Size of rats

[Casillas_Brian]

So I started my bp on small female rats 3 weeks ago yesterday. He's just under 3 feet I was wondering should I move up to mediums or stay on smalls?

[Annarose15]

What does he weigh, and what do the rats weigh? That is a better indicator than length. How large of a lump does the meal leave in his belly? How frequently are you feeding him?

[Casillas_Brian]

Not sure on weights since I don't have a scale. And yeah you can some what tell there's something in there after feeding, but nothing very noticeable. I feed him every 7 days

[Annarose15]

If you can see there's a lump, it's probably still a fine size to feed. A little larger wouldn't hurt, but probably isn't necessary. General rule for eye-balling it is that the rat should be slightly larger at the hips than the BP is at his widest point.

I strongly recommend getting a scale. They're only $20-30 for a digital kitchen scale, and are your best friend if he goes off feed, tracking his growth, getting that ~15% estimate for food weight, etc.

[gardenfiend138]

I go by the 10-15% body weight (leaning towards 10%), but I've also heard people never go above a small rat for adult females... sorta tough without a scale, they're definitely a must! Otherwise things get very subjective

[decensored]

How much does he weigh? Length isn't as important as weight. I would feed a 3 foot 1000gram female a 100-150 gram rat. I would feed a 3 foot 600gram female a 60 - 80 gram rat. I remember your other thread about feeding multiples. If your BP is 1000grams than you would be fine feeding 2 small rats every week.

And just out of curiosity (not that it really matters) but why are you only feeding female rats?

[Casillas_Brian]

The guy I got him from said to feed him "female mice" figured since he said that they were bigger than males. Yeah guess ill invest in a kitchen scale. I do want more snakes so guess it's better to get it sooner rather than later

[Annarose15]

The guy I got him from said to feed him "female mice" figured since he said that they were bigger than males. Yeah guess ill invest in a kitchen scale. I do want more snakes so guess it's better to get it sooner rather than later

The gender of the prey really shouldn't matter, just size. It's great that it sounds like you've switched him to rats from mice. I know I never want to have to feed as many multiple meals as it would take feeding mice to an adult BP!

[Casillas_Brian]

Yeah, they had told ,e they tried to feed him rats once and he couldn't take but the first time I gave him a rat he snatched it up no problem. Then again they hadn't had fed him in a month and they were only feeding him mice

[Annarose15]

Yeah, they had told ,e they tried to feed him rats once and he couldn't take but the first time I gave him a rat he snatched it up no problem. Then again they hadn't had fed him in a month and they were only feeding him mice

Sounds like he found a much better home!