Just a feeding day rant...

Went to the pet store where I get my mice today, I usually get 7 large adults for Jynx and 1 large hopper for Sadie. Last week my adults were a little on the small side (like almost small enough for Sadie), so I was happy to see the mice were the correct size this week. The woman working told me their hoppers were small this week so I was welcome to look at the adults and see if there was one small enough for Sadie, there weren't... Well that was no problem I thought, Sadie is right on the edge of needing a larger sized prey item, so I said I'd take two of the small ones this week. Moving along with my day, I got home moved the snakes to their feeding enclosures, took the weight of the mice for Jynx, and weighed the paper bag with the hoppers in it, and it came up much less than I was expecting even with the warning from the woman at the store. I looked in the bag, and she was right, the hoppers were almost comically small, just barely hoppers really, at least they weighed about 13 grams together... Only slightly smaller than I was hoping to give her this week.

I continued with my normal feeding day routine, and returned Sadie to her clean cage to curl up in her hot spot, then gave my attention to Jynx's enclosure. By the time everything was cleaned, he had only 3 mice left, so I continued feeding, and watched as he ate. Now he is usually very theatrical in the way he kills and eats his mice, but today it seemed over the top even for him. He was letting the mice come up and sniff his nose then start to walk off before he actually decided to strike with more force than normal. Then when he was actually swallowing he was tying himself in more knots than normal before the stretch and swallow followed by the look and beg for more. This went on until the last mouse.

I tossed the last mouse in the tub and he struck much quicker than on the first six. Well after he killed this one he kind of tossed it into the corner, not odd for him, he usually does that before positioning it to swallow. Jynx nosed around at it for a minute, the yawned and went to the other side of the tub... I rolled my eyes, and left him in there for about a half hour, checking on him every once in a while to see him starting to search for water and his hide, all the while smearing mouse blood on the sides of the tub. So I put that little jerk away and watched as he drank some water and slithered into his hide with, what I assume to be, a smug look on his snakey face.

I love that little jerk but it is annoying when I have to toss a perfectly good mouse and spend extra time scrubbing blood off the sides of my feeding tub... Sometimes I think he does things like that on purpose just to annoy me.

Toss that mouse in the freezer, thaw it out next week, warm it up, loop it into a coil when he's constricting the first mouse. If you get it the right temperature he'll very likely eat that one along with the first one he kills for next weeks feed.

I considered that for a little bit, but the maternal unit is not too fond of the idea of rodents in the freezer haha

Why not try switching to rats. 7 mice per feeding seems a little crazy.

It's just what's been working for us, and the savings from switching to rats isn't a whole lot from the pet store I get my feeders from.

But killing one rat is much better than killing 7 mice for the snake. It takes energy and calories to kill, really it is a waste if he will take a small rat instead.

He's been finicky in the past and has been doing perfectly well this past year on the mice. Yes I have considered switching to rats, but as long as he is healthy I'd rather stick to what I know he will eat and is doing successful on. Now will I try to switch the baby to rats when she gets big enough, yes, and at that time I might try to switch Jynx as well, but for now I would much rather avoid upsetting the apple cart.


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