Change in feeding - need some advice please

[jamesa2580]

I just got a new female a couple weeks ago. She is a little over 200 grams and had been eating F/T just weaned rats. She's in great shape and had been eating weekly.

As luck would have it, a few days after I got her, she started going into shed and refused food which is no biggie. She had a great shed last night and looked plenty hungry this morning. I wasn't able to find just weaned rats, so I picked up some adult frozen mice. I picked up a small rat as well and packed him in with the mice, so some of the rat scent would rub off on the mouse and hopefully trick her into thinking the mouse was a rat.

Anyway, she refused the f/t mouse. I picked up a live mouse tonight to see if that would spark some interest and boy did it ever! She went after that thing and devoured it. Perfect strike to the head, good wrap, and she had it down in no time flat.

Great, right? Well now should I just keep feeding her live adult mice, or should I give the f/t another chance? She's eating, she's happy, and I'm happy, but ideally I'd love to have her on f/t. Let me know if this has ever happened to any of you and what you did. Since she did so well with the live, I'm inclined to just go with what works, but I don't know.

Thanks
Jim

[Bleepr]

Keep her on f/t rats. In the long run, it'll be better for her. Its good that she ate, but don't make a habit of feeding her mice.

[RichsBallPythons]

does not matter what you feed. Mice and rats are the same gram fer gram. There is no proof rats are better for ball pythons. Their is no problem feeding mice its whole life.

Theres no research done proving it. feed what ever works for you.

[Crazy4Herps]

I agree; f/t is amazing. Cheaper, less of a risk, not such a hassle to keep... My girl won't take f/t. Wish she would!

[Bleepr]

Nutritionally, yes, rats and mice are the same, but it'll take more mice as the snake grows, so its best to have them on rats to keep them full in one feed, instead of 3-4 you would need to equal one large rat.

At any rate, f/t is the way to go, as Crazy4Herps said.

[RichsBallPythons]

if you feed anything larger than a small rat your pushing the python to its limits and asking for problem feeders. Just cause the python can take a medium or large dont mean it should.

Ball pythons when full grown do well on 3-4 20 gram mice per feeding or one small rat 4-5weeks old at 55-75 grams.