Small Problem

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jager08

do you guys realize that this is why animals become mean and cage aggressive! not only that your enabling the pyschology of aggression! :) yes im a pysch major.

1 if you feed agressive food they are going to become agressive cause they are afraid of being bit! i would too wouldnt u? ( our hands look like mice! :) in heat anyways :) )

2. feedin in the cage is standard conditioning! door opens food comes in and lets attack before it attacks or im hungry strike! yes reminder food is a huge conditiong agent! ( just ask my cat who hears the pastic to a pack of treats and comes running!)

We need to remember that these animals run on instict and the more we give them reasons to be agressive thats more of a reason for them to be! also feeding in the cage is the equivalent of pavlov dog experiment!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Pavlov
,if you dont know what im refering too check it out!!

Sorry for the tagent!

:snake::snake::snake:

---

:rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:
:weirdface:weirdface:

Um.....no....just....no.

I'm sorry but feeding live does not make an animal any more aggressive than if they were eating a hotdog. That goes for snakes as well as many mammals. There is a difference between a feeding response and aggression. What you may be taking for aggression is simply a feeding response. I keep my snakes in the same room as my rats. I feed a combination of live and f/t, depending on which I can get a hold of. Not a single snake in my collection could be considered aggressive due to feeding live food. Not a single one. The only snake I have to worry about flying out of her tub is my boa, who has an amazing feeding response. She's not aggressive. She's just hungry and honestly, she's the one snake that gets only f/t. Explain that one to me. She's the one snake I do not feed live to and she's the one with the biggest feeding response, which you might misunderstand as "aggression". All of my snakes that occasionally get live are completely fine with being handled and having my hands in their tubs.

Another point about aggression in response to feeding live. I have 3 ferrets. Each ferret can easily hunt down and kill a live rodent within seconds. They are little killing machines if I let them and soon when I have enough room I'm going to expand my rodent breeding so that I may offer them a whole prey diet instead of pellets. A few times a week they will get live food. I have done this many times before. Yet, my ferrets are still the cuddly little monsters they've always been. Hunting and eating live prey has not made them more aggressive in the slightest.

To the OP,

You could feed live which is not a problem at all. Just make sure to supervise every feeding. Never leave a live rodent with your snake without supervision. If you are worried about bites, have your feeding tongs ready to stick in the rodents mouth. The rodent will bite down on the tong's end instead of your snake. I've had to do this a few times and I've never had any issues with feeding live.

You could feed f/t. Just get your feeders the day you are feeding. Thaw it out and you're ready to go. Congrats on getting a new snake! :D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jager08

do you guys realize that this is why animals become mean and cage aggressive! not only that your enabling the pyschology of aggression! :) yes im a pysch major.

1 if you feed agressive food they are going to become agressive cause they are afraid of being bit! i would too wouldnt u? ( our hands look like mice! :) in heat anyways :) )

2. feedin in the cage is standard conditioning! door opens food comes in and lets attack before it attacks or im hungry strike! yes reminder food is a huge conditiong agent! ( just ask my cat who hears the pastic to a pack of treats and comes running!)

We need to remember that these animals run on instict and the more we give them reasons to be agressive thats more of a reason for them to be! also feeding in the cage is the equivalent of pavlov dog experiment!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Pavlov
,if you dont know what im refering too check it out!!

Sorry for the tagent!

:snake::snake::snake:

---

:weirdface :weirdface

Anyone ever wonder where misinformed people come from? You don't happen to work at a pet store do you?

All kidding aside. Lets review your statement.

1. Ball pythons are not aggressive. They are a defensive snake. When they get startled they ball up (Ball Python). Our hands and fingers are not even close to a rodents heat signature. The only ones who are confused are young ones. And, only because they still have the instinct of not knowing when the next meal will come. So, they will snap at anything warm. Rodents have a much higher heat signature than us, and a totally different scent that balls can detect. That puts them in feed mode.

2. This doesn't make any sense at all. Your cat is smart, that's why it conditions so well. Snakes, not so much. And, if you try and open the cage every once in a while, they will learn not everything that comes in is food. Like I said before, it's the scent of the rat that puts them into food mode. Even that sometimes takes a while.

3. Yeah, see above post.

Um. What's a tagent? If your a psych major, you need to learn not every animal learns the same way as others. There are different levels of intelligence.

You've already gotten plenty of advice so I'll just give my two cents. Buy the amount of frozen mice/rats you need for that day, thaw it, and feed your snake. If you don't want to do that, then buy live. I feed solely live because I just don't want to deal with f/t, I think it's a real pain in the butt when you have a bunch of snakes and half of them aren't interested in f/t and waste it.

I've only had one semi serious injury from feeding live and it was feeding off a medium sized rat. The bp bleed a bit, but healed within a day or two on clean newspaper. Serious wounds can happen, even if you are watching the snake/rodent, but it doesn't happen that often. Just don't leave the rodent in the cage all day or night, that's when your snake is at risk of being chewed to death. I only leave them in for 10-30 minutes unsupervised if I have a shy snake, but I know the rat is well fed and watered before putting them in.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jager08

do you guys realize that this is why animals become mean and cage aggressive! not only that your enabling the pyschology of aggression! :) yes im a pysch major.

1 if you feed agressive food they are going to become agressive cause they are afraid of being bit! i would too wouldnt u? ( our hands look like mice! :) in heat anyways :) )

2. feedin in the cage is standard conditioning! door opens food comes in and lets attack before it attacks or im hungry strike! yes reminder food is a huge conditiong agent! ( just ask my cat who hears the pastic to a pack of treats and comes running!)

We need to remember that these animals run on instict and the more we give them reasons to be agressive thats more of a reason for them to be! also feeding in the cage is the equivalent of pavlov dog experiment!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Pavlov
,if you dont know what im refering too check it out!!

Sorry for the tagent!

:snake::snake::snake:

---

Oh dear... BPs are not aggressive, so they cannot be 'trained' to be aggressive. I get that you are a psych major, I'm a graduated sociology major, but I'm not about to discuss BPs in relation to their environmental and social influences. They are dumb! There's no two ways about it, if you wanted a smart pet get a dog. I feed almost solely live, the snakes share the snake room with my 90+ colony of rats, and I can open the cage and pull them out any time I want without getting bit. If BPs became aggressive because they are introduced to aggressive rodents why do they let rodents eat them alive???
http://www.deviantconstrictors.com/i...feed-live1.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/olathea...al/4725853770/

Sooo, if feeding live causes aggression in animals, why aren't there packs of ferocious killer tabby cats everywhere ? :confused:

While feral cats do exist, they are NOT usually aggressive to humans, on the contrary, they take care to avoid humans at all costs. Do you have any idea how many live animals a colony of feral cats consumes in a day ?

Even the most pampered and well fed domestic cat will hunt and kill, often just for the sake of killing. But I don't see people running around worrying their aggressive pet cat is going to eat their face in the night.

The idea that feeding live causes aggression and feeding dead doesn't is manure, I don't care if your a psych major or not it's still manure. If a poorly trained dog threatens anyone who comes near it, does that mean it's eating live, because that makes as much sense as what you're saying.

For crying out loud, your mouth waters every time you smell popcorn even if you just ate, does that mean your going to attack the popcorn vendor ?

For someone who's trying so hard to be smart, you sure are dumb.

Gale

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jager08

do you guys realize that this is why animals become mean and cage aggressive! not only that your enabling the pyschology of aggression! :) yes im a pysch major.

1 if you feed agressive food they are going to become agressive cause they are afraid of being bit! i would too wouldnt u? ( our hands look like mice! :) in heat anyways :) )

2. feedin in the cage is standard conditioning! door opens food comes in and lets attack before it attacks or im hungry strike! yes reminder food is a huge conditiong agent! ( just ask my cat who hears the pastic to a pack of treats and comes running!)

We need to remember that these animals run on instict and the more we give them reasons to be agressive thats more of a reason for them to be! also feeding in the cage is the equivalent of pavlov dog experiment!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Pavlov
,if you dont know what im refering too check it out!!

Sorry for the tagent!

:snake::snake::snake:

---

You give psych majors a bad name jager!

Make sure you study hard... you need it to graduate.

P.S. Snakes are not humans. Try taking reptile psychology classes... or you can just go learn it from the ones who own a bunch of them for years. They offer you the information for free.

P.P.S. I'm a computer programmer - so, thinking of it logically... if a ball python gets aggressive because they are afraid of getting bit, then it follows that they will become more aggressive if you pick them up because they are afraid of you eating them. So... never mind rats, humans are much bigger and meaner!

I like Psych majors... :] they take a psych class and suddenly rule the roost intellectually.

Deeefinitely a difference between Psych MAJOR and someone with a DEGREE. (I will admit, I sort of went through this phase with bio until I realized there is no way in hell I'll ever know everything there is to know!)

OP-
Like everyone else said, don't fret about live too much. Especially with a young snake! Who knows, maybe by the time your BP will be chomping down some big, mean rats you'll be free of your mum's house and can get F/T to your heart's desire!

All that aside- good luck, and congrats on your soon-to-be first! <3

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jager08

We need to remember that these animals run on instict and the more we give them reasons to be agressive thats more of a reason for them to be! also feeding in the cage is the equivalent of pavlov dog experiment!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Pavlov
,if you dont know what im refering too check it out!!



:snake::snake::snake:

---

Sorry, come at me with a reputable source, and maybe then I'll consider reading what you have to say. It doesn't matter what subject you're talking about, to use wikipedia is a big NO NO in college and research. It may have the same information word for word as the world's most scholarly site, but your professor (a good ones anyways!) won't even give you the time of day if you use wikipedia as a source for anything.