Quote Originally Posted by drmoreau View Post
I've been wondering about this. I'm considering taking in a rescue python. Guy I'm adopting her from feeds live to all of his snakes. However, she's barely two years old, still small for her size, and she has an injury on her neck from the last person who had the snake before the guy did. I don't want to live feed her until she's a little bigger though, since I'm not experienced with snakes and she's not really an experienced hunter. Is there a way I can kind of encourage her to eat thawed/warmed up mice? Or how can I make sure she can eat live safely? The guy suggested I use a shoe box and put her and the mouse in the box until she eats it but I'm hugely concerned about the mouse getting defensive.
As long as you don't mind wasting a couple f/t feeders, there's no reason you can't try offering f/t feeders for a few weeks just to see if she'll take it if that'd be more convenient for you. Things like blasting them with a blowdryer before feeding to bump the temp, some snakes prefer that you leave the feeder in their tank overnight for them to eat in peace, some strike better when you jiggle it around and make it look 'alive', just try several different things.

If she refuses f/t and you need to do live, it sounds like she's pretty small? Unless you're in an area with a lot more variety in live feeders than where I live, that means you're probably going to be feeding mice. Whereas you do still need to supervise the feed (I watch until the prey is dead then leave my snake to eat) mice are not as strong or dangerous as rats. I've seen mice try their hardest to bite my snake and be unable to even scuff the scales. I also recommend keeping a pair of tongs nearby to put in the prey's mouth if it's in a position to bite the snake once it's been coiled. As long as you supervise and are ready to intervene, the risk of a feeding injury goes down to almost nothing.