Feeding twice a week?

[Blaise22]

I have a healthy female ball about 33 inches long. I just bought 25 small rats for her but i think they are too small to last her to her next feed day which is every 7 days. I think two would be too many in one feeding so should i just feed her more often, like every four days?

[EAC Reptiles]

Depending on the weight of the snake it is fine to feed every few days, but by the sound of your snake eating larger small rats then I am guessing it has some size. My recommendation would be to feed every 5-6 days. That will give it enough food if you think that one every seven day is not enough. It also depends on what you are trying to do with the snake, if it is a pet then you don't have to feed them a ton of food, but if your intentions are for breeding then doubling up on the rats in the week is not a bad idea.

All my snakes that are under 700g get feed twice a week, after that I put them on once a week with a larger meal.

[Blaise22]

Thanks for the fast response. Right now im not trying to breed her but i want to make sure im not stunting her growth. I think a medium sized rat every 7 days would be perfect for her. If thats the case do you think a small rat every 5 days will keep her happy?

[snakeg]

If you overfeed them they are more prone to getting sick. I don't know if it's from their metabolism or just from introducing rodents and the bacteria they carry. I would feed them more at 1 time then 2 twice a week. If it takes a small rat, try another, if it takes that try another then starve it for a little bit.

[Blaise22]

Sounds good i'll try that this week, thanks!

[PitOnTheProwl]

If you overfeed them they are more prone to getting sick. I don't know if it's from their metabolism or just from introducing rodents and the bacteria they carry.

Please enlighten me


If my snakes eat then I will feed. I have some that take several in one sitting and others that will only eat one every couple weeks. Then there is my spider that only eats a couple times a year.
Keep an eye on her weight and as long as she is not loosing weight you are doing good.

[LLLReptile]

I feed small rats to my mid sized snakes, even though many of them can eat larger sized prey items. It maintains them at a nice weight just fine. Consider how much they are eating and how regularly compared to the wild - even feeding a relatively small prey item every week is still better eating than what they'd get in their natural habitat!

If you're worried about her weight, feed her two in one sitting, rather than every 5 days.

During the summer, when my snakes are eating like crazy, I'll sometimes feed every 3 to 4 days for the big girls, especially if I'm just feeding them excess small or medium rats instead of a good sized large. That only lasts for a month or two at most (right after egg laying, actually) before things slow back down to a more normal 7 to 10 days.

-Jen

[Mike41793]

If you overfeed them they are more prone to getting sick. I don't know if it's from their metabolism or just from introducing rodents and the bacteria they carry. I would feed them more at 1 time then 2 twice a week. If it takes a small rat, try another, if it takes that try another then starve it for a little bit.

Tell me more about overfeeding...? How do you know you're overfeeding them? What if once a week is technically underfeeding them? Will that make them sick too?

[TheSnakeGeek]

If my snakes eat then I will feed.

this. they'll let you know if they're full. you're lucky if they WILL eat twice a week.

[Daybreaker]

If you overfeed them they are more prone to getting sick. I don't know if it's from their metabolism or just from introducing rodents and the bacteria they carry. I would feed them more at 1 time then 2 twice a week. If it takes a small rat, try another, if it takes that try another then starve it for a little bit.

I would be hesitant to take any advice from this individual, please refer to this post and the long Fauna BOI thread on him:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...egenius-BEWARE

http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/foru...d.php?t=371684

Thomas has shown he has no clue how to properly care for these animals and his setup/husbandry is so ridiculously wrong as pointed out many times in the above threads. To be blunt: I wouldn't take any advice from this person. My .02