Terrible mother.

I just got done feeding my bp two live mice (not at once) and one of the mice bit her hard enough to rip a small bit of scales off. I can see a sliver of flesh, so I put Neosporin on the wound. I feel absolutely terrible for her getting bit hard enough to do as much damage. But will the Neosporin be enough? Or should I take her in to the vet?
I feel so terrible for letting her get hurt like this. How can I prevent it? Is there a way to keep the mouse from biting that doesn't involve hitting it on the head?

The only way to prevent something like this is to feed f/t or pre-killed.

The Neosporin you put one the wound was the kind without pain relief, right? The pain relief stuff is toxic to reptiles I believe.

When feeding live, you need to be prepared to use tongs or a chop stick, to put in the rodents mouth to prevent it from biting.

You BP should be fine.

x2 on switching to f/t or prekilled. Thats all you can do to prevent rodent bites.

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Originally Posted by Kinra

The Neosporin you put one the wound was the kind without pain relief, right? The pain relief stuff is toxic to reptiles I believe.

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Yeah, you want ot make sure that any topical ointments used have no pain relievers or numbing agents. Check the neosporin and if it does have the pain reliever in it make sure you clean her up good and replace with just plain old neosporin.

When feeding live there is always the chance for injury. If you continue to feed live just be vigilant and on hand to try and prevent any mishaps. When I feed live I have my feeder tongs on standby just in case.

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Originally Posted by Kinra

The only way to prevent something like this is to feed f/t or pre-killed.

The Neosporin you put one the wound was the kind without pain relief, right? The pain relief stuff is toxic to reptiles I believe.

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I read about the pre-killing. I just break the mouse's neck, correct? I've fed my bp live ever since I got her, so will she even take pre-killed?

And my Neosporin bottle says it's the original, I don't see anything on it that says it's pain-relieving.

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Originally Posted by llovelace

When feeding live, you need to be prepared to use tongs or a chop stick, to put in the rodents mouth to prevent it from biting.

You BP should be fine.

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How can I get the tongs/chopsticks to the mouse in time? (Wow, I feel like such a newbie.)

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Originally Posted by ShamelessAardvark

I read about the pre-killing. I just break the mouse's neck, correct? I've fed my bp live ever since I got her, so will she even take pre-killed?

And my Neosporin bottle says it's the original, I don't see anything on it that says it's pain-relieving.

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I just feed f/t so I don't really know how to go about pre-killing prey. It never hurts to try feeding pre-killed or f/t. When I got my first BP the petstore told me she only ate live mice so that's what I fed for a while, but then I tried a f/t rat and she took it no problem. You just never know what they are going to do.

If the Neosporin doesn't say pain-relieving then it should be fine. :)

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Originally Posted by Kinra

I just feed f/t so I don't really know how to go about pre-killing prey. It never hurts to try feeding pre-killed or f/t. When I got my first BP the petstore told me she only ate live mice so that's what I fed for a while, but then I tried a f/t rat and she took it no problem. You just never know what they are going to do.

If the Neosporin doesn't say pain-relieving then it should be fine. :)

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I'll try pre-killing then. I'll buy a small mouse, I'm sure it'd be a bit easier to kill. c:

Thanks so much for the advice, I'm starting to feel a bit better about this.

quickly, I've had to turn over snakes after a bad strike, to be able to stick the chopstick in. I can say that I've never had a rodent draw blood.....knock on wood.
Mine have a tendency to strike at the rear end of the rodent.