How Frequently Do You Feed Your BPs?

I feed all my snakes an appropriately sized f/t food item every five days. To continue the f/t versus live conversation (though I'm not sure if any of the following will be new), there are a couple reasons why I convert all my animals to f/t. The obvious main reason is for the safety of my snakes. I feed live when necessary, especially during the conversion period, but I've had a minor bite or two with some of my more inexperienced and younger snakes who don't strike and constrict properly. My heart can't take helplessly watching a mouse sink an incisor into the side of one of my animals, haha. Another reason is that, because of the previously mentioned incidences, when I do feed live, I stun my prey. Not only do I not like doing this, for obvious reasons of it seeming inhumane, but I also absolutely hate stunning/killing an animal only to have a snake refuse the meal for that week, and not have another snake to take it. I know having a frozen and thawed rat passed on equates just as much to an animal giving its life for waste, but somehow it seems so much more wasteful and disheartening to throw away a freshly killed mouse that was otherwise happy doing its rodent thing moments ago. I'm not at all squeamish about the predator-prey relationship, and I have absolutely no issues feeding live prey for ethical reasons (i.e. I don't find the act at all cruel for either party), but again, the potential waste factor of dispatching an animal and not having it eaten gets to me sometimes. Anywho, just my little input here. I'm very happy to see everyone putting so much thought into the well being of their animals though, it's very encouraging!

Cheers,
-Matt

I feed two live rats every week

Depends... Cu gets two small rats or one med. rat every 2 weeks, Prospekt gets 2 mice or 1 sm. rat. The boa gets a mouse every other week and the blood gets a small/med rat every month.

I feed my ball python one f/t adult mouse every 7 days, and I'm going to try and switch him over to one F/t rat pup every 7 days pretty soon.

I feed every 5 to 7 days. I feed F/T. I think it's funny that someone thinks that a snake won't take F/T the first time. My snake has eaten 10 F/T rats over his lifetime and he's almost 5 months old. In fact, according to his iHerp page, his FIRST meal after his first shed was F/T. Apparently, my snake recognized a F/T rat as food. And he continues to. I think you have to do what works for you. If I had a pet store 5 min from my house, I might do live. As it is, the pet store is 30 min from my house and to drive there every week is a little of a pain as I have a job and 3 children. So I buy a bunch at a time and freeze them. It works out better for me bc I'm not wasting all that gas and I don't have to worry if my $ runs a little low one week bc suppers in the freezer!

I feed every seven days one small/med f/t rat. To also further the live/frozen debate, I can personally attest to live being able to harm your bp. I was recently at a pet store handling their adult female, and I asked what all the imperfections were with her scales. I was told, quite cheerfully, I might add, that occasionally the rat gets nippy. I know the chances are lowered dramatically if you stun them, or heck, if you prekill them the chances dissappear, but why would you take the chance? I mean, I can understand if you believe it's healthier to eat fresh prey, and more power to you, but please, please take the precautions. I don't like seeing or hearing about rat bites. They do happen, atleast with negligent people. Sigh.... I think it MIGHT be snake rescue time. Or atleast time to talk to them about it. Something.

Sorry. My little :rage: moment.

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Originally Posted by 51-50 Python

i dont know why poeple even give it frozen food at all i guess some people are scared the mouse or rat will damage the snake but ive never had that problem and ive had my ball for 5 months

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Many people say they carry less parasites and diseases if frozen and then also can't damage the snake. My understanding was that some viruses can mutate when introduced from a cooled temperature to a warmer one.

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Originally Posted by rabernet

Can you point me to a study that says that live is healthier and more exciting for the snake than f/t? The fact that there are thousands of animals feed f/t that are thriving in collections around the world is proof enough that f/t is no less healthy than feeding live.

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Some people do stun feeding or freshly killed. Freezing prey removes many nutrients in my opinion, no, I haven't seen any tests on this but I wouldn't feed my bearded dragon frozen crickets, I wouldn't feed my tegu frozen turkey, nor my tarantula frozen crickets, why would I eat frozen spinach? It has less nutritional value than fresh. I can't use a meat item as an example since I'm a vegetarian. But you get my point. My understanding was many vitamins are removed from meat and proteins become weakened when in a frozen state and thawing it wont make any of that better. Many people will disagree on this and can send hate posts if they want. I really find it useless to argue about this point anyways. It's hard to say honestly...I haven't seen any nutritional value sheets for anything besides Bearded Dragons it's just my personal opinion. Plenty of snakes live off of f/t and so do many on live.

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Originally Posted by FireproofGorilla

F/t is more humane. Feeding live also gives us herps a bad rep with the general public. When the public starts getting scared, they start proposing bans. You really should rethink your purpose for owning a snake if you got it for the entertainment value. A starving dog could eat a cat and get plenty of nutrition that way, but are you going to stop feeding it dog food? No, b/c no one should be entertained by a creature getting slaughtered.

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The bans are up because people are scared from the idiots who get snakes and release them or don't care for them properly, they're using large snakes a gateway simply because people get them, they don't want them anymore, they escape, or they never realized how large they would get and release them, which them scares the public. If those of us owning herps would make an effort to educate and reach out to the public maybe there wouldn't be such an issue. I go around to my public schools and bring snake, lizards, and so on to show the kids and educate them. I make public speeches and try to educate my community the best I can. Soon I hope to set up booths during the festivals here offering pamphlets, information, and so on. If I had a Burmese or Reticulated I could educate people about their size but large snake make me uncomfortable honestly. Rethink your purpose of owning a herp if you can't reach out and educate the public about herps disbar the myths are horrors.

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Originally Posted by FireproofGorilla

1. Nature designed us to hunt and kill animals to eat as well. How do you explain vegetarians? I agree that constricting is instinct, therefore, how could a snake forget or lose touch with it? Breathing, eating, and survival are all instincts. Have you forgotten how to do any of the above?

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Originally Posted by FireproofGorilla

I totally agree with the vegetarians dying off. You ever seen a vegetarian? They're all gaunt and yellow (Ron White reference, just a joke).

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I can explain vegetarians because I am one, I lack the amino acids to digest high protein foods properly, I become sick and vomit. Thus, survival. Breathing is an unconscious reaction, our bodies cannot forget how to breathe unless our brains are harmed, eating is a subconscious reaction, people can forget to eat. And I don't eat frozen foods, or canned food for that matter. I eat three meals a day and three snacks a day, maintain a moderate weight, eat many fresh fruits and vegetables, cook most of my own meals, and exercise quite often. So some people shouldn't live because of certain values and ethical beliefs or that their bodies lack certain things? And that isn't inhumane to say some people don't deserve to live? Oh and I have no canines to bite into meat like most people. Vegetarians who think they're doing the world a favor by not eating meat or using animal products are idiots. And I love things like sushi, frog legs, and eggs that are runny in the middle but more than a couple bites makes me sick. Vegetarians get proteins by a mixture of proper proteins with carbohydrates. Starches come from fatty foods, just because we don't eat high protein foods doesn't mean we can't get starches from things like carbohydrates. Fat is in most food. Grains are high in starches which are also high in carbohydrates, carbohydrates carry 4 calories per gram, one gram of protein has 4, and one gram of fat has 9 calories. There are also sugar starches, too. Any intelligent vegetarian that knows about nutrition and diet management can be healthy, on the other hand many become a vegetarian because it's a trend or some other retarded reason.

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Originally Posted by mikeamy2007

i tend to agree with you on this point. my female wont eat unless i leave the room lol. She will literally constrict , and then stare at me until i leave, even if im across the room !!!!!!!!!

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Lol, our little ball, Jumbo is just like that. if he sees a human anywhere he will drop the food and go hide instead, the key is to watch him strike, leave, come back, and make sure he's eating fine, then leave and later check for any physical issues.

I find it amazing how well snakes can dispose of their prey and it's a great experience when there's live prey available but I don't believe live prey should be offered purely or mainly for our entertainment.

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Originally Posted by WingedWolfPsion

(The albinos are particularly bad about it, and I have to balance offering them unconscious prey--which the female wants to turn her nose up at, since it doesn't move--and getting the betadine ready if the rodent isn't out of it enough, and bites).

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I've heard albinos can't see movement as well as normals...I'm more curious if that's true or not than anything.

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Originally Posted by AmandaRisher

I think I would rather have the air squeezed out of me then slowly freeze to death. :(

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Most freeze chambers will kill within seconds, so it's really not that bad.

Live prey offers the natural hunting instincts. I do live feeding and always watch the feeding process up until they get the food inside their mouth, then usually leave them to eat in peace. I've had one ball bit once but I've been keeping an eye on the wound, never had a repeat, the ball learned from his mistake and always gets a good grip on the side on their head and wraps so their feet and held against their bodies. And I do have a local herp vet if anything goes awry and another 30 miles away, another 20 miles away, and another 90 miles away in case I can't use my local one.

My snakes all have their own feeding schedules, I offer them all food at least once a week and monitor the live prey to make sure no mishaps happen. Our little Jumbo eats once a week, Cynric would eat every couple days if I offered it so I offer him food twice a week at an even interval of days (usually Tuesday nights and Friday afternoons), Deja eats once every two weeks.

Cynric refuses f/t or freshly killed anyways, Jumbo I guess was force fed by his breeder so we're trying to change that, he refuses freshly killed too and f/t but I'm finding it hard to locate mice of the proper size for him that aren't so I've started breeding some mice.

And Deja, even though she's 5 feet long refuses rats and will ONLY eat mice...odd, but mice are cheaper and easier to keep, they're less likely to hurt a snake of her size too, not to mention they aren't as predisposed to carry mycoplasma which I still worry may be transferable to snakes. Thinking about using gerbils instead for her.

I haven't weighed any of my snakes, I know Jumbo looks a little small not unhealthy but he could be more round in the middle, Deja looks pretty healthy even though she eats not as often, then Cynric always looks round and contented. I've tried feeding a baby rat that was killed by the mama knocking over the water dish, every snake refused, it's not natural to them, they would come up and nose it but it's almost as if they didn't understand what to do with it.

The matter is we all believe our opinion is right or are afraid to admit to being wrong...it seems most people do week feedings with live prey.

But I do happen to feel so much better now about doing live feedings...many boa owners do f/t feedings, I just don't understand why. Live feedings shouldn't cause any problem when monitored and such.

I personally prefer raising my own feeders but all my rats have mycoplasma, and thus I refuse to feed them to any of my snake, I'd like to know if it's transferable between snakes and rats but no one will ever give me straight answers about it.

Look! I wrote a book!

When dealing with baby balls it all depends on their feeding response. I monitor each snake behavior for the first few feedings to get an idea of it's temperment. An agressive snake I feed after a poop or shrink in bulge of previous meal, 3-5 days. A snake that shy's away from prey I give longer breaks in between meals till it gets very curious in it's encloser and gives an agressive response when food is entered. I feed all my snake in their enclosers to build confidence. I rather a nippy healthy eater then a shy picky eater. Much easier to tame a snake down for handling then to getting a shy stressed snake to feed aggressively.

I've always fed my snakes live prey for the simple reason that nature intended it that way. Heaven forbid one of my snakes get loose to nature and be used to feeding on dead rodents. I know that if one of my pets get reintroduced to nature it may have a chance to thrive by feeding on live prey. I feel that giving dead prey is parallel to having a feline declawed (wrong). Many people disagree and may say that they dont need to hunt but I believe that good husbandry includes conditioning to as similar to nature as possible and not to your convenience.

i'll read through the rest of this thread later, but heres my info:

I feed every 6-10 days, the time frame depends on a few things:
- my schedule
- temperature in my apartment
- last feeding
- who ate last time food was offered

My adults go off feed seasonally so i offer them food less often when its cold, and give them longer to digest when they do. (so they eat every 7-14 days in the winter).

My babies are offered every 6-8 days. If someone is a little thin or wont take more than one item per feeding they get fed every 5 days.

When its warm, i'll feed more frequently. I generally feed smaller than normal prey items because i feed a bit more frequently (even my adult animals, in the summer/spring will be offered food every 5-7 days).

I feed F/T although i have fed live on a few occasions. I feed F/T because
1. all of my animals will accept F/T rats or mice without hesitation when they are eating.
2. i know how to properly thaw and warm frozen prey to make it apetizing for my snakes.
3. it is convenient for me.

To FireproofGorilla, I have a question.. What happens when you feed a snake a live prey item and it doesn't constrict? I have witnessed this first hand and it is one of the reasons i don't like to feed live. If my animals can dispatch a prey item quickly so it dosen't suffer that is fine, but if they swallow it alive without killing it first its cruel to me and dangerous for my animal. I listened to that mouse scream and squeak until it suffocated. Not very efficient if you ask me. And this is an animal, that when she is feeding, has an incredible feeding response 99% of the time.