Hatchling Food

In a few short weeks I will have my first hatchlings...I've never fed a hatchling so I need to make sure I've got the appropriate sized food.

I will be ordering from Big Cheese Rodent Factory, so please feel free to suggest what size you would feed, mice and rats :)

If you are ordering mice I would go with small mice. We have 20 CH babies and their first meal was small mice. We feed live though I have not tried to feed new hatchlings FT.

crapola. I'm worried because the ONLY source of live I have is Petco..and they have large mice and up...nothing smaller.

if I order F/T also, i will have to order a lot...which kinda sucks, but I do what I gotsta do :cool:

I just picked up an order of corn cob, aspen, and mazuri rodent food from smelts feed. They are down in tampa but every two weeks they meet a bunch of people in orlando over by sea world.

Anyway, I met a lady that breeds mice and rats. She lives somewhere over there in the orlando area. I also met another one on sat that breeds mice and rats in deltona. Both of them are suppost to be emailing me price lists for there rodents. I can let you know as soon as I hear from one of them.

On those CH the first meal was a small mouse and the second and third were regular sized adult mice because that is what I could get. When people say that a BP hatchling can eat an adult mouse they are not kidding.

Are you far from pet bazaar? I know that they have all kinds of mice. Last time I bought from them the mice were 6 for $6.00.

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Originally Posted by kellysballs

I just picked up an order of corn cob, aspen, and mazuri rodent food from smelts feed. They are down in tampa but every two weeks they meet a bunch of people in orlando over by sea world.

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Right next to me...almost...i'm interested in knowing more!!

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Anyway, I met a lady that breeds mice and rats. She lives somewhere over there in the orlando area. I also met another one on sat that breeds mice and rats in deltona. Both of them are suppost to be emailing me price lists for there rodents. I can let you know as soon as I hear from one of them.

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:please: :please: :please: :please: :please: :please:

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On those CH the first meal was a small mouse and the second and third were regular sized adult mice because that is what I could get. When people say that a BP hatchling can eat an adult mouse they are not kidding.

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taking mental notes... Thanks!!

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Are you far from pet bazaar? I know that they have all kinds of mice. Last time I bought from them the mice were 6 for $6.00.

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Yes. I liked Pet Bazaar...unfortunatly it's about a 45 minute trek because of Traffic :mad: I don't have that kind of time unfortunatly.

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Originally Posted by kellysballs

I just picked up an order of corn cob, aspen, and mazuri rodent food from smelts feed. They are down in tampa but every two weeks they meet a bunch of people in orlando over by sea world.

Anyway, I met a lady that breeds mice and rats. She lives somewhere over there in the orlando area. I also met another one on sat that breeds mice and rats in deltona. Both of them are suppost to be emailing me price lists for there rodents. I can let you know as soon as I hear from one of them.

On those CH the first meal was a small mouse and the second and third were regular sized adult mice because that is what I could get. When people say that a BP hatchling can eat an adult mouse they are not kidding.

Are you far from pet bazaar? I know that they have all kinds of mice. Last time I bought from them the mice were 6 for $6.00.

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Just asking. You hatched these out your self? or did you buy them as ch??

nate, If your going to feed mice start with hoppers. If you go with rats start with rat pinkies..

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Originally Posted by JASBALLS

nate, If your going to feed mice start with hoppers. If you go with rats start with rat pinkies..

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Thank you :gj:

Those were CH, however last year our CBB babies ate the same way.

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Originally Posted by kellysballs

Those were CH, however last year our CBB babies ate the same way.

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Kelly, Not trying to deter(sp?) you from doing that. But a live small mouse will devour a bp hatchling!

Thank you for the concern, I know what adult prey can do so I do not leave adult prey items in with my snakes unattended. I am in the room with them if they don't eat with in a few minutes the mouse/rat comes out.

Only time I leave anything in unattended is if it is a fuzzy or F/T.

I'd also go with hopper mice or pinky rats. IMO a small mouse just seems too large for a first meal. Good luck getting them started on f/t, I hear that can be tricky.

I use live mouse hoppers for the first few meals. They seem to be the perfect size.

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Originally Posted by JASBALLS

Kelly, Not trying to deter(sp?) you from doing that. But a live small mouse will devour a bp hatchling!

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I saw the size she was feeding them as well as hopper asfs and they were appropriately sized.

In my experience only about 5-10% of hatchlings will start off on frozen thawed mice or rats. Most need the movement of live mice to stimulate a feeding response. Once you feed a few meals of live they usually go onto frozen/thawed no problem.

I start off all my hatchlings on live hopper mice.

Corey

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Originally Posted by FIREball

I saw the size she was feeding them as well as hopper asfs and they were appropriately sized.

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So, they may have been hopper mice? People call different sizes different names lol..

They were out of the "hopper" phase but small smalls