quickly I lean to the 5-7 day schedule rather than the 7-10 for adults.

[anwhit]

Yeah, I was concerned about this too. I just think juveniles haven't built up that extra fat and muscle yet. He looks pretty healthy to me.

[Gpoop]

I feed him every Saturday, so 7 days.

[Kodieh]

I'm starting to feed my girls on a 3-4 day schedule, their 20g bigger than yours. I feed them with my adults, then three days later they get a second meal. Four days after that they're eating with the adults again. Then there days later they eat again. So, they're getting two meals a week now.

Sent from my SAMSUNG Galaxy SIII using Tapatalk 2

[Gerardo]

I thought feeding 1 good sized meal a week was good enough to get them growing like a weed.

[Marduk]

Many people feed the young ones every 5 days until around 500g; then switch to every 7 days.
In each case, meals should be 10-15% the snakes body weight.

[Mike41793]

I'm starting to feed my girls on a 3-4 day schedule, their 20g bigger than yours. I feed them with my adults, then three days later they get a second meal. Four days after that they're eating with the adults again. Then there days later they eat again. So, they're getting two meals a week now.

Sent from my SAMSUNG Galaxy SIII using Tapatalk 2

You could offer to the adults every 4 days too. Im sure some would take it.

[DooLittle]

I feed youngsters every 5 days. And let me tell you, my enchi would think he was going to die of starvation if I didn't give his little piggy face a rat on day 5.

Sent from my ADR6410LVW using Tapatalk 2