I've never had any trouble getting any of my balls to take rats, but I do have an adult jungle carpet python that absolutely refuses to have anything to do with a rat. It doesn't matter if it's live, freshly killed, or thawed. He tracks it the same way he does with mice but as soon as he can smell it up close, he backs off and waits for me to get rid of it. He's the most frustrating snake we have. I bought him as a yearling and have had him for over ten years now. Feeding him half a dozen mice or so at a feeding is time consuming and so aggravating. I've tricked him to eat a weanling/small rat only twice in the years that we've had him. Thankfully, I have several breeder friends and connections with one of the vendors for local pet shops so I can get feeder mice for little to nothing but I'd much rather that this guy would eat medium/large rats like the other JCPs..
If you have an oppurtunity to transition your little ones to rats early on, by all means do so. It's been my experience that the older the snake is, the more stubborn they can be.
Reply With Quote