Bp Not Eating F/t!! Help!!

well my title says it all, for two weeks now i have been tryign to feed my guy f/t but he just doesn't seem to like them, he would go up and look at it and smell it but would not strike and swallow:mad: last week he did the same thing but i fed it a live mice after and he took it. I sually buy 1 live mice and a couple of prekilled and leave them in my freezer so i don't ahve ot buy him live everyweek. He took the f/t before but now anymore. any sugguestions on how i could swtich him to f/t?

are you making sure the f/t is really warm when you feed? i find that makes a huge difference to my snakes. also, some of them like their prey to move around so i use my tongs to do a little dance for them LOL and that gets them interested.

After working with 400 hatchlings and trying to get them to eat, I realize how frustrating this can be.

I would recommend trying frozen mice and frozen rats, and dangling them with tongs. If it is warm and dancing and smells like a rat/mouse, you have a much better chance.

It may take some time to finally switch your snake over to f/t. Some BP's are more picky then others. Keep trying.

I'm not sure but if you get him eating f/t again is it wise to alternate with live? (in that that is likely to cause problems when you offer f/t?)

I second the 'make sure it's warm' notion. My BP male didn't want to eat for a while, because the rat wasn't warm enough. I use my hair dryer to get it nice and warm, especially on it's head.

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Originally Posted by rottnpagan

I second the 'make sure it's warm' notion. My BP male didn't want to eat for a while, because the rat wasn't warm enough. I use my hair dryer to get it nice and warm, especially on it's head.

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i stick the rat inside the heatlamp shield for 5 minutes or so, and then put the bulb above the rodents head for another minute

usually does the trick every time.. sometimes it can take a while with a hair dryer

i've actually started feeding wet rodents. in a thread a while ago someone was saying they just pop their frozen prey into a bowl of boiling water and let them thaw...

so now i do that... drain the water, add more really hot water (we have a special tap in our house that the water comes out ready for tea or cocoa! every home should have one!!!) and i refill - allowing the prey to become hot again (because the water cooled thawing the prey) and then i put them into a tea towel and lightly dry them and pop them into the enclosures. i've had much more success since doing this instead of warming them in a bag and then putting them under my heat lamps...

and...

some of my snakes go back and forth no problem... but not my ball. he refuses to eat f/t - he did a few times but now... he just ignores anthing not alive. so, i feed him live. but that's just my experience.

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Originally Posted by recycling goddess

i've actually started feeding wet rodents. in a thread a while ago someone was saying they just pop their frozen prey into a bowl of boiling water and let them thaw...

so now i do that... drain the water, add more really hot water (we have a special tap in our house that the water comes out ready for tea or cocoa! every home should have one!!!) and i refill - allowing the prey to become hot again (because the water cooled thawing the prey) and then i put them into a tea towel and lightly dry them and pop them into the enclosures. i've had much more success since doing this instead of warming them in a bag and then putting them under my heat lamps...

and...

some of my snakes go back and forth no problem... but not my ball. he refuses to eat f/t - he did a few times but now... he just ignores anthing not alive. so, i feed him live. but that's just my experience.

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Rock on! I've been doing that all along! I would be careful with the hot water dispenser as that is fairly close to boiling and could be cooking the rats as opposed to just hot tap water. I remember having one of those in our house as a kid and I always burned myself (I wasn't so sharp and still am not).

well i tried all that you guys suggested, all the dancing and heating, i usually put the mice on the heatpad too before i feed but i can never seem to trick him into eating it. i fed him another live one yesterday almost instantly before i even got to settle down and watch he had the mouse curled up.