switching to rats?

[whiSki08]

Want to switch to rats but not sure if a fuzzy or a pup is the right size. Right now I'm feeding hopper mice. Last time I weighed my bp he was 156g. I'm guessing fuzzies are the way to go but I have no experience with rats or there sizes. Any insight would be helpful.

Thank you

[Slim]

I'd feed him rat hoppers for a a couple weeks then put him on pups.

[Lizardlicks]

@Slim: You mean mice hoppers? Hoppers are basically weans, right? It wouldn't make sense to go for a larger sized rat then down to a smaller one.

Anyway, I was offering my first two girls rat pups at about the size your kid is now, and my tiny 69g boy just took a small adult mouse that was easily 15g to my shock and amaze. You should be safe to offer rat pups at this point. The only thing you have to watch out for is a stuborn snake with a prey preference.

[chrid16371]

Here is the mice to rat comparison chart and weights. Again I hope the person that originally showed me this doesn't mind me reposting it. It really is good information and I thank you!



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[Lizardlicks]

Keep also in mind that different places sell their feeders under different names. Big Cheese doesn't have mice weans, they have mice hoppers 7-12g and adult mice 13 -18g. Their rat fuzzies are 10 - 19g and the rat pups are 20 - 34g. Layne Labs classes their rat pups in the 20 - 29g range and fuzzies as 14-19g. When buying food, it's a lot easier to get the weight of your snake then go by the 10-15% guideline and weigh your feeders too, or try to eyeball feeding prey the same thickness (or slightly more or less, advice here varies) as the thickest part of your snake. There's common terms but not a whole lot of standard with the feeder labeling conventions- weans, hoppers, crawlers, pups... it gets confusing! Go by numbers or what you can directly observe and there will be a lot less mystery.

For your kid, going by the 10-15% rule 15-23g feeders would be a good number to aim at though slightly larger would likely not hurt them. Smaller rat pups, or larger rat fuzzies would be perfect. If you get a pack of f/t rat pups it will have rats through that whole range which will grow with your snake. What I did when I ordered my f/t stuff from Big Cheese was take them all out of the bag they shipped in and divided them up into smaller freezer bags by 10 gram increments. Two packs of rat pups lasted my girls perfectly up to the point they were ready for weans, and then I did the same from the weans up to smalls, and from that point I stopped weighing and just started eyeballing for general size. They get one small adult rat a week now and don't usually bother with weighing the food except a couple when I get a new bag so I have an idea of the average in it.

[whiSki08]

Keep also in mind that different places sell their feeders under different names. Big Cheese doesn't have mice weans, they have mice hoppers 7-12g and adult mice 13 -18g. Their rat fuzzies are 10 - 19g and the rat pups are 20 - 34g. Layne Labs classes their rat pups in the 20 - 29g range and fuzzies as 14-19g. When buying food, it's a lot easier to get the weight of your snake then go by the 10-15% guideline and weigh your feeders too, or try to eyeball feeding prey the same thickness (or slightly more or less, advice here varies) as the thickest part of your snake. There's common terms but not a whole lot of standard with the feeder labeling conventions- weans, hoppers, crawlers, pups... it gets confusing! Go by numbers or what you can directly observe and there will be a lot less mystery.

For your kid, going by the 10-15% rule 15-23g feeders would be a good number to aim at though slightly larger would likely not hurt them. Smaller rat pups, or larger rat fuzzies would be perfect. If you get a pack of f/t rat pups it will have rats through that whole range which will grow with your snake. What I did when I ordered my f/t stuff from Big Cheese was take them all out of the bag they shipped in and divided them up into smaller freezer bags by 10 gram increments. Two packs of rat pups lasted my girls perfectly up to the point they were ready for weans, and then I did the same from the weans up to smalls, and from that point I stopped weighing and just started eyeballing for general size. They get one small adult rat a week now and don't usually bother with weighing the food except a couple when I get a new bag so I have an idea of the average in it.

Good info about separating them. I live 20mins from big cheese and I think I'm going to contact them, get what I need and weigh each one. Thanks

[whiSki08]

I'd feed him rat hoppers for a a couple weeks then put him on pups.

Slim do you mean the rat fuzzies or continue with the mice hoppers until he's about 10-15% of a rat pup?