Feeding mice/ rats to breeders

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Originally Posted by threezero

...following the regular 10-15% body weight rule...

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You have good intentions with this recommendation, but need a little course correction. The percent "rule" only really makes sense for hatchlings up until they start eating small rats (500 grams or so). The reason it works is because the math helps guide a keeper towards appropriately sized prey for thier new, smaller, additions when they aren't comfortable eyeballing it quite yet. Once the snake gets large enough, the math becomes more and more inappropriate. The example Deborah gave (400g rat to 4000g snake) is a good example of just how ridiculous it would be to try to blindly apply this "rule" to all animals. :)

I see what you mean. I actually don't even go by the 10-15% rule I just eye ball the rats I give to my snake so I actually have no ideal how many grams the rats that I feed my snake. After every meal my snake has a little bulge in their stomach nothing crazy. The reason why I'm asking about male feeding is I have mostly female up to this point and without power feeding them they are developing a little fat around them but they are still hungry every week so I assume I'm doing soemthing right. I'm worry that if I feed the male the same way they will also develope the same fatty and be lazy. Or is does the male just naturally not horde as much fat as the female?