Never Felt This Way Until Now..thoughts?

Just recently, I've been starting to feel wrong for feeding live. As my snakes get older the prey gets bigger and feeding rats isn't the same feeling as feeding mice. I like rats alot and I enjoy keeping them before they are fed off (sounds sick). So when I do feed them off it just hasn't felt right lately. Especially when they scream..I've thought about how it must feel to be caught off guard and constricted to death. I can't even watch it happen, just happens to slow.

Anyway, im thinking about switching all my snakes to f/t. In the wild atleast the prey has somewhat of a chance to put up a fight..idk im just kind of thinking out loud here. Just makes me feel sad for some reason...


What do you guys think?

a popular response i see when people talk about feeding live or f/t is:
use what works for u =]

i hav 2 BPs that feed on f/t, 1 that takes both, and 1 that only takes live

i LOVE mice (not a big fan of rats..) and i enjoy the short amount of time i have with them, but when they poop on me, i just feed em off.

i prefer feeding f/t, not bc im sentimental towards the mice (even tho i am), but bc its always available for me.. f/t WORKS for me, but since i have to buy live for my stubborn one, i buy live. and the closest place is like 20 mins away

GL switching over to f/t =]

I feel the same way when I see people feeding live chicks to their snakes, seeing as I kept chickens and I currently keep a pigeon. :( Especially when they are still chirping while the snake is swallowing it. :upset:

Steph

I am going to be trying to feed my BP a small f/t today for the first time. I understand what you are saying about hating the sound of the rat making noise when the snake stirkes and coils around it. I do not enjoy this either. I really hope your snake converts to f/t for you. I will feed my snake live rats though if for some reason he is just to stubborn to accept f/t.

I fed live for many years. I recently switched to f/t for convience only.
You have to understand that rats/mice are what snakes eat. As long as you give them the respect they deserve for giving the ultimate sacrifice for the well being of your snake, all is ok. Treat them well before hand.

I feed mainly frozen thawed but my babies get live rat fuzzies and rat pups. I used to feed mainly live but after having a couple rats scratch up and bite a few of my snakes, anything larger than a rat pup is fed f/t. I have not had a problem switching any of my snakes over yet. I give them an extra feeding cycle so they are hungry and they usually take it without a problem.

I try not to feed mice to my snakes, but sometimes I have to substitute a hopper or two for rat pups. The rats seem to help the snakes grow faster and for a while I had some snakes that were on hoppers and some on rat pups. The ones feeding the rat pups seemed to have a better muscle mass than the ones on mice.

I really have no problem with the snakes killing the rats, I just want my snakes to be safer. It may be natural for them to feed on live, but it is nothing I want to chance any more.

If you talk to 20 different people about a subject like this, you'll get 20 different answers. Everyone feels differently about rodents...everyone has a different perspective on what the word "cruel" means...everyone has different reasons for why they use the feeding method they do....and many other variables as well.

If you HAVE to feed live for some reason, then you'll have to figure out how to emotionally distance yourself from the prey item. And that's different for different folks as well.

If you can switch to f/t...then go for it! I did and I hope I don't ever have to go back to live feeding. I don't have a problem with anyone else feeding live...but I much prefer f/t. There's nothing wrong with switching to f/t for whatever reason....be it financial or emotional.

I feed what the snake will eat. If the snake will only eat live, then I'll feed live, but I'll stand there until it kills the prey item and is starting to swollow it down. I also always check over my snake for injuries. I would of course, love to get my girl onto p/k in the future, but since mice are kind of on the pricey side, I've decided to wait until I have a good population so I can risk her being picky. Seeing how excited she gets at feeding time though, tells me I won't have an issue, but I'm not realy to have a dead, uneaten $1.25 mouse ;D

I have no issue with feeding live and watching them die. Admittedly, the first time I watched my girl constict her mouse, I fell a twinge of guilt. Still, I keep in mind that these mice are bred solely for one reason: food for my snake. Keeping that in mind, it's no different than walking out into my goat herd and pointing out goats that will go in the freezer, or pointing out goats to take to auction knowing they might end up in the freezer.

More than likely, I'll have a harder time feeding my breeders (they have names) than the nameless mice that reside in the 'kill tank'.

I definitely prefer to feed f/t, but if the snake refuses, I'd rather feed live than have the snake starve, obviously.

But that doesn't mean that I don't keep trying every now and again! I'm down to somewhere between 2 and 4 ball pythons that seem to really need live, and that's hassle enough for me. I can't imagine having to get live food for my whole gang, and we definitely aren't set up to be breeding our own food!

Rats are just a bit more charming than mice for most people. I never understood it until I got my little supposed-to-be-food-but-was-too-cute eyeless rat, Blind Mag. Now I feel just a little bit worse every time I have to go get a live rat for Hazel, Clarice, Princess Lady or Wadjet. We also have four new additions that I'm not sure about, feeding wise. We'll see if the number jumps.

I've had a few snakes get badly damaged by live rats right in front of me! I had tongs and gloves and everything, all prepared just in case, but they still got scratched and bitten, and generally beaten up. They won in the end, and the wounds healed quickly, but nobody wants to see their pet get hurt and not be able to do anything about it. The two in particular who got injured, though, had no problem switching over to frozen/thawed the next time, though.

It just boils down to your own feelings on the subject, and what your snakes will and will not accept. And remember, sometimes it takes a few tries, and tinkering with your technique to talk them into it. Other times, they snap it up right off the bat. Definitely warm the prey up, though, I totally rock my hairdryer on feeding days. :P I have one snake that I've been trying to get onto f/t for almost two years now. The day she finally takes it, I'm busting out the champagne and having a freaking party.

in my case, as far as hassle goes,
i prefer to just put a live mouse in the tub and watch to make sure its killed, and that my snake begins to swallow it.

with f/t, u hafta wait for warm water, then put a mouse in a baggie, let it sit for 10 mins or w/e, take it out, i dry mine with a hairdryer so they're not soaking, then offer, and wait til snake swallows..

just takes longer. although with responsible and knowledgable live feeding, even a .00000000000000000000001% risk of a scratch or bite, i dont like. it may not do any harm at all, but i like my snakes scales the way they are ^-^. i hate taking the chance

There's nothing at all "sick" about liking rats or enjoying their antics even if their eventual end is as a feeder animal. I'm sure a lot of beef farmers quite like their cows and the calves but still understand what that animal's place is in the scheme of things. I personally quite like rats. I think they make excellent pets as well as a great source of food for our snakes. At one time before I kept so many of them, most of my breeder adults had names. I appreciate the rat's role in our family being able to keep the number of snakes we have. I understand the dynamic between the predator and it's prey as well as the mechanics of the quick and clean kill ability of a snake.

Having said all that, it's your snake so you should do what is best for you and more importantly what is best for your snake.

I now feed everyone F/T. It can sometimes be difficult to switch over to F/T if the snake is a picky eater. But as for your actual question. I too like rodents (as pets) and i have bred and kept them before (not as feeders) but now that im not breeding or keeping any rodents as pets i didnt get attatched to any that i was feeding before i got my female on F/T.

In fact, i would have the herp shop near me give me the albino rat or the ungliest one they had LOL! To me the colored ones or the dumbos are too cute to feed. But i do understand the food chain. My snakes are too important to me to let something like caring for a rodent, get in the way of feeding them..

Thanks for the feedback guys. As much as I like the idea of my snake being able to hunt prey, I think im going to make the switch. Of course if a snake only takes live its a done deal. Doesn't bother me too much..mabye I'll feel differently in a month but for now im going to give the f/t thing a try.

:)

I think it's easier for rat, snake and me to feed larger prey items prekilled or FT.

We have some big snakes that hit their food hard, and I know the rat wouldnt know what hit it within a few seconds as the force of the squeeze literally knocks them out, but for ball pythons, we don't feed much bigger than a weaner.

And I LOVE rats too. Every last one of the breeders is named. Call me crazy...

Well they are living animals, nothing wrong with loving them. I feed f/t whenever I can, but when my snakes only take live I go ahead and feed them live.

I don't take enjoyment in a mouse suffering, but it is interesting to watch a snake hunt. If the snake doesn't take the mouse the first time, I actually have a seperate tank with bedding and a hide and I give the mouse food and water. Actually they are very cute little fuzz balls...

Personally I love rabbits so I cant stand feeding them live, EVER. Pre killed I still don't like, but live I cant' stand. I suppose that rules out burms/retics/rocks/anacondas for me :(

I mean if you treat the mouse kindly and dont throw it etc, it shouldnt be too much suffering. Snakes constrict them rather quickly, and for aesthetic purposes, the prey item doesn't ever get mutilated really.

It's really just a part of "taking an oath" when you keep snakes. I say do what you need to do for the snake while keeping in mind the feeder's well being. Good luck.

I'm working towards getting all of my snakes to eat frozen/thawed. I love rats and like mice as pets, so I want to be as humane to them as possible. I also don't want to risk my snakes getting hurt. And ordering bulk frozen from online works out to be a lot cheaper than buying live feeders from the store, even with shipping.

So far all of the snakes that I've tried to feed F/T have gone for it except two. One is a picky eater, one was probably stressed because I'd just gotten him. I plan on trying them both on F/T again soon. It actually wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be to get some of mine to make the switch.

Some of my snakes will take FT, some will take pre-killed, and some insist on live.
You can pre-kill the rats. Of course the approved method of doing so is euthanasia via carbon dioxide. An extremely hard, swift blow to the head will kill a rat painlessly and instantly, but you'll feel absolutely terrible if you should happen to miss.

If it is any consolation, death by constriction is actually usually VERY fast indeed. The animal isn't suffocated to death--it is squeezed so hard that its blood stops flowing, and its heart stops. Unconsciousness occurs within a few seconds. The struggling that appears to occur later on is due to reflexive muscle spasms as the animal actually dies--death throes. It has already been unconscious for some time by the time this happens, and it remains unaware.

If you can bring yourself to do so, watch more closely next time, and you will see just how fast the lights go out--you can tell the moment, because the animal stops struggling or trying to bite. It's reassuring to know that death is usually too swift for them to feel much.
Rats scream when they are startled--the snake's bite hurts, but it's not tremendous pain, because the teeth are so sharp--the rat has little time to panic before it's unconscious. I've had a rat scream when I grabbed it, and it wasn't expecting it--the scream doesn't necessarily indicate pain.

I hate mice and love seeing them die by the dozens, the little buggers irritate me. But rats are cute and sweet and lick you and cry red.

Personally I just feed f/t. And rats from the start (the only mice my snakes eat are when they're still small and I run into a jam and have to get lives).