Is it ok if my bp eats a live mouse, live?

[BallPythonsRule]

Well, today was feeding day... and 2 out of 3 pinks were consumed live, she/he didn't squeeze the pinks, just grapped and ate.. one of them was still crawling inside..
Is this not good? Should I make him/her squezze it? Can the pink hurt the insides possibly??

[SatanicIntention]

Pinkies don't have teeth or nails and the snakes know they don't pose a threat. When meals are too small, then the snake won't constrict. Why is he still on pinkies? Baby Ball Pythons right out of the egg can eat hopper mice, then by the 3rd meal or so, they can go on to small adult mice. Pinkies aren't much of a meal and he's likely wasting more energy swallowing them than he's getting out of them. Try a small adult mouse, he should be just fine.

[Bright202]

Yeah, save the pinks for corns

[BallPythonsRule]

Pinkies don't have teeth or nails and the snakes know they don't pose a threat. When meals are too small, then the snake won't constrict. Why is he still on pinkies? Baby Ball Pythons right out of the egg can eat hopper mice, then by the 3rd meal or so, they can go on to small adult mice. Pinkies aren't much of a meal and he's likely wasting more energy swallowing them than he's getting out of them. Try a small adult mouse, he should be just fine.

The pet store had no rat pups ( I feed 2) so the guy gave me 3 pinks... And this guy is WAY too small to eat a adult mouse.. My close to 1 year old eats 2 and is pretty full... dunno maybe it's just me..

[ArcticBlue]

How many grams is your BP? Ive seen 75 g BPs take a small mouse. I can't say that I am the absolute authority on the subject, but I would think that it would be more stressful on your snake to eat 3 pinks then one small mouse, and in my experience, a small mouse is about the same size as a rat pup. If you are worried about it biting back, stun it, thump it or offer FT.

[Gooseman]

How many grams is your BP? Ive seen 75 g BPs take a small mouse. I can't say that I am the absolute authority on the subject, but I would think that it would be more stressful on your snake to eat 3 pinks then one small mouse, and in my experience, a small mouse is about the same size as a rat pup. If you are worried about it biting back, stun it, thump it or offer FT.

Just FYI, "stunning" is considered by most to be a very cruel way to feed. Either feed live, or fresh dead. You risk putting the prey through unnecessary pain and suffering by merely "stunning" it.

[ArcticBlue]

Feeding live mice to snakes is no less cruel in my opinion. Suffucation is not a pleasant way to die. I would be happy to continue the discussion in PM, do not want to distract from the OPs question, as it is an important one.

[Roswell]

Why did he give you 3 pinkies instead of 3 fuzzies? Fuzzies are the next step down in prey size, not pinkies.

[Gooseman]

Feeding live mice to snakes is no less cruel in my opinion. Suffucation is not a pleasant way to die. I would be happy to continue the discussion in PM, do not want to distract from the OPs question, as it is an important one.

Not to start a flame war, however, if you're going to give advice, and then someone comes and questions the soundness of advice (even if it is just one or two choice words, such as here, as 99/100's of it was great), what good does it do to take the convo to PM's? The information should be readily available to those who are reading this thread. Besides, it's a discussion on feeding live... I believe the topic fits quite well.

Feeding stunned is considered more cruel to the prey, and dangerous overall because there's a chance the prey may wake-up from it's stupor while actually being swallowed and causing even more damage to the snake then a mere scratch or defensive bite. The prey may not be knocked unconscious and only be paralyzed, causing the prey to experience both suffocation, and the nasty lump you gave it from being smashed around; or that the snake may refuse the meal and you're left with a prey item that will awaken to terrible amounts of pain. If you care for a pain-free death for the prey, make a proper CO2 chamber to peacefully put the prey to sleep.

Once again, I am not trying to single you out, but if you give advice, be prepared to stand by it if someone questions it.

[MelissaFlipski]

Why did he give you 3 pinkies instead of 3 fuzzies? Fuzzies are the next step down in prey size, not pinkies.

Yes, try two fuzzies.

How large is the thickest part of your snake? Usually they can swallow something the size of their thickest part of the body. Our BP is about a year, maybe slightly over and on adult F/T just fine. But when we ran out of adults, we offered two fuzzies F/T since we didn't want to wastethem, it was feeding night, and the pet store was closed.