live feeding blues..

Yesterday I successfully fed my new carpet python a p/k adult mouse, which she took like an entitled princess--no strike & constrict, just gobbled it up. The fact she fed so quickly & easily made me a little annoyed when I went back to the shop today for 2 live pinkies for my ball python. I've tried to feed him p/k but all he'll be receptive to are the live ones.

To get him to eat even those he him-haws around them for a few hours & then randomly attacks. Today he was constricting one & got the foot of the other caught in his death grip. He then left it injured and in pain for another hour or so before deciding it would be a tasty morsel after all. It's a great sign that he's eating regularly now but I'm a little disheartened that he continues to require live. I tried to feed him live off tongs to get him used to p/k but my success rate with that, even live, was not frequently enough. Instead, he lost weight.

Any suggestions, or do I have a permanent live eater on my hands after all?

Are you feeding a BP mouse pinkies? Even BP's right out of the egg can and should be on mouse hoppers. Try bumping you the rodent size and see what happens.

Also putting 2 prey items in at the same time may be overwhelming or confusing him.

I successfully fed him a small hopper live after he refused p/k fuzzies, next he refused another small hopper, then a fuzzy live, then he refused live fuzzies for 2 weeks, ate another, then refused, I then tried 2 live pinkies 'cause they were out of fuzzies again & ever since then he's eaten live pinks like clockwork. He's even getting ready to shed & still accepted my...offering (it's what it feels like lol).

What size is this snake and what type of setup do you have him in? What is your husbandry like? ( temps, humidity, how you're reading them, etc. )

I have no idea what you just said lmao. Im not trying to be the grammar police but seperating that huge list into a few sentences would be nice... :)

Have you tried something larger? Perhaps something that moves around a bit more will stimulate his feeding response and at least get him feeding regularly. Mouse pinkies and fuzzies are awful small for even the littlest of bps...

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Originally Posted by Mike41793

I have no idea what you just said lmao. Im not trying to be the grammar police but seperating that huge list into a few sentences would be nice... :)

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Sorry I do all my internetting from a small phone so sometimes grammar suffers as a result.

Anyway he's kept in a 10 gal on aspen. currently reading 89° on the hot side 77° on the cool side with digital thermometers. The heat sources are a night heat lamp & uth. Humidity is 50% though it fluctuates a little. He's approximately 1.5', a little on the skinny side. Shown no obvious signs of stress for quite awhile now & is only handled about 3x each week.

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Originally Posted by roseyoungblood

Sorry I do all my internetting from a small phone so sometimes grammar suffers as a result.

Anyway he's kept in a 10 gal on aspen. currently reading 89° on the hot side 77° on the cool side with digital thermometers. The heat sources are a night heat lamp & uth. Humidity is 50% though it fluctuates a little. He's approximately 1.5', a little on the skinny side. Shown no obvious signs of stress for quite awhile now & is only handled about 3x each week.

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If you don't have a thermostat for your UTH, it might be too hot (they can easily get up to 130 degrees which is enough to burn & even kill a snake) do your thermometers have probes? and if so is a probe directly over the UTH?

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Originally Posted by roseyoungblood

Sorry I do all my internetting from a small phone so sometimes grammar suffers as a result.

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I feel you on that one, I try to keep my grammar as correct as possible but auto-correct and screen size make that very difficult. (I find myself editing most of my posts to fix issues lol)

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Originally Posted by The Serpent Merchant

If you don't have a thermostat for your UTH, it might be too hot (they can easily get up to 130 degrees which is enough to burn & even kill a snake) do your thermometers have probes? and if so is a probe directly over the UTH?

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I do have a thermostat for my uth with the probe directly against the glass floor.

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Originally Posted by roseyoungblood

I do have a thermostat for my uth with the probe directly against the glass floor.

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ok, sounds good just trying to rule things out.

For what it's worth I got him from someone who did not have very good husbandry practices; there was no water in his water dish or anything at all done for humidity. The uth & thermometers were my new additions, as well as all the stuff on top of his screen to keep humidity in. I don't know what size they fed him but it was live mice. Itty bitty ones is my guess. I've had him for about 3 months now, & this will only be the 2nd shed while in my care.

I think your temps are a little low. Up your cool side to 80-82 degrees and your hot side to 90 degrees.

A BP that is at least 3 months old really should be on more than just pinkies. The rule to go by is 15% of the snakes body weight.

Example:

Say you have a BP that weighs 100 grams. 15% of that snakes body weight is 15 grams (100 x 0.15=15) How you get to that amount of rodent isn't as important, but I try to get it in as few rodents as possible.

A cheap kitchen scale is all that is needed for this. I picked up mine for $15 at a grocery store. (I know many people buy ones from Walmart as well)

This is what I use:

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...t/f79cdeb5.jpg

The little guy really needs bigger prey.

It is not unusual for them to be intimidated by bigger prey the first few times, just be patient and keep trying. If pinkies are what he wants, at least try rat pinks which are bigger. If you can find feeder rats of the correct size, he'll do much better on rats than on mice, fewer prey items with more food volume, if that makes sense.

Crawler rats are generally good for timid ball pythons as compared to hopper mice. They are about the same size, but hopper mice are called that for a reason, they jump all over the place and can really intimidate some baby balls. Crawler rats on the other hand, move around, but are not nearly as spastic as a hopper mouse.

Gale

I'll go pick one up. Is it bad if he only accepts the proper amount of rodent every few weeks? When I was feeding him larger he wouldn't eat consistently. Also I will bump up the temps a couple degrees.

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Originally Posted by angllady2

The little guy really needs bigger prey.

It is not unusual for them to be intimidated by bigger prey the first few times, just be patient and keep trying. If pinkies are what he wants, at least try rat pinks which are bigger. If you can find feeder rats of the correct size, he'll do much better on rats than on mice, fewer prey items with more food volume, if that makes sense.

Crawler rats are generally good for timid ball pythons as compared to hopper mice. They are about the same size, but hopper mice are called that for a reason, they jump all over the place and can really intimidate some baby balls. Crawler rats on the other hand, move around, but are not nearly as spastic as a hopper mouse.

Gale

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Great suggestion, I'll see how he responds to rats next week. Thanks for your advice guys!

They can go without eating for over a year so there are not any negative effects of them not eating consistently... but you want to get as close to the right amount of food as often as possible (meaning feeding consistently on feeding days)

yeah, if he were an adult or at least not on the skinny side, I wouldn't sweat it at all. Hopefully switching to rats helps!