trouble changing from mice to rats

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Originally Posted by BPBeth

Why make the switch at all? If the snake is happy and healthy with mice, then keep him on mice, though a full grown ball will need more than 1 mouse a week. 2 of my balls will only eat mice, while 1 will only eat gerbils. None of them like rats, so I don't force the issue. All are very healthy, good weight and my oldest is 15+ years old and my other 2 are over 10 yrs. The 2 on mice now, were once eating gerbils until they decided they didn't want to anymore. They refused to eat for months, until I wised up and went back to offering them mice! They gobbled them up like kids in a chocolate factory. Point being, your snakes know what they want and need, its up to you to provide it.

Tough love may result in the snake just refusing to eat period. We all know how finicky BPs can be about eating. I'm not saying don't try and offer your snake some variety, but I wouldn't agonize over it. Give them what they want, live, frozen, or whatever they want. Make life simple for yourself, and your snakes.

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I already explained in the origional post why I want her to eat rats. The biggest reason I would like her to eat rats is that I breed rats! I do not, and do not want to breed mice! The second reason is that all of my other snakes are feeding on rats. The third reason is I believe that the high protein rats are better for the snakes then high fat mice! MICE STINK! I am not agonizing over anything. When you are going to care for something for 30 years, it is a pretty a good idea to get them set up and eating what works for YOU if at all possible! There is nothing wrong with trying! as stated above if it must be mice so be it... But first I will try very hard to switch!

I've had to switch BP's from mice to rats myself. I breed rats, I don't breed mice. While I don't mind going out to buy prey I'm not generally interested in the up and down quality of local mice suppliers. Since I have rats on hand that I know are a very good quality, our snakes all eat rats.

I do tough love. I used to mess about with scent switching and so forth and it often didn't work. Now they simply do not even smell a mouse. I skip a week, then offer an appropriate sized rat, often one smaller than they could take but that they can handle easily. They often refuse this first week. They get the same type rat one week later and so forth. The longest I've seen a refusal was 4 weeks.

Now I will balance that by saying, these are NOT tiny baby snakes or underweight rescues - these were juvenile, sub-adult or adult ball pythons, all in excellent weight and condition. 4 weeks of refusals is nothing to them and did not harm them one bit. Their weight was closely tracked during this time. All are now happily snarfing down the rats I produce for them. :)

When it comes to feeding do what works for you as a keeper, what the snake will take with a strong feeding response and what makes good common sense to do.

thanks franky... I will give it another 2 weeks. I have been monitoring her weight very closely, and so far, she hasn't lost any weight!

Mike

You're welcome Mike. Just remember always it's a fine line and a very specific one that no one but you will end up being able to truly judge. Some ball pythons are so prey specific they won't switch and a keeper that refuses to see that in their snake, may be too one track in their thinking. Saying no ball python will switch is just as one track. Making a tiny 45 gram hatchling go without eating to switch for a keeper's convenience would be way too one track and perhaps something best left until the snake is big enough to deal with the issue. Worrying about a 1,000 gram snake missing a meal or two, is for me, overthinking the issue. Sometimes certain times of the year are better to switch for that snake than others depending on it's eating habits. Lots of things to think about.

It's just about being common sense about it, knowing your snake, monitoring the situation and making adjustments as required. :)

how many gram does your snake have to be before it can eat rats? i have a cage that i keep mice in then some oe told about rats. i stop buying mice andgot rats but i put them in the cage i keep mice in and had no problems. depending on how many grams your snake is, how many grams should the food be for the snake?