Adult bp feeding

Ok so i have a random question about feeding my bp. My bp is an adult (female i think) and i feed her a big rat weekly. Am i feeding her to often? Or should i keep feeding her the same time with a smaller prey to maintain her weight? I dont want her getting obese so im just curious i have all babies so im use to big meals weekly for them. I got my adult bp about a month ago and she was kinda skinny so i started giving her huge rats to fatten her up now that shes nice an solid i want to maintain her so she doesnt grow super fast because she shed twice with in one month and id rather that not happen again for atleast 2 months. I do not know any of her history like i said i rescued her from a person who was by no means properly caring for her. So id love some advice on this :) this is the girl im talking about
http://img.tapatalk.com/425746fb-5eeb-7cb6.jpg
Shes about 3 1/2 to 4 feet long and about 8 inches in girth id have to actually measure her again and if i had to guess she weighs about 5 pounds maybe 10 at the most

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Originally Posted by Snake.chick09

Ok so i have a random question about feeding my bp. My bp is an adult (female i think) and i feed her a big rat weekly. Am i feeding her to often? Or should i keep feeding her the same time with a smaller prey to maintain her weight? I dont want her getting obese so im just curious i have all babies so im use to big meals weekly for them. I got my adult bp about a month ago and she was kinda skinny so i started giving her huge rats to fatten her up now that shes nice an solid i want to maintain her so she doesnt grow super fast because she shed twice with in one month and id rather that not happen again for atleast 2 months. I do not know any of her history like i said i rescued her from a person who was by no means properly caring for her. So id love some advice on this :) this is the girl im talking about
http://img.tapatalk.com/425746fb-5eeb-7cb6.jpg
Shes about 3 1/2 to 4 feet long and about 8 inches in girth id have to actually measure her again and if i had to guess she weighs about 5 pounds maybe 10 at the most

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If this were in the advanced husbandry forum I'd probably get on my high horse about how I feel on over feeding, but once a week is fine. Knowing the weights of the snake and prey would be much more helpful, but slightly larger than the snakes largest part is fine.

You want to feed her a rat that is as big as the widest part of her body. Once a week is a perfect schedule.

Yea i do the widest part of her body thing but i just dont want her growing super super fast im about to upgrade her to a 60 gal tank on the first and i dont wanna have to upgrade again a month later yea know

In adults feeding doesn't equal growth like it does in babies.

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Originally Posted by The Serpent Merchant

You want to feed her a rat that is as big as the widest part of her body.

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Actually way over killed to feed that large of a prey with an animal that big if the animal is indeed 5lbs

A small to medium rat weekly is all that's needed, the largest I feed are rats that are 125 grams those are mediums and I do so even with females that could take a retired female rat 250 grams and over.

Females don't get sluggish (it takes them days to digest a large prey) and they eat with more consistency throughout the year as opposed to long fast period.

Over sized prey can also cause damage.

Because a BP can take a very large prey does not mean it needs to, in my opinion they already eat much more than they would in their natural environment and smaller preys even with large females is probably more than they need.

The rules of a prey as large as the girth size of the animal generally applies to hatchlings and juvies, not many people doing so with adults.

I really want to know how big she is, do you have a kitchen scale you can weigh her on or put a soda can in the picture so we can get a closer idea of how big she is? 10 pounds is HUGE. A friend of mine has an EDB that is over 6ft and eats large rabbits, it's barely 10lbs.

Like i said approximately ill pull her out real quick an see

Ok after careful judging and using weight of regular house hold items i was way off weight wise shes about 2-3 pounds give or take and heres a couple pics i just took http://img.tapatalk.com/425746fb-6956-984c.jpg next to my hydroxy cut bottle...... :/
http://img.tapatalk.com/425746fb-6986-c35f.jpg on my bed
http://img.tapatalk.com/425746fb-69ab-95bf.jpg

In my humble opinion - a 60 gallon tank is overkill for a ball python adult. Not to mention, trying to lug that size tank to disinfect it every month will be difficult, and maintaining proper humidity and ambient temps will be extemely difficult.

She's really not that big, judging from the pictures, and she's probably at her max length as an adult.

My adults are in 41 quart tubs.

fedding her a small or medium rat would be enough

Trust me shes bigger than she looks lol alot bigger i measured her and shes approx 4 feet

Just a wild guess but she might be about 2000g to 2500g.
I have changed my ways of feeding after I opened my eyes:rofl:
Their natural prey are ASFs right?
Have you seen the size of a full grown adult ASF?
A small rat is just about the same size, maybe a little bigger.
I offer one small every seven days to all my adults.

All of my balls get fed once every 7-10 days an appropriate sized prey item. Once they hit 1000grams i disregard the 10-15% of body weight rule. The biggest rats i will feed are 125-150ish grams to anyone over 1000grams. When they are babies/juvies i feed 15-20% of body weight once a week. Some may say 20% is too much but its really not when some people are feeding 10-15% every 4 days lol.

Thats just how i do things, by no means am i saying its best or correct. It just works well for me.:gj:

Yea i dont want her to get to huge to fast lol ill feed small rats she will just try to manipulate me to feed like she always does...... Shes very manipulative haha