My "theory"

[Adam_Wysocki]

Thanks for adding ... I love a good debate too and your experience and comments are awesome!

1) It is allot easier for us to drop in a dead mouse on to a cleaned hide box top then to sit there and watch to ensure the mouse is killed and digested properly. That would just take way to long.

That's all I do, I drop the LIVE rat in the box and move on. Drop, drop, drop ... but, if you'd like to come down and visit, I can show you how long it would take to do pre-killed ... LOL ... it would be a long day. Do 100% of your ball pythons eat every week?

Adam I do believe it was you who mentioned having to sit and wiggle the mouse with hemostats to entice the snake, 99% of our animals will eat it still, the ones that do not are usually the arboreal species such as the GTP’s ATB’s and carpet species. They will normally take it within seconds of “dangling” the prey item.

I really thought we were only talking ball pythons here. Nothing that I have said would apply to other snakes, as many other snakes have much better natural feeding responses than ball pythons. How many of your animals are balls Rusty?

2) I feel (and has been scientifically proven) that not all snakes in the wild will actually catch the first prey they are aiming for. They do get away, but in captivity your herps are kept in boxes so be it they can be as nice and as big as possible but if you face the facts it is still a box. The prey doesn’t have a chance to escape as they do in the wild, Thus my point being that it is in no way a “natural” way to feed.

Scientifically proven? Where? Do you have a study or something? I'd like to see the data? ... I never advocated that anyone should feed live because it's the "natural" way ... I personally feel that once you put a snake it a cage, you can throw all of the "natural" stuff out the door. What I did say was that the snakes "natural instinct" is to eat live. Ball pythons must be "taught" to eat dead food.

3) It is easier and a lower cost for us to purchase prey items in bulk. Please remember we normally have a large quantity of animals to feed and in this we have many size prey items to feed them.

I have a large quantity too, and I pay the same price for live as I would for frozen. I guess you could call 250 rats a week "bulk" ... LOL

4) Has a rabbit or a large rat ever bitten you? I’ll tell you it hurts I have the scars to prove it. There is no way I would subject my animals to that bite no matter what the odds are. Plus there is no way I would ever through a twenty pound live turkey in with a 250lb Burmese python. (Like stated before I do not find it natural), plus to be honest the idea of a live twenty pound turkey in my house isn’t that pleasant.

Again, I thought this was strictly about ball pythons. You'd never feed a large rat or rabbit or 20lb turkey to a ball. At least I'd hope not.

5) I wanted to comment on something someone said about parasites and the relation to freezing prey items:
ROUNDWORMS: have an indirect life cycle and require an intermediate host. Roundworms are acquired by digestion said intermediate hosts, such as amphibians, fish, rodents and marsupials
STOMACH WORMS (mostly in lizards eating ant) There is again an indirect life cycle with ants as the intermediate hosts. Many Horned Lizards are infested with these parasites.
HEPATIC WORMS: (Capillaria SP.) These parasites also have an indirect lifecycle and are acquired by ingesting the intermediate host.
FILARIAL NEMATODES: Oswaldofilaria, Foleyella, Macdonaldius) Are rarely found and rarely diagnosed properly in our herp friends. These have an indirect lifecycle and are transferred by arthropods such as ticks and mites and live in the bloodstream of the host.
CRYPTOSPORIDIA: (the keepers who know such a protozoan shudder at the thought) The life of such Protozoan is not completely known but many researchers including Dr. Klingenburg, DVM, and DR. Zyra DVM feel that infected mice can transmit the disease to snakes that eat them.
If your food sources are the intermediate hosts stated above, you should either Freeze your prey items or de-parasitize your food colonies first
There are more but that I will leave for another thread

As I stated before Barnard & Upton have documented that freezing host animals is not 100% effective for killing amoedo-flagellates (a common parasite found in ball pythons) and now that you mention it, I know for a fact that if you email Klingenburg he will tell you the cryptosporidia most likely cannot be 100% eliminated thru freezing either (I'm a huge fan of parasitology)

6) Sadly here at Rusty Reptiles we have seen our fair share of abused animals, which does include a large Burmese python eaten alive, with such bad wounds he had to be euthanised. There is also Eye cap the ball python that was eaten alive by a gerbil. Luckily we received eye cap in time and had to do multiple surgeries to save her. 95% of her spine was exposed, so be it an extreme case, but not another rescue I would like to have to go through. And yes both cases were do to the negligence of the previous owners; I will not argue that fact.

Sad, but more of an argument for advocating the punishment of the owners than for arguing against the proper feeding of live prey.

But what I will say is that the above reasons are why we here feed pre killed or F/T prey.
For convenience, safety, prices, and piece of mind

Exact same reasons I feed live ... cool! :lol:

-adam

[SatanicIntention]

Hey Adam, I am a big fan of parasitology also. My teacher, who is a DVM, has also said that parasites cannot normally be transmitted to the snakes that eat them. The parasites are normally located in the feces, and when they are pooped out, they go through a maturation phase, and when they are picked up by another animal, be it by eating the feces or by getting it on the paws and then licking it off, then the parasites become infective. Inside the intestines, parasites aren't really in the correct stage of development to infect anything.

I, myself, feed f/t just for the fact that it is easier for me. I only have 1 snake at the moment, and it takes about 20 minutes to thaw the mouse, and then 2-3 minutes to feed her. It's great for me when Petco has sales on their mice for $0.99. So I just usually buy 15-20 of the little boogers and kill them all myself before bagging and dating them. I'm also starting 1.2 mice breeding so I will have a supply that I won't have to buy A 35lb bag of lab blocks doesn't cost much, so I think this will be the best option for me.

[sk8er4life]

man! i never thought id start such a dispute(60 or so posts)>"i fear we have only waken up a sleeping giant!"(or something like that>from pearl harbor). The reason why i choose to feed p/k is that when i use to feed live I'd put my snake in with the food and literally see the food go up the bps nose and sniff it and im just worried that the next time it wont be just a sniff it will also involve a bite! so that is my reason i chose to feed p/k

[Adam_Wysocki]

Hey Becky! ... Thanks for the scoop. Do you have a text book that references that or was it just from your teacher? I'm always looking for good refernces to help debunk the myths that are out there.

I love those Petco $.99 mouse sales too. I usually only pay $.50 per mouse from my breeder (i buy them in bulk) but sometimes he is short or I need extra and if Petco is having their mouse sale it's awesome!

Nothing wrong at all with feeding frozen ... sounds like you have a great system worked out for you and your girl!

Thanks again for the info!

-adam

[CTReptileRescue]

Hi Adam, I will say that upon reading this whole thread I think in my head I turned it to all of our herps instead of just our bp's. I agree with you, that bp's are more then likely to eat live over dead. In our experience with the bp's that we have rescued and adopted out (approx 260 total (would have to check our records for exact numbers) we have been lucky that they all take to eating pre killed prey very quickly. On a side note we have 1.3.0 Bp's in house now.

Sad, but more of an argument for advocating the punishment of the owners than for arguing against the proper feeding of live prey.

I agree, the reason I stated the above was to give everyone another reason why we choose to feed pre killed. I have seen what happens when you drop a live mouse into a snakes cage and walk away, even if you come back a few minutes later, there is still the possibilty of a bite wound and to be honest we have enough vet bills then to produce more reason to visit our DVM.
Like I said I love a debate, and I think everyone has good points, even if they go against mine. To his, his own, we choose to do what we do and I stated why above.
As for the freezing of parasites, our DVM and the many doctors both my husband and I have worked for in the past agree. So that's what we choose to do.
Also a note on the natural ideas that I stated above, I know you in general (Adam) had not brought it up. I chose to add it as a general thought due to our ideas and ethics.
Thanks
Rusty

[Adam_Wysocki]

man! i never thought id start such a dispute(60 or so posts)>"i fear we have only waken up a sleeping giant!"(or something like that>from pearl harbor). The reason why i choose to feed p/k is that when i use to feed live I'd put my snake in with the food and literally see the food go up the bps nose and sniff it and im just worried that the next time it wont be just a sniff it will also involve a bite! so that is my reason i chose to feed p/k

I don't think it's a dispute, just a passionate discussion amoung some very smart people and me ... LOL

That's awesome that PK works for you and your snake! When you did feed live did your snake eventually eat the food? i mean after the sniffing was over? Also, was your snake ever bitten? just being curious is all.

-adam

[CTReptileRescue]

(Not to be off subject) Sorry
Adam, I just looked over your site, you have many beautiful bp's. I have never been that much of a breeder as we do mostly rescue / rehabilitation work, but it is nice to see a responsible breeder. Daytona must have been fun, sadly we had a full house and my husband and I were unable to go down.
OK Now back to the subject at hand....

[sk8er4life]

yea she always eats the food never has turned down any type(altho never tried f/t>dont have any down here),no it wasnt ever bitten but i was startin to worry since they would usually come head to head and there noses were actually touching each other so i got paranoid and now i feed p/k

[Adam_Wysocki]

In our experience with the bp's that we have rescued and adopted out (approx 260 total (would have to check our records for exact numbers) we have been lucky that they all take to eating pre killed prey very quickly. On a side note we have 1.3.0 Bp's in house now.

Did they (the 260) and do they (the 1.3) eat FT every week (barring sheds)?

As for the freezing of parasites, our DVM and the many doctors both my husband and I have worked for in the past agree. So that's what we choose to do.

I'd really be interested in more information on this topic. Maybe your DVM or some of the doctors you and your husband have worked with has a reference to a study or text showing this to be true? Unless they were talking about snake mites or external parasites? But as i stated above, if your rats have snake mites you have bigger problems than freezing can fix. LOL

-adam

[Adam_Wysocki]

(Not to be off subject) Sorry
Adam, I just looked over your site, you have many beautiful bp's. I have never been that much of a breeder as we do mostly rescue / rehabilitation work, but it is nice to see a responsible breeder. Daytona must have been fun, sadly we had a full house and my husband and I were unable to go down.
OK Now back to the subject at hand....

No problem ... thanks for the nice words. I've rehabed a ton of ball pythons over the last 15 years or so, so I can really appreciate what you guys do!

Daytona is a blast every year. It's always hard to find help to "mind the store" while I'm gone, but it really is worth the trip if you're into herps.

Thanks again!

-adam