accessing size of f/t feeders

[BHReptiles]

Okay. It sounds like your ball pythons are pretty young. I would start off with F/T rat fuzzies. I would suggest you get a scale for them because it will make this a lot easier on you. I feed F/T rat fuzzies until they are about 150g (roughly the size of a half dollar) and then switch them to rat pups until they are about 350g. I am feeding my nearly 400g male (about as big around as a clementine orange) weaned rats. Now, unless you find a reptile specialty shop that sells these size feeders, it's nearly impossible to find them at chain pet stores (Petco, Petsmart specifically) because they sell all size mice and only small, medium, and large rats.

So, here are two options for you if you don't have a reptile specialty shop near you that sells feeders:

1. Feed mice...in that case your babies can probably take hopper mice (Petsmart sells these as small mice) for a few weeks, then feed them weaned mice (Petsmart sells these as medium mice) and the after a few more weeks, feed them adults (Petsmart sells them as large mice) . When they get the size of a clementine, go ahead and feed them jumbo mice. Then, once they are big enough to eat small rats, you can try to switch them over to eating rats. Now, it's often suggested to start them on rats early because sometimes they are more finicky about switching to rats when they are older. If you don't want to do that, I would suggest option 2.

2. Bulk order your rodents and stick them in the freezer. Now, shipping is a little bit expensive (they usually do priority shipping and package the box with dry ice) so in order to get your money's worth, you will need to bulk buy and store them in your freezer (I use the top part of a mini-fridge to keep the rodents out of my main freezer because my family is a little grossed out by it). When you bulk order, you want to buy SMALL bags. RodentPro sells bags of 100 whereas MiceDirect, Big Cheese Rodent Factory, Loxahatchee Rodents, Feeder Source, and some others will sell in bags as small as 10-25. Because you're only feeding two snakes, I'd buy a 25 count bag of rat fuzzies, two bags 25 bag of rat pups, and 3 bags of weaned rats to start off with. Now, because ball pythons grow at different rates, it's very hard to bulk buy. Because I guesstimated wrong initially, I have a freezer full of rat fuzzies/rat pups that my girls have outgrown. But instead of wasting them, I feed my girls a rat pup every 3-4 days since they should be on weaned rats by now. You can always feed two prey items of a SMALLER size in order to use up the rodents that you have. That way, none of your rodents that you order will go to waste.

I hope that helps a little bit!