Interesting read about boa & python feeding.

http://reptilefacts.tumblr.com/post/...688/on-feeding

Interesting! Most of us obsess over having high quality rats raised on specific food and frozen and packaged in a specific way and some guy was feeding his boa squirrels from his backyard and the snake lived into its forties... kind of makes you rethink how we feed our snakes lol.

I scrolled down to "A Boa Rant" where whoever was ranting about how tubs are bad, minimum sized enclosures are bad, that they are arboreal and should have a pretty much vertical enclosure. I don't like it. I don't particularly like any Tumblr reptile thing.

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Regardless of the sourse (tumblr), Warren Booth is a well respected and admired member of the boa and reptile community.
I agree with his statements and have had great success with slow growing, low feeding on my reptiles and seen first had early deaths caused by early power feeding.

Interesting Sauzo, thank you.

The writer said that it was rare for these snakes to live past ten years. He's assuming that it is rare for folks to Not overfed their snakes. While many snakes are overfed, I think it is a stretch to insinuate that most snakes are indeed overfed.

Well I too am not a tumblr fan but I thought the article was interesting and being from a well known person in the boa and reptile community like April said, I definitely give it credibility.

And Reinz, assuming at minimum a 2-3 week period is needed for a boa or python or completely go through the "feeding cycle", I would bet 90% of the people who own boas or pythons as a whole do overfeed. I know i'm guilty of it myself as well.

I feed every 2-3 weeks. I don't see anything wrong with that article. I just don't like the Boa Rant post.

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Originally Posted by Fraido

I scrolled down to "A Boa Rant" where whoever was ranting about how tubs are bad, minimum sized enclosures are bad, that they are arboreal and should have a pretty much vertical enclosure. I don't like it. I don't particularly like any Tumblr reptile thing.

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I didn't even see that part. I just ripped the feeding topic off it as I originally saw it on some guys phone. I suppose I could have gotten it from another site. It is actually a published thing from Warren Booth. As for the other stuff, not sure about tubs being bad and minimum size being bad although I do like to offer my boas cages large enough to semi stretch out in. As for them being arboreal, I will agree that they are semi arboreal. Nothing like a GTP or ETB but I know both my gals actually love to climb up on top of a dresser next to my bed or up on a shelf over the bed and perch up there looking down. Boas in the wild will climb trees. Again nothing like a GTP or ETB who spend like 80% of their time in the trees. Anyways, the feeding part is pretty interesting.

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Originally Posted by Fraido

I feed every 2-3 weeks. I don't see anything wrong with that article. I just don't like the Boa Rant post.

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Lol yeah I didn't even see that part. And yeah I do a 2-3 week feeding for all my gals including my BP but I might move them to a 3-4 week feeding after reading about this since all my gals are pretty much adults now.

I get that, I just got the implication from the Boa Rant post that you are a terrible owner and shouldn't own a boa if you don't have a GTB or ETB type enclosure for your average boa.. I like for them to have space and all, but as I've seen, they do perfectly fine without the height and most people don't give them that. 😛 At least the hardcore hobbyists don't.

My boa's still a young, small girl. She's 3 and a halfish years old, and maybe about the size of a typical central boa?

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Where even is this "boa rant"? I don't see it anywhere on the page linked.

I'm curious... Does anyone here have a ball python over ten years old that has been always fed weekly minus the yearly hunger hunger strike?

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Originally Posted by JodanOrNoDan

I'm curious... Does anyone here have a ball python over ten years old that has been always fed weekly minus the yearly hunger hunger strike?

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I have a 14 year old female that eats every week unless she is gravid. She was a picky eater her first couple years but she eats every week now without any fasts.

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Originally Posted by Dave Green

I have a 14 year old female that eats every week unless she is gravid. She was a picky eater her first couple years but she eats every week now without any fasts.

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Thanks Dave. Anyone else? I haven't been at this long enough for my opinion to be worth much. My oldest is five. That said I really have a hard time imagining mine eating themselves to death. With the exception of one male I have they all seem to decide when enough is enough. I succumbed to the desire to get one of mine up to weight fast once. She ate willingly for a couple weeks but one day decided she wasn't playing any more and refused to eat for another couple weeks. Oddly enough the math worked out that she ate the same amount she would have if I offered at the normal rate. I have no idea about boas or other pythons for that matter.

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Originally Posted by cristacake

Where even is this "boa rant"? I don't see it anywhere on the page linked.

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Thanks for providing that post! I honestly don't disagree with them though. Especially seeing some of the breeder tubs that people keep their adults in. I feel animals that would climb often in the wild should be allowed to climb whenever they want/need to in captivity. Everyone has different opinions on conditions of captivity versus the wild environmental conditions though, not trying to argue. But I don't think they're being unfair

No problem, haha. I just don't like the "you're stupid and a bad owner if you don't do this" attitude I got when reading it. I do think that many enclosures should have some more size, but the larger boas seem to be so lazy.

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Sigh. BCI do not need UV light to be healthy.

My adult BCI are in 4'x30"x18" enclosures. They have hides (restaurant bus tubs) and spend most of their time under their hides.

Do they climb? Yes, and they're very good at it. I also give mine lots of opportunities to do so, either a small tree in the front yard during good weather, or on a sturdy bannister for the staircase if it's cold outside.

Interesting article. I'd like to see more scientific data. I don't keep boas, and my carpets are younger, but I generally feed my older snakes every 10-14 days. They're on more of a healthy maintenance diet than a growth oriented feeding cycle.

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Originally Posted by Sauzo

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And Reinz, assuming at minimum a 2-3 week period is needed for a boa or python or completely go through the "feeding cycle", I would bet 90% of the people who own boas or pythons as a whole do overfeed. I know i'm guilty of it myself as well.

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Ever since my adult Boas have been in my care, feeding is monthly, as well as my adult BP and Coastal Carpet.

Now my three younger Carpets that are visually growing, they feed every 2-3 weeks.

I thought the 'boa rant' was also written by Warren, thank you for posting it. I see it's by some random person that got their 'facts' from googleling boa images and old forum posts? LOL While the basic principle behind the post is commendable (providing the best, largest enriching environment we can) it's poorly researched and does not have factual information.

Well the "meat and potatoes" of the post and why I posted it was because of the part with Warren Booth and snake feedings. I pulled it off Tumblr as that was the first link that came up for me on search. I originally got just the Warren Booth part off a phone text thing I read. As for the rant part, that's a moot point as it wasn't written by Warren Booth, just some yahoo with opinions which I personally don't agree with other than the boas will climb if given the opportunity.

@ AbsoluteApril. Not sure if the "poorly researched and does not have factual information" part was referring to me or not. If not, then no need to read further. If it is, I posted this as research that was done by Todd Costoe, Steven Secor and Warren Booth. I wasn't posting as my personal knowledge as honestly didn't know that boids and pythons actually went through these physical changes after feeding. I'm sure if you wanted to dig deeper, you could probably find the research papers by said guys but I didn't dig that deep.

Again I just pulled this off Tumblr as it came up on my search engine after I read it off a text message. Heck I don't even know what Tumblr is lol. The only thing I use is Facebook and because most of the reptile forum sites everyone has switched to facebook for them. I think a lot are missing the point of the post about the feeding and reading the stuff that doesn't matter which honestly I didn't even notice until it was brought up lol.

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Originally Posted by Reinz

Ever since my adult Boas have been in my care, feeding is monthly, as well as my adult BP and Coastal Carpet.

Now my three younger Carpets that are visually growing, they feed every 2-3 weeks.

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Yeah, Rosey isn't too keen on monthly feedings lol. She makes it well known when she is hungry. And the more I look and read about carpets, it makes me want one. I was eyeballing some of those Jungle Carpets that Nick Mutton has. Might have to get one of those instead of a GTP next :P Plus he lives in Spokane which is only about a 4 hour drive from me. Decisions decisions :D

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Originally Posted by Sauzo

@ AbsoluteApril. Not sure if the "poorly researched and does not have factual information" part was referring to me or not.

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What? No, of course not! Sorry if my statement wasn't clear, I was directly speaking about the "boa rant" that was screenshot and written by Mark Scherz, his comments about how boas need UV and tall aboreal caging due to google image search of 'wild boa constrictors' showing them in trees.

I total agree with the statements Warren said and know (some) about the changes a snake's body goes through when digesting. Their organs swell and it's very taxing.

There's several studies you can look up that cover the digestion process of a variety of species. Hit up sci-hub and search python digestion or whatever you are after, tons of info out there. It's a big process. Currently only my hognose is fed weekly, the younger snakes are fed every two weeks and my adults every three weeks.

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Originally Posted by Sauzo

Yeah, Rosey isn't too keen on monthly feedings lol. She makes it well known when she is hungry. And the more I look and read about carpets, it makes me want one. I was eyeballing some of those Jungle Carpets that Nick Mutton has. Might have to get one of those instead of a GTP next :P Plus he lives in Spokane which is only about a 4 hour drive from me. Decisions decisions :D

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One thing I left out, I go against the grain on feeding size compared to most folks here. I feed large meals which allow me to go longer in between. With my BP, this assures success each time. It doesn't play a role in success of the Boas or Carpets, but helps cut down on the begging for more rats time frame. In particular, it seemed to have cured my Male Carpet of cage/food aggression as well.

For example, Elenore, my female(?) BI, appears to be similar in size to your Rosey, based on your descriptions. I feed Elenore a jumbo rat monthly. When I first got her it was two mediums every 2 weeks, but she was Always hungry. Then I moved to a large rat. It will do fairly ok, but the Jumbo just seems to satisfy and last longer. So far, no weight gain.

As far as you thinking about a Jungle Carpet, they are really cool snakes, great to display as well! As much as you handle and interact with your snakes, I believe a Jungle is a better choice than a GTP. While I do admit that a GTP has been on my brain for quite a while. But I am overly pleased that I got the Jungle first!


Esmarelda, Jungle Carpethttp://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...56793d2331.jpghttp://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...e2ec544ebc.jpghttp://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...315680089a.jpghttp://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...16ad890339.jpg

Ohhh I like Esmarelda.

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Originally Posted by AbsoluteApril

What? No, of course not! Sorry if my statement wasn't clear, I was directly speaking about the "boa rant" that was screenshot and written by Mark Scherz, his comments about how boas need UV and tall aboreal caging due to google image search of 'wild boa constrictors' showing them in trees.

I total agree with the statements Warren said and know (some) about the changes a snake's body goes through when digesting. Their organs swell and it's very taxing.

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Lol ok. Guess I read it wrong or I was half asleep as it was late. I didn't even bothering reading anything other than the Warren Booth part :)

It's amazing how far some of these posts go. I think I responded with this to a friend back in Northern Ireland. It has since traveled around the world it appears.

So, let me clarify a few things. This feeding regime does not apply to colubrids (so your corns, kings, rats, hognose, etc) feed differently. They are weekly, and sometimes sooner, feeders. Those that undergo organ remodeling are the pythons, boas, and pitvipers. Do they all do it? We are not sure. The initial work was carried out on Burmese pythons (note this is work by Stephen Secor and Todd Castoe. While Todd is a good friend of mine, I am not involved in it). What has been shown is that remarkable remodeling occurs within four hours of feeding (heart, liver,kidneys, intestines, increasing in size dramatically; blood plasma levels spiking). This likely puts enormous physiological stress on the organs.

While visiting Castoe several weeks ago, we chatted more about this to gauge opinion whether it is better to remain in that remodeled state and feed frequently, or whether rest is needed. There are two sides to the argument. One is that is is physiologically stressful to remodel your organs and thus keeping them remodeled might put less stress on the animal overall. The second is that the snake is under such physiological stress while remodel that remaining in this condition long term is detrimental. What we can see from the hobby is that there are actually very few "old" snakes in captivity. Does this reflect poor care outside of feeding, or is it a result of overfeeding and thus physiological stress. I cannot see it being the former as not everyone keeps their animals poorly.

We will always have exceptions. I hear it from people "I feed my snake every 5 days and its 15 years old". That is perfectly fine. My grandmother also fed her black Labrador a 200g bar of Cadbury's Chocolate every Friday night and that animal lived till it was 16. And chocolate is poisonous to dogs. We hear people that smoked and drank all their lives living past 100. There are exceptions to the rule.

How I feed my animals is simple. As adults, I feed males every 3-4 weeks on an appropriate sized meal. Females get fed every 3. Juveniles are fed every 2 weeks, and I feed babies every 10 days. I stop feeding my adults between November and February every year. I then feed every 2 weeks for a period of 6 to 8 weeks prior to breeding, and then back to the standard feeding. I have been breeding boas for 20 years and produce 3 to 7 litters a year. So not that many, but they are very healthy litters with few to zero slugs.

Am I telling all of you to feed the same way. No. Feed how you like to feed. It is your animal and only you can decide what you feel is healthy and what is not. My animals (~100 boas) have proven to thrive on this feeding schedule.

Two other things and I will leave the topic. 1) We never see fat boas in the wild. Those that I have caught are muscular. Shaped like a loaf of breed (squared sides). Males are always lean. 2) We know that boas undergo feast and famine feeding. Look at insular boas. These often feed only for 2 to 3 months a year on migratory birds, then starve the rest. Mainland animals certainly undergo the same, but less extreme.

In regards to how people keep their boas. I personally keep all of my babies and yearlings in v15 and V18 tubs. I then move them to V35s, the V70s. The males (mine are all Central American), remain in V35s all of their lives. Mine are all around 3ft long and phenomenal breeders. My females are in V70s and 4ft Reptilebasic cages. I am planning to switch these to ARS 8000 series cages this year. This season I have three females gravid. One is 15, one is 9, and the other is a young one at 5 (her first season). I also can tell you that some boas love having tall cages. Insular boas in general are small, males very small. These thrive in tall cages with branches, as in the wild they are very arboreal. Not like a Corallus, but will spend a lot of time in the trees (because they eat lizards, birds, an arboreal rodents). I have a male Costa Rican T+ boa in my office at the University and he is in a Zoomed arboreal cage. He is rarely on the ground. My other CA males and females at home are all in racks, and all thrive. Do they need arboreal cages to thrive... no. Will they use branches and spend time in them if offered, most will. Colombians are a different matter. They are heavier bodies and primarily terrestrial. The person posting in that tumbler thread seemed a little extreme and failed to differentiate locality, insularity, and species. All have important implications.

Warren

Thank you for clarifying and expanding on the subject Warren. And welcome to the forum. :)

We made the decision to stick with Small Rats with Damien for his entire life. We just feel that a small rat every 7-10 days will be far better for him than a medium or large every 2 weeks.

But we have no intention of breeding, our Ball Python is a family pet that we proudly display.

It's nice to be able to educate people on how gentle their nature can be, providing you do things correctly. I've already had 2-3 guests that would have never gone near a snake disappointed when the snake had to go back into it's cage :p

I think Warren's post should be stickied. Very valuable information for both beginners and more advanced keepers.

Thank you for that Warren, it's very interesting.

I would definitely be interested in any further developments on this subject, partly for the sake of caring for my pet as optimally as possible, but also just because it's interesting generally. My BP is a baby, which I got upon the death of my 18-year-old corn snake, but I hope to have him around for many years (no breeding plans).

I think it's also interesting to consider that just because an animal's instinctive response to food serves it well in the unpredictable natural environment does not mean that instinct is actually the best thing to listen to in an environment where it will always have access to what it needs. A case in point would be how we humans crave rich calorie-dense foods high in fat, sugar, salt, etc - ice cream, fried anything, candy, prime rib, potato chips, etc. Craving those things served to motivate our ancestors to eat up while they could, because they did not have constant access to that stuff. Obviously, our bodies need fat, salt, etc; but those were rarer commodities once upon a time, so we evolved particular motivations to get them. Now that we can have as much as we want and we don't have to do much physical labor anymore, our instincts aren't necessarily in line with our actual needs, so we have a national obesity problem.

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Originally Posted by Hammertime1977

We made the decision to stick with Small Rats with Damien for his entire life. We just feel that a small rat every 7-10 days will be far better for him than a medium or large every 2 weeks.

But we have no intention of breeding, our Ball Python is a family pet that we proudly display.

It's nice to be able to educate people on how gentle their nature can be, providing you do things correctly. I've already had 2-3 guests that would have never gone near a snake disappointed when the snake had to go back into it's cage :p

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The problem with that is it will still keep the snakes whole system enlarged in feeding mode. The size of the prey doesn't determine how long the organs stay enlarged, its the amount of time. Regardless of if you feed your snake a small rat or a medium rat, it still has to enlarge all those mentioned organs to digest the food. Now with that said, I still would keep the feeding in line with the size of the snake especially boas as they aren't as stretchy as a python. This is why Rosey is on a 1 month feeding and very soon, Vicky will be going to 1 month feeding. Dottie on the other hand gets food a few days after she poops which is usually every 2-3 weeks.

You can also look up studies and papers written by Todd Castoe and Stephen Secor. I looked up some stuff and started reading but its a lot to absorb especially late at night before bed lol.

Before people jump into a new feeding regime, I think the best thing they should do is start keeping detailed records of weights, shedding, defecation, and feeding. If you drop down to a more reduced feeding regime, monitor the snakes weight to insure it is not losing weight rapidly (assuming it is not overweight to start). Then adjust your feeding to compensate.

Warren

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Originally Posted by Warren_Booth

Before people jump into a new feeding regime, I think the best thing they should do is start keeping detailed records of weights, shedding, defecation, and feeding. If you drop down to a more reduced feeding regime, monitor the snakes weight to insure it is not losing weight rapidly (assuming it is not overweight to start). Then adjust your feeding to compensate.

Warren

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I like a lot of "serious" boa people. Gus Rentfro, Vin Russo, a host of others that REALLY know boas. DR. Booth is on the list.

I'm glad he is posting here and think people should take note of his posts.

Most boas in captivity are overfed, but if you are doing things the right way, don't assume your snake is, as noted above.

Thanks DR. Booth for adding to the topic.