BP food question - concerned.

[Smarion0006]

Hello everyone. I get my ball python tomorrow (yay!). He is a month old and the breeder has been feeding him rat pups. Is this okay? From what I read everyone chooses different sizes of mice and rats to feed baby ball pythons, but I think it may be too large. What do you feed your baby ball pythons when they are this young? Also, he feeds his ball pythons live food. I live over an hour away from the nearest decent pet store and don't always have the time to drive an hour every week for fresh, live food. Can you recommend a way for me to get him off of live food and on to frozen rodents?

Thanks!

[Stewart_Reptiles]

The problem is that from one person to another a certain name may not be the same thing and not all feeders are the same size either based on who the supplier is

Rat pups are generally 2 weeks old with eyes open.

At a month old BP are generally fed fuzzy (on the larger side) either way just eyeball it so the prey is the size of the girth of your BP.

Right now before trying to switch you need to get him to eat for you, that will be your first job as a new owner, once he eats for you with consistency (3 to 5 meals) you can consider to switch him.

[Velrys]

Congrats!

If he is eating pups now then I would continue to feed pups. "Pups" can mean somewhat different things to different people, just ask to see one, or better yet put one on a scale to find out how big it is to get a better idea of what you are looking for. I feed my hatchlings fuzzy rats from RodentPro, they ship at a particular weight (if I have a runt I may bump down to pinkie for a couple weeks but not usually). A good rule of thumb is that the food item should be as big around as the snake.

Unfortunately switching from live to f/t doesn't have a cruising lane. There are instructions in sticky form on the husbandry forums that can explain the process of thawing, the thing to note is that you are heating them up more than they would be naturally and I would suggest thawing them inside the fridge instead of at room temp. Lots of nasty stuff in a whole rat (its not prepared). I would try to match up what they are being fed now with what you want to thaw. If your breeder feeds some f/t (some pre-kill food when it gets to the larger rat sizes) ask if they could freeze a couple for you to take with. This way the snake will have a better chance of continuing to recognize the food even though it is now f/t instead of getting confused by suddenly being offered f/t instead of live and for example a mouse instead of a rat. I would also try to get maybe a half dozen live meals in him in his new home so that he is not changing too much at once.

It may take a while for the snake to switch over though so don't worry if it goes for a while (its a hatchling so a little while) without eating. It will eat when it's hungry. If it doesn't then that is a different conversation... but don't be worried about time elapsing only behavior (no energy etc.etc.).