Thought I'd better introduce myself as things seem to be a bit shaky .

[Zincubus]

Now, pictures like that would make acceptable ammunition for your anti-live campaigns. At least it's a "wound" that occurred during a feeding time strike unlike your last choice. Just have to find a way to spin this out of proportion and make it seem like that snake is on death's door.

As I said at the time , that horrendous injury to the Royal python ( in the photo I posted ) actually WAS an injury from live feeding - albeit unattended which I'm fairly certain some still do given the time constraints of our modern lives .

[John1982]

As I said at the time , that horrendous injury to the Royal python ( in the photo I posted ) actually WAS an injury from live feeding - albeit unattended which I'm fairly certain some still do given the time constraints of our modern lives .

Wrong, just because the keeper thought it was a feeding doesn't make it so. A proper feeding of live includes a snake in hunt mode, appropriate prey(size and type), appropriate offering method, appropriate supervision. I'm 100% certain some of these integral pieces of the puzzle were missing and wouldn't be surprised if all were. If you don't have time to turn off the stove, have a bowl of cereal.

Since you seem to know so much about the situation surrounding the original photo please post a link so I can enlighten myself. I found the bit on the irish forums but they just posted the pictured saying it was from some american forum with no further details. They didn't even know if it was a rat or mouse injury - just some rodent.

[John1982]

I think you'll find it challenging to find the original source for most of these "feeding massacre" pictures. Out of millions of snake photos on the internet there are only a handful of these chewed up shots available. The pickings for anti-live propaganda pictures are so slim that available material has been regurgitated to the extent that the original source is all but impossible to locate. If and when you do find some I think you'll see that in every occurence a rodent was left for an extended period of time with the snake, unsupervised. Again, this is not a "feeding" as any responsible keeper knows.

[scalrtn]

I have absolutely no problem with live feeding, but I do have a problem with people who post live feeding videos to YouTube or Vimeo, particularly with heavy metal music playing in the background (where an animal's death is apparently being celebrated). I also have a problem with people feeding captive ball pythons to North American kingsnakes, whether they post videos or not. That's just my opinion, you're entitled to yours.

[goddessbaby]

Zinc, welcome to the forum. I read every post and I think running elk has had some particularly insightful things to say on this thread. I hope you continue to enjoy the forum and share your photos. I spend most of my time here keeping my opinion to myself on husbandry/feeding but feel free to comment on pictures/questions. I think it's unfair to bring a live vs f/t debate to this thread when the OP has stated numerous times that he has avoided commenting on those threads specifically for this reason. Everyone has an opinion, any animal can kill another animal. There's no need to shove it in the OP's face when there has already been posts where people provided input on how to set a positive tone and get positive feedback going forward.

[200xth]

a live , proven killing machine ( adult rat ) who's going to fight for it's life INTO an enclosed area WITH the snake .

More irrational fear mongering from a person who has never once fed a live animal to a snake.

Attempting to scare newbies into agreeing with you because they don't know better and it makes you feel better is a pretty poor thing to do.

[jclaiborne]

Here are my thoughts on live feeding. At this point I don't do if for a simple reason. My Tegu and Childrens Python both readily accept F/T so it is easier for me to keep a stock pile in the freezer. When I first started keeping snakes as a kid there really wasn't any place around me that sold F/T so I had to feed live (which meant weekly trips to the shop to get a mouse). Before I even got my first snake the store owner told me that feeding live wasn't just throwing the mouse/rat in the tank and walking away. He said "you have to watch and be ready to interject if something goes wrong, and possibly take a bite from either animal. If you aren't willing to do that, then maybe you want something different." So from the beginning I was lucky enough to have a reptile shop around me that actually cared. So for about 5 years I was feeding live and didn't have one accident. There is a right and wrong way to do everything.

[SCWood]

On am off-note, thank you to everyone who is patient and acknowledges the fact that, yes, Aspergers DOES effect the way we communicate. For the longest time, I have been afraid to mention it and I know some of my posts about my animal care come on strong or seem awkward but I can't help it x.x So, thank you for your educated, non-judgmental responses.

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[Stewart_Reptiles]

Can we please not turn this thread to another f/t vs live debate?

BTW this is not a request but a first and FINAL warning any additional feeding posts in this thread will be removed and merged to the already existing one.

[Zincubus]

On am off-note, thank you to everyone who is patient and acknowledges the fact that, yes, Aspergers DOES effect the way we communicate. For the longest time, I have been afraid to mention it and I know some of my posts about my animal care come on strong or seem awkward but I can't help it x.x So, thank you for your educated, non-judgmental responses.

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Nice to hear from you ... it's certainly not easy admitting that you / we are different from the " norm " but I've always been upfront about my Aspergers and most seem to understand or at least cut me a bit of slack , sadly not everyone .

Thankfully there are positives that come with the many negatives as regards to Aspergers .