Feed again or wait a week?

Alright so of course I got out 2 rats last night (roughly 24 hours ago) I placed them in room temp water that I got out and ready 2 hours before that. I placed the bowl in the same area as my new ball pythons. When I got home from work today (about an hour ago) I took them out of the bowl dried them off with a towel and put them under the heat lamp until they hit roughly 100*F. I fed my girl with a set of wooden spoons holding the back of the rat (bc of course all my prep I forgot tongs.......) she took it almost before I even touched the ground in front of her:

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...ee5066cc2e.jpg

Now with the male hatchling I grabbed the rat with the spoons and started running along the cage around him. He was pretty interested, watching and curling up in an a shape and then boom the rats belly just collapses and guts go everywhere...I assume knocking his rock or being to rough don't know. As soon as that happened he wasn't interested. But now my question is why would the rats belly just break and gush everywhere like that? I wasn't dragging it all over just "hopping" barely touching the bottom.
And should I wait a week and try again or go ahead and throw a rat out to defrost and try again in the morning?


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I would say he was definitely hungry because before I put the rats under the heat lamp he was in his hide balled up and then not even 5 minutes later here he is:

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...60f5ef8fce.jpg


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You thawed them for 24 hours? I'm pretty new to this but that seems like a long time for thawing. If you wanted to thaw them out that long I would imagine you could do it in the fridge and then warm them up just prior to presenting them to your snake. 24 hours at room temp is a long time for bacteria to grow, and the gas/bloat from that, plus the pressure exerted on them by holding it with spoons could have helped your rat to explode.

Just a guess though, like I said I'm pretty new to this and my baby has only been with me long enough to eat twice now.

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Originally Posted by audioclass

You thawed them for 24 hours? I'm pretty new to this but that seems like a long time for thawing. If you wanted to thaw them out that long I would imagine you could do it in the fridge and then warm them up just prior to presenting them to your snake. 24 hours at room temp is a long time for bacteria to grow, and the gas/bloat from that, plus the pressure exerted on them by holding it with spoons could have helped your rat to explode.

Just a guess though, like I said I'm pretty new to this and my baby has only been with me long enough to eat twice now.

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I'm sure that's exactly what happened. Thawing too quickly can also cause the same issues, but that's certainly not the case here.

You left them in the water too long. It doesn't take 24 hours to thaw a little rat. Even my small rabbits I feed, I leave them in zip lock bags in warm water for about 3-4 hours and change out the water every hour as it gets cold. Rats I usually just leave in zip lock bags for a couple hours and change the water every hour. Small stuff usually only take about an hour and again, I leave everything in zip lock bags. It helps to keep the smell on them if you got a little stubborn feeder.

I've had rats pop on me before too. In my case, it was because I left them in too hot of water plus my sunglow boa slams her food and squeezes the bejesus out of them while pulling at the same time, so she literally tore the rats belly open. Luckily it was on top of her hide so was kind of easy to clean up.

My advice is you are going to leave them out to defrost, I would just put them in ziplock bags and leave them on top of the snake cages before you go to work. Then when you come home, they should be ready. Or like what I do, throw em all in ziplock bags and then throw it all on a bucket of warm water and change it out every hour and work your way down for feedings....little stuff in a hour or 2 and bigger stuff in 2-4 hours.

Awesome thank you guys! It does make sense now that I look at it. So a good solid plan would be (that I'm favoring toward) is placing them in a ziplock bag (2 rat weanlings in a snack bag) put it in the fridge 24ish hours ahead of time. And then how do I slowly warm them up? Can I just place them on top of the cage still in the bag for idk 10-15 minutes until the temp right? I don't have a hair dryer or anything like that although that sounds like a really good idea


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Originally Posted by BBotteron

Awesome thank you guys! It does make sense now that I look at it. So a good solid plan would be (that I'm favoring toward) is placing them in a ziplock bag (2 rat weanlings in a snack bag) put it in the fridge 24ish hours ahead of time. And then how do I slowly warm them up? Can I just place them on top of the cage still in the bag for idk 10-15 minutes until the temp right? I don't have a hair dryer or anything like that although that sounds like a really good idea


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I wouldn't put them in fridge. Just take them straight from the freezer, into zip lock bag and then either throw it in a bowl/bucket of warm water for 2 hours. Probably don't need that much time for weanlings but I like to be safe than sorry so I do 2 hours for them. I then just rinse them under very warm water for a couple mins to heat them up a little. None of my snakes are picky so they don't care if its a little wet. I just pat dry them with a paper towel and fluff them a little and then hang them off tongs for the snakes. I never bothered with a hair dryer or stuff. Thaw them out in warm water for a few hours, rinse them off with warmer water to heat them a little, pat dry with a paper towel and feed them. Been doing it for years and they all love em lol.

Sounds good to me thank you.


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Gotta say im glad i dont deal with any of this nasty stuff... I buy live each week, throw it in my styrofoam cooler with the Co2 bottle connected, and 10 sec of gas and all 3 are out like a light.. Then I drop 1 in each enclosure and they are all hit before I leave the room ;)
No Fuss, No Mess, No prep thawing or tongs dancing them around hahahaha
http://i1036.photobucket.com/albums/...serzmk3rt.jpeg

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Originally Posted by Mr Sully

Gotta say im glad i dont deal with any of this nasty stuff... I buy live each week, throw it in my styrofoam cooler with the Co2 bottle connected, and 10 sec of gas and all 3 are out like a light.. Then I drop 1 in each enclosure and they are all hit before I leave the room ;)
No Fuss, No Mess, No prep thawing or tongs dancing them around hahahaha
https://ball-pythons.net/forums/cach...serzmk3rt.jpeg

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Instead, you run the chance of your snakes eating parasites that the rat is carrying inside and outside of it :P

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Originally Posted by Sauzo

Instead, you run the chance of your snakes eating parasites that the rat is carrying inside and outside of it :P

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You had to shut me down didnt you... :rofl:
True that can happen....luckily for me the same fam pet store guy that breeds his own Snakes & Rodents has been here in business 2 miles from me.. Ive dealt with him for 20 years now.

I raise my own rodents and do fresh killed, never had one explode or get stinky or rip open or get a bloody nose, even with my 10 pound retic eating them. Plus I like the prep only takes a couple minutes to gas them with CO2. Of course I have to clean rat tubs a couple times a week, but I think it's worth it.

Closest pet store near me is almost an hour. And they're all big name pet stores so I'll probably just order online until I build my rack (looking into a 6 wide x 4 high) and aquire a few more snakes until I start breeding rats. Even then I'll probably still use f/t though way more convenient if I have to many or not enough


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I've had a few fall apart and it's nasty. sometimes they seem old and freezer burned from petco so I've stopped buying there. a time or two I think I over heated them and that was the cause. I'm now driving out of my way to a pet store that gets locally produced, much higher quality mice/rats. for the mice I heat up a pint of water for about 45 seconds in the micro wave, till it's very warm but not too hot to keep my finger in it. I place the mouse in a zip lock and weight it down with a spoon and leave it for a half hour or so. then I take the mouse out, warm the water again and sit it for another 15 while I hold the snake. so far, between our three snakes they are eager eaters this way. with medium rats, I thaw them longer before warming them up and I use a larger water container.

Everybody's got good advice I'm gonna try either placing in bag in room temp water while I'm at work or Luke warm water for an hour or so til defrosted and then probably warming with running hottish water for a couple minutes til the correct temp. We'll see I ended up defrosting for a few hours this morning in water and heating up in heat lamp then placing the rat on a cardboard box inside of his enclosure. Since I only worked 5 hours today I just left it in there and it was gone when I got home.


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