Gerald Super Dwarf Ultra Ivory Retic Progression

[Sauzo]

A SD retic will stay small no matter how you feed it, if you have to underfeed it to keep it small it's likely going to get bigger than you want.

I'll have to disagree that the schedule Gerald was on was starving though. Not every snake is a hunger-crazed beast like Caesar, and they grow just fine being fed in that manner. Lol River was 3' even when I got her and I fed her rat pups until she was at least 4'. She grew 1.5' in 6 months eating that way, went from 3' at 6 months to 4.5' at a year. I did up her feeding through most of her second year, but ended up having to reduce the prey size as the bigger prey seemed to weigh her down. She easily took prey 15-25% of her weight as a baby, once she got on rabbits it had to be brought back down to 10-15%. Rats don't weigh her down as much but she does still get lazy the first few days on a colossal.


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I agree the schedule Bob had him on with rat pups would work but you got to remember, those schedules are going to be on the minimum side as like I mentioned, they need to try and keep them as small as they can for as long as they can simply because its easier to sell a cute 3' snake than it is to sell a 12' monster. Also there is the overhead cost as breeders are going to have to deal with probably hundreds of animals and feeding that army on a more 'filling' diet is going to up the cost a lot. That's why you see breeders having these auctions and sales. They need to move the animals asap as every day its there, its costing them money plus they probably need rack room.

And I agree also that not every animal is going to be the bottomless pit Caesar haha. You have to just learn how much food your animal needs and adjust. I mean all of our retics are a perfect example. On the more mannered side, we have Wallace and Riverrun who even when hungry, they are fairly placid. Then you have Phyllis and Caesar on the other end of the spectrum. They go bonkers and push, dig, climb, strike at stuff and even hurt themselves from pushing when they get hungry.

I still think though that a 3.5' retic should be on small rats regardless though. If for no other reason than a small rat is going to offer more nutrition with developed bones, muscle and organs vs a pup who is still suckling on mom. And by all means, if you can keep him on a small rat every 10 days or even longer with him being placid, go for it. But I'm just saying don't feed the snake the bare minimum to keep it alive because you wanted a small snake. Not that JM is doing it or anyone here. I'm just saying it as a general statement everyone. That was the reason I was worried about getting a retic to begin with. I didn't want a huge snake but I also didn't want to have to feed it just enough to keep it alive and stunt it's growth just so I could say I have a retic.

Also rats aren't as dense as rabbits. I mean when I feed Rosey rabbits, I usually tack on another week until the next feeding. I was planning on doing that with Caesar once he got on gpigs, rabbits or piglets. I figure those meals would give me a good 2 weeks between feedings before he got agitated and started being a menace to society lol. I'd love to do those 0.5lb piglets from Monster Feeders but their minimum order is 50lbs and I don't need 50lbs of piglets as I'm sure they would freezer burn or go bad before I got done with them.