Ride Or Die.

[Salamander Rising]

If you dont wanna buy hemostats then just dangle the rodent by holding it in your mouth. Thats What I Do And Ive Never Been Bit Before!

[this certainly is shaping up to be quite a capital thread]

[rabernet]

Yes Ive Heard Of How the Rodent can Harm The Snake , Thats Why I Was thinking Maybe multiple of the littler ones? and I Got Him a New Tank so I Would Have To Reach My Hand Inside To Feed Him, and Im not comfortable With That

I feed live. There's nothing wrong with feeding live, as long as you follow some guidelines.

Make sure the prey is well fed and well hydrated. Place in opposite end of the enclosure from the snake to allow the snake to ambush hunt the prey.

Feeding multiple smaller ones is not ideal, because many will kill and eat one and then have no interest in any more after that, even if the prey is smaller than what they need.

If you're going to commit to live, then commit to also providing appropriately sized prey to your animal - otherwise, stick to f/t. Buy some long hemostats to offer the food so that you don't have to worry about sticking your hand in the tank.

[rabernet]

Getting bitten doesn't hurt. Also, do you really HAVE to dangle the frozen rodent around? Have you tried just dropping it in there and seeing if it's eaten?

EDIT: Capital letters go at the beginning of a sentence and for proper nouns. Please use them this way, it makes your posts easier to read.

EDIT 2: You should just use the heat mat all the time. The lamp sucks out humidity and works the same as the UTH. Be sure to use a red/black bulb instead of a white one if you keep using the lamp.

He's typing in all caps, our software then converts it that way.

[BP_Pascal]

Thank You To Those Who Seem To Think Im An Idiot. I Would Like To Know What An OP Is? Obviously I am Fairly new To Owning A Ball Python, and I assure You That Before I Bought Him I Did Do My share Of studying, But You Always get Different oppinions. A sincere Thank You Goes To Those who Offered Good Advice.

[rabernet]

I didn't say that rodents harm ball pythons all the time I said that they have the chances of harming each other (50%/50%)

Feeding a bunch of smaller prey is not only a pain, but going by what the OP is talking about (rodents so small that they cannot hurt the BP aka Rat pups) Do you really think that an adult BP will eat rat pups its entire life? I can see adult mice but not anything smaller, which once again is what the OP is talking about.

It's less than 50/50 chance when done properly. Just saying!

If it's a 50/50 chance then in over 15K live prey items I've fed off, I would have had 7500 injuries in my collection. I've had probably 5 insignificant scratches that you can actually see in all that time. That calculates out to .00033333% chance of injury. Far less than even 1% chance.

[rabernet]

Thank You To Those Who Seem To Think Im An Idiot. I Would Like To Know What An OP Is? Obviously I am Fairly new To Owning A Ball Python, and I assure You That Before I Bought Him I Did Do My share Of studying, But You Always get Different oppinions. A sincere Thank You Goes To Those who Offered Good Advice.

It's unfortunate that sometimes members here start to mock someone new who's here to learn, since we're supposed to be here to help.

Unfortunately, some members have become jaded by new members that at times will refuse to take advice offered to them, after they've asked for that advice.

I would recommend that rather than post snarky posts, they bow out of the thread and let others who are willing to help, assist that member.

OP means Original Poster - so that would be you.

[Zombie]

Thank You To Those Who Seem To Think Im An Idiot. I Would Like To Know What An OP Is? Obviously I am Fairly new To Owning A Ball Python, and I assure You That Before I Bought Him I Did Do My share Of studying, But You Always get Different oppinions. A sincere Thank You Goes To Those who Offered Good Advice.

Its not that people think your an idiot. The people on this forum are very passionate about these animals. It honestly seemed by your first few posts that you hadn't done any research at all (not saying you didn't, just seemed that way). I do know, as many others do, that there is a lot of bad information out there. Some of this info even comes from people that seem like they should know what they are doing.

My best advice is to throw away any advice you received anywhere else and listen to the people here trying to help. If some of them seem harsh just remember they are just concerned for your animal. They may not seem like they are being nice but some will hold your hand and others will tell you what's what and be on their way. Don't take offence to it, its just their way.

Heed their warnings and pay attention to their suggestions. It isn't every day you get info from such an experienced crowd. Everyone here is trying to help, even if it sounds like they are being mean with their suggestions. Sometimes its hard to remember how it was being ignorant in this hobby. Good luck to you and your snake, hope everything turns out great and you stick around to learn all you can...

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2

[MrLang]

This isn't an obvious troll?

[dr del]

This isn't an obvious troll?

No.

I'm tempted to start censoring and infracting that word due to its severe overuse on here lately.

[Mike41793]

BP_Pascal,

Im sorry for being a wiseass but i mean come on dude, theres no reason to type out everything in capitals. It doesnt make your point come across any clearer, it actually makes it ALOT harder to read. (and makes you look like a goober lol). I also read capitals as SHOUTING so it comes off as kinda obnoxious.

As others have said feeding live is perfectly fine. If you really wanna convert it to live it shouldnt be a problem. I personally would start feeding it appropriately sized rats bc then when its an adult you only need to buy 1 rat for it. As RobNJ said its fine to keep it on mice and feed multiple mice per feeding; however, price wise the mice at my local pet store are like $2 a piece. So youre looking at like $12-$16 a week for one snake unless you breed your own which is a whole other ball game lol. I personally feed mine f/t just bc its more conveniently for me not to have to drive to the pet store every week and i can stock up. Plus f/t rodents tend to be cheaper.

As for being afraid of being bit by your bp, theres really no need to be afraid. The speed of it surprises you and scares you but it does not hurt at all. Ive only been bit once. I was lifting my normal girl outta her tank and she was just in a pissy mood and whipped around and tagged my arm. I saw her head jerk outta the corner of my eye but i thought she had just pulled her head back really fast. It wasnt until i noticed the pin drops of blood that i even realized she had bit me. As long as you dont smell like food then theres a very small chance she'll wanna bite you.

If you have any more questions or concerns feel free to post more or PM if you want. (with caps lock off though please haha).