The importance of a 7-10 day feedings schedule for Balls the opportunistic feeder.

Looking for personal experiences or studies.
Im now figuring out a schedule on how I should breed & feed off my Rats. I had my 1st litter on 3/16 and see how they can go from food for the Balls to snacks for the Burm in what seems like a week or two.
Id like to hear what experianced Ball Python owners know/think is best or what should/shouldnt be done.
Ive been a Burm owner most of my life and Balls are a tottally different "Ball" game hahahaha.
With that said, can I feed my Balls (all over 6 months of age) 2 or 3 smaller Rats (depending on Gram weight) twice a month in order to use up my litters?
I understand there are other common sense options like F/T but im not looking for idea's as I feed fresh kill only at this point.
Thank you for any info you can share.
The Basic Question is - Can a Ball Pythons still thrive on a twice a month feeding schedule if they're eating more at each sitting?
Thx peeps ����

I think the only problem with that would be that some Ball Pythons refuse to take more then one food item per feeding.

Feeding twice the month a fairly large (but still appropriate) meal can be done with adults Ball Pythons. Esp. if you aren't building up a female for breeding.

I'm not sure I would want to do this with a younger Ball Python, though (below 1000gr)

They usually do get hungry more often and you don't want to put to large a meal into them. To make up for the missing week, you'd have to feed a meal that would be bigger then I would be comfortable with.

All that said, you do have the odd "young" BP that actually prefers to eat less often then weekly. I'd still like to offer weekly, though.

I know you said you prefer NOT to feed FT. So if you don't want to save surplus and feed it off that way, you could possibly sell some? But that might make you short on appropriate sized rodents, too.

Perhaps you could just see how it goes for a couple of month, try different things. Most likely once you have the ongoing "operations" things will fall into place and you will figure out what works :)

For what it's worth two of my five Royals will only eat every 10 to 14 days ...


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Originally Posted by Zincubus

For what it's worth two of my five Royals will only eat every 10 to 14 days ...


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I have one thats doing that too.. Its a Male and I think his Growth Spurt has slowed.. My female 1/2 his age (6 months) eats anything, anytime, anywhere hahahaha and she has now passed him by 100+ grams @450g.
I call her my Tooch hahahaha


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Originally Posted by zina10

I think the only problem with that would be that some Ball Pythons refuse to take more then one food item per feeding.

Feeding twice the month a fairly large (but still appropriate) meal can be done with adults Ball Pythons. Esp. if you aren't building up a female for breeding.

I'm not sure I would want to do this with a younger Ball Python, though (below 1000gr)

They usually do get hungry more often and you don't want to put to large a meal into them. To make up for the missing week, you'd have to feed a meal that would be bigger then I would be comfortable with.

All that said, you do have the odd "young" BP that actually prefers to eat less often then weekly. I'd still like to offer weekly, though.

I know you said you prefer NOT to feed FT. So if you don't want to save surplus and feed it off that way, you could possibly sell some? But that might make you short on appropriate sized rodents, too.

Perhaps you could just see how it goes for a couple of month, try different things. Most likely once you have the ongoing "operations" things will fall into place and you will figure out what works :)

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Your right I have to try it for 2/3 months and get a idea of how things go.
Now that I think about it, my male is already being picky at 10-14 day feedings so I could actually feed the female every week but go by feeder weight. So if they are 20 gram pups then give her 2 but the next week if their 35 give her one.. That way I'm still feeding every 7-10. What you think about that?



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Originally Posted by Mr Sully

Your right I have to try it for 2/3 months and get a idea of how things go.
Now that I think about it, my male is already being picky at 10-14 day feedings so I could actually feed the female every week but go by feeder weight. So if they are 20 gram pups then give her 2 but the next week if their 35 give her one.. That way I'm still feeding every 7-10. What you think about that?



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The thing is in the wild they don't eat every seven days of course ..that's just to suit us :)



There's a guy in the UK who feeds his snakes a varied diet of mice / rats / chicks .... and varies the sizes .... sometimes feeding doubles .... and mixes the dates anywhere between 5 / 7 /10 / 14 days ..



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Originally Posted by Mr Sully

Your right I have to try it for 2/3 months and get a idea of how things go.
Now that I think about it, my male is already being picky at 10-14 day feedings so I could actually feed the female every week but go by feeder weight. So if they are 20 gram pups then give her 2 but the next week if their 35 give her one.. That way I'm still feeding every 7-10. What you think about that?



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Sounds like a plan !! :)

The "varied" diet and such can backfire with Ball Pythons, though.

They sometimes decide they like one of those food items and then refuse everything else. And as we all know, they can be stubborn about it.
Through all my years with them, I like getting and keeping them on rats, because rats are easily available, in all kinds of sizes, and I don't have to feed more then one item, unless I want to.

I'd hate to get my BP stuck on something that is rather difficult to obtain. They are already such picky snakes ;)

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Originally Posted by zina10

The "varied" diet and such can backfire with Ball Pythons, though.

They sometimes decide they like one of those food items and then refuse everything else. And as we all know, they can be stubborn about it.
Through all my years with them, I like getting and keeping them on rats, because rats are easily available, in all kinds of sizes, and I don't have to feed more then one item, unless I want to.

I'd hate to get my BP stuck on something that is rather difficult to obtain. They are already such picky snakes ;)

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I cant remember what morph it is as pics online are deceiving but what size can your large 5' Ball take? .. And whats the aprox weight of that one?


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Originally Posted by Zincubus

The thing is in the wild they don't eat every seven days of course ..that's just to suit us :)



There's a guy in the UK who feeds his snakes a varied diet of mice / rats / chicks .... and varies the sizes .... sometimes feeding doubles .... and mixes the dates anywhere between 5 / 7 /10 / 14 days ..



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I agree... I think we may be doing things as healthy for them as possible but it sure isn't how its done in the wild.
I guess I'll play this all by ear, Im sure I will figure out whats going to work and what isn't rather quickly...


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