My Ball Doesnt Like To Soak...

Falcor is THE MAN. I wish I had a Luck Dragon!!!

It might be cool to see your snake stike and kill a live animal but when he ends up with a cut on his eye or on his head or even in his mouth you will quickly change your mind. You dont have to feed frozen i feed both my snakes fresh killed. I just put them in a ziploc bag and bang it against the counter and that does the trick. I strongly recomend you feed fresh killed. A mouse can still do lots of damage to a snake. And if it so happens that your snake gets injured by a mouse it could go off feed because they associate the mouse with the injury. There was a picture on the web some where that showed a ball python that was severly injured by a mouse it had almost all of his skin bitten off.

Yeah I agree on the whole idea of it being better to feed p/k. I mean, you take a risk each time you feed live, small of a risk as it may be. But its one of those things, that if it does happen 1 out of 1000 feedings, its a HUGE deal and can have lasting consequences.

It is also important to understand that your bp, when fully grown, will need to be eating adult rats. Rats are MUCH more hostile when threatened, and therefore totally unacceptable to offer live to your snake. Point being, get your snake used to eating prekilled items now, and the transition to p/k rats will be much easier further down the road.

I think it's time for Mikey to see what happens when the prey turns on the predator: http://www.proexotics.com/graphics/b...ive_prey_1.jpg

Thank you i have been looking for that picture. Post the one that shows the whole body. And remember that snake is STILL ALIVE in that picture but i am sure it didnt live long after that. The point is that if you feed live you run the risk of you snake getting a nasty injury then a scar. Remember that the mouse is a prey item and its life depends on how hard its going to fight back and it will fight for its life. Your job as a keeper is to reduce the level of stress to the animal and to eliminate the possibility of injury. There are rare instances that a live feeding is advisable and this is when the snake refuses to eat. If you feel queezy about killing a mouse or a rat and if you live close to the pet store they will kill the mouse or rat for you.

That was obviously done by a rat.. The mice i use are harmless and before feeding my snake live prey I always somehow imobolize it so it doesnt get the chance to hurt my snake. I usualy bang it on the wall pretty hard to a point were it can barley move but has some life to it. That picture looks like whoever that was left there feeder in there with the snake for some time. If i see a threat to my ball I will immidieatly take the mouse out. A mouse with a cuncussion and broken limbs can do little harm to a hungry ball.. =] .. And if any of you say a crippled mouse can do any harm to my ball are skeptics. If worse comes to worse I will give it to my cat and let him kill the mouse for me before feeding it to my ball..

Not "obviously" done by a rat, that could be done a by a mouse, rat, gerbil, hamster, or any other toothy live rodent with a strong sense of self-preservation. Feeding "stunned" prey is generally a good bit safer, especially if you supervise the entire process sober, but stunned prey have been known to recover to the point where they could inflict significant damage and distractions are always a possibility (phone, doorbell, videogame, 12 pack, whatever).

It is every snake keeper's choice to make what and how to feed their snake(s), but I just feel like it should be a fully informed decision. If you are aware of all the dangers and possibilities involved and still make that choice, then that is your choice to make, but too many keepers feed live because they don't know the dangers (not just of wounds but also of parasites and/or poor nutrition), because "it's what they do in the wild", or because of poor advice from pet stores.

I think broken bones take a while to heal.. I make sure my rodent is completely stunned.

That picture gets me every time I see it.

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Originally Posted by maniac

Hey just wondering, Did you name your snake after that movie " The Never Ending Story "... I loved that movie when i was a little kid. That dragon dog was my favorite :mrgreen:

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I did. And my other bp is Bastian. When I get a female, I'm going to name her Moon Child, which was Bastians mothers name, and the name he gave to the Childlike princess to save Fantasia. :)