How long do you leave a feeder in unattended?

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Originally Posted by ColinWeaver

I'm always the outcast on this topic, the pariah.

I have absolutely NO problem leaving a well-fed, well-watered rat in with one of my snakes for more than an hour or two. I don't do overnight but it has happened once or twice (on accident) with no ill effect.

A few points:

• I have multiple hundreds of snakes. I don't have time to sit and watch each of them for 20 minutes and then take the rat out if it doesn't eat.
• Some of my snakes NEVER eat within 20 minutes. They only eat after the rat has been in the cage for a much longer period of time.
• If I monitored every single feeding I wouldn't have time to make this post because I would be feeding 24/7 and would never do anything else.

In almost 20 years of doing this (hundreds of thousands of feedings) I have never seen a well-fed rat simply attack a snake. It just doesn't normally happen. If you throw a starving rat into a tub with a snake that doesn't want to eat, you may have a problem. If your rat can drink from the snakes water bowl I think you'll be fine. Unless you have an aggressive strain of rat they are pretty darn docile until they get very hungry or very thirsty.

Now, I know nobody who regularly posts here will agree with me on this but I'm cool with it. What I do works for me and I have not had an animal damaged yet from rodent bite (knock, knock).

If you have a ball python that doesn't seem to be eating in the 20 minute range, consider trying what I say. If it makes you uneasy, sit there the whole time and read a book. While you're at it, toss a piece of rat chow in the cage, too. That will give the rodent something to eat if it gets hungry.

Regards,

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Colin, I 100% agree with you! I have never seen a rat that is well fed or watered just out right attack a snake. I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one that feels that its Ok.
:gj:

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Anyway I was wondering how long do you leave a live feeder in an enclosure unattended? I know that you shouldn't leave a mouse or rat with your snake very long, but I imagine that those with larger collections probably do this often.

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It depends. I have no problem leaving a crawler rat or a fuzzy mouse in with a snake overnight. They're small enough to not be able to do any damage. I also don't have much problem with small rats or hopper mice either and am willing to leave them alone for a while, but as the age and size of the prey grows, the less comfortable I feel about leaving them alone with my snakes. This is why my largest snakes that take the largest prey either take frozen/thawed, or fresh killed, I don't allow my largest snakes to kill their own prey.

I never leave anything bigger than a fuzzy unsupervised.

I also vote for never. There is no reason to have a mouse in there without watching. That is an accident waiting to happen.

I drop the mouse/rat in then come back in 20-30 min to check on everyone. But as others have pointed out, there are some snakes that don't follow the rules. My mojave girl has to be left alone for a couple of hours with her prey before she eats it. So its about knowing your animals and what they need to thrive.

But as others have said, a well fed rodent won't really be a threat to your snake if you're smart about it.

I do not as a general rule leave any live prey with any snake no matter what. I do have a decent collection but I also have worked at a few pet stores. At the stores there were hundreds of snakes and I just stagger fed them, Monday would be boas, tuesday would be pythons, and so on... I know with my collection and past experience that a live rat will attack a snake, I had one rat within 5 minutes kill my snake. The rat was well fed and watered as well as extremely tame but it still killed a beautiful snake all because I did not want to wait a few minutes.

That being said I also know quite a few people who just toss and leave the prey with the snakes.

I am against it even if it is just a pinky mouse i don'e leave it alone with my snakes. I like to be consistant with my animals so from birth they are watched feeding after 3 meals they are all switched to f/t or fresh killed.

I NEVER leave live prey unattended with any of my animals. You forgot to include an option for this.

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Originally Posted by Slim

Your poll doesn't have an option for Never. I would never leave anything larger than a fuzy in with any of my BPs unsupervised.

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x2

Lol, I remember the good old live-feeding days. :P My big BP girl would take 20+ minutes to strike. My eyes did not wander from that rat for more than 5 seconds.

Ah, I love f/t!

I would vote NEVER.. i believe that even if your there watching the rat and the snake does strike, depending on where the snake strikes if the mouse is large enough it could still get a chance to bite and/or scratch some scales off!! so i do like giving my snakes live but i'll usually(sounds mean) give it a good smack on the head with my prongs, just to stun it.. and sometimes if the rat is medium to large i would consider killing it first!

I said that I check every fifteen minutes, but that's not entirely true; my bp eats the rat within 2 minutes of it being dropped in. It depends on the bp; when he was younger, mine wouldn't eat in front of people because he felt threatened, so I'd leave the rat in and check every 8-12 minutes. I do agree with what others have said: NEVER! Never is probably best, and back then I was a bit of a newbie and still kinda am.