How many rats/mice max per feeding sessions,

[JiBster816]

Just curious on how many rats/mice do you feed your pythons at once. Age and size of pythons and feeder?
I have read online to feed them as much as they want but smaller meals are better then larger ones. Today I did a total of 4 small rats for my adult females that weigh in about 1500 grams. They seem to want more! The rats look pretty small but after taking them in pythons look nice and plump. Before that its usually 1 for male and sometimes the females would take two. Again this is what ive read online and I am just curious about how you guys would go about doing this. I used to have redtail boas and I would always give them 1 large meals. It seems that ball python do better with smaller meals. As in the feeder is not bigger then the python's rounder area.

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[ViperSRT3g]

I usually do one medium rat per feed. But I base feed sizes off the widest portion of my snake, never by pure weight alone.

[Phantomtip]

1 appropriate sized rat a meal. If you're feeding them 2 small ones a meal go to the next size up. If they are still hungry go a size larger.

[JiBster816]

Hello thanks for answering. Yes I understand the widest portion of the snake. These feeder is about 2/3rd of that. She took in 4 rats but I didnt want to offer her another. The females were locked up for about a month now. Thanks for answering but i forgot to mention this is for breeding purpose.

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[ViperSRT3g]

Are you attempting to get them to breed ASAP? Because in that case, most people will offer them much more food than one rat or mouse per meal.

[TheSnakeGuy]

How often are you feeding? Given the size of your rats, you probably don't need to be feeding more than two at a time. If she knows it's breeding time then just offer every 5 days and she'll pack on some weight gor you anyway. 4 rats sounds like too much all at once, especially considering the big bowel movements that have to compete for space with growing follicles inside her.

[Darkbird]

Depends on what your feeding and the size of the snake. I got a picky asf feeder that I just cant get on rats reliably. She'll take a scented one sometimes, but it's easier for me to just give in to her. So she gets 2-4 asfs per feed depending on their size. She did take 5 once but this was after one of her 3 week "I don't wanna eat so I'm not gonna!" phases, and the asfs were on the small side. For a rat feeder I would just up the size and feed singles.

[PitOnTheProwl]

I offer till they ignore it.

[Darkbird]

I offer till they ignore it.

Good point. They will stop eating when they are full.

[JiBster816]

Ok I know when you offered til its full but how many was the highest rat count? I youtube some videos and thatd what the op says. Do I trust or rely on that one or two source..probably not
My highest was 4 rats. I fed that to my 1500+ gram female. The size of the rat was small. Bought the ratd from professionalreptiles. Rats was small giving the fact it took her a minute and 30 sec to 2 mins to devour. She was still hungry because her behavior was the same after the 4th rat. I didnt want to overfeed her.

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