Should I stop buying rats from a particular breeder?

[Maddumpling]

So I have had 2 snakes die on me in the past 3 months. The deaths of these two snakes I believe were caused by the live rats that I fed them. The two snakes that I had in my collection ate great until their last rats and after eating the last rats, they would started having fowl poops everyday and would not stop pooing and never ate. After a week they passed. Can live rats pass on some sort of infection to the snake? I have 6 other snakes that are doing fine and eating well. But the only reason why I blame the rats is because the two snakes that ate the live rats, both had the same symptoms right after eating the live rats and then died.

[MD_Pythons]

You should've got a necropsy done, without one you might not ever really know.

[c0r3yr0s3]

How long did you have the snakes prior to this?

[L.West]

Given your suspicions I wouldn't chance it again. I would just switch breeders/suppliers. Not worth the chance. That being said - without any sort of proof - I would not go bashing that breeder/supplier just move on to a new supplier.

Best of luck to you.

[SDA]

Unless for some strange reason those rats were poisoned (highly doubt any business would be that careless), sounds more like you had a long term problem that spread to your collection and the feeding was simply coincidence. You could have possibly contracted parasites but that would take time to develop into a problem and you would have noticed issues like your snakes not gaining weight. You could have kept them in substandard conditions that eventually compromised their immune systems. You could have not quarantined properly and spread a virus across your collection.

What I am getting at is exactly what others have said, you have no evidence your snakes died from eating live prey and without a vet diagnosing this issue, you can't point toward live prey and the vendor that sold them to you.

[Maddumpling]

One snake I have had was for 2 1/2 years. I just started buying feeders from this company 3 months ago. The other snake I had and died was about 2 months. Regarding gaining weight, all my snakes that I have had were gaining weight fine and were breeding great before this incident. I have 5 females and one male and all them are in great in weight and two of them are either in ovulation or closing to laying. I'm not sure if it was a long term problem because I have one snake that has been with me for 6 years and eats great and a proven breeder and another male thats been with me for 2 to 3 years and has impregnated two of my females. I agree I have no evidence since I have not done a necropsy or vet diagnosis, but just wanted to get an opinion since two of my snakes that I had died the exact same way after eating a live rat.

[Maddumpling]

Forgot to mention the one snake that I had for 2 1/2 years died and a month later I acquired the snake that also died to replace that snake for breeding purposes. The snake was obviously in quarantine and ate great the first two meals and then after the third meal, it went downhill from there.

[c0r3yr0s3]

It's possible that the newer snake had something and passed it on. Do you have a quarantine method? If it were me, I'd get my remaining snakes to a vet a.s.a.p

[Maddumpling]

Not possible, the newer snake was in quarantine and came into my collection after a month the older snake had died. Both snakes were never in my collection at the same time.

[c0r3yr0s3]

Not possible, the newer snake was in quarantine and came into my collection after a month the older snake had died. Both snakes were never in my collection at the same time.

Was the newer snake bought from the same place as the others? Sorry for all the questions, just trying to help