SIB experts....advice needed!!!

[Lucas339]

ok so i have a pair of SIBs. they were born in Feb. i have been feeding them frogs every 5 days. for the past month i have been trying to switch them to rodents with little luck.

here is what ive tried:

all methods have involved a few weeks of no food offered.

unsented live pinks
f/t pinks soaked in frog water
f/t pinks rubbed on frog
f/t pinks soaked in frog water with frog skin on them

all methods were left over night with little to no success. i had one that ate a f/t soaked pink with frog skin one week, the next a soaked and then the next week a refusal. the other one went 22 days without a meal so i fed a frog.

any advice?? im running out of frogs and this is starting to get expensive.

[dr del]

Hi,

I take it they are not known for being lizard eaters or anythig else you could try scenting with?

I did find this site on my travels.

http://candoia.ca/

Sorry I couldn't be of more help.


dr del

[Patrick Long]

Although my experience was short lived with Candoia, they have a very very slow metabolism, so skipping food for 20+ days is really not that big of a deal.

I was only feeding my little guys every 10 days.

My suggestion would be to keep scenting the rodent with the frog.

[zackw419]

Email Jerry conaway, he wrote the candoia page. He is experienced and replys fast.

Jerry told me they can go without for up to a month

conway.j@att.net

[Styx]

I've e-mailed Jerry with the very same issue. He told me to scent them with tuna water too. Try a live one maybe, just to get them interested at first too, see if that works. Unfortunately I don't have the e-mail saved so I can only remember the tuna water. And I think someone may have suggested (maybe Jerry, might not have been) getting the snake good and angry so it strikes at the pink and maybe coils. Didn't work for me, but nothing did.

Some may take years and years to switch, I had a female I eventually sold (because I couldn't switch her and she wouldn't even take lizards), but I tried everything with her. Braining a f/t, soaking live in tuna water, washing them and them putting frog slime/skin/guts on them, tired one scented with lizard, washed and wrapped in lizard skin. I tried f/t, and then live. I even tried a live pink that's face was crushed (and in case anyone is wondering I did NOT do it, I had a female mouse that decided she was going to freak out and kill all her young so I pulled them as fast as I could and fed them to my snakes, and I figured I'd try the one I pulled from the mother's mouth with my SIGB). I could not get her to take a pink.

So, it may take FOREVER. I tried two years to switch that female before I was fed up and now I just buy pink eaters. Like everyone said, try fasting them a little before so they're good and hungry.

[Lucas339]

yea ive emailed jerry and he told me some of what you guys already touched on. they won't be fed for a month this time and ill try the tuna water.

[Mettle]

Hi,

I take it they are not known for being lizard eaters or anythig else you could try scenting with?

I did find this site on my travels.

http://candoia.ca/

Sorry I couldn't be of more help.


dr del

The creator of that site is a member on these forums. Username is "Zoe".

[Skiploder]

Lucas, I'm not an expert, but I've has my paulsoni for 8 years and have never been able to get her to take f/t rodents.

She'll take rodents, just not f/t. I've tried every trick in the book and she is the only snake I've every kept that I can't win her over.

When I first got her, she refused to take frogs, and would only eat feeder anoles. I am lucky enough to live in an area where western fence lizards are plentiful. I caught several groups of them, treated them for internal parasites and bred them for a number of years. She would eat those without fail.

After about three years I was able to get her on live rodents - first scented with lizards and then unscented. But she adamantly refuses to eat f/t, no matter how I scent them.

[freelancer]

I can't really help because mine was already on pinkies when I got him at the shop. He'll jump on any mouse I put in there now. I can ask the shop the next time I go in there what they did to get him to convert.

I've been lucky with my critters, neither the boa nor the betta fish - known finicky feeders as well - have ever given me trouble with eating.

[zackw419]

yea ive emailed jerry and he told me some of what you guys already touched on. they won't be fed for a month this time and ill try the tuna water.

cool, good luck.