Welcome to the site Salmonella and congrats on the new bp. We've found with our young bp that pre-killed is working best for us (if you aren't squeamish about dealing with a once weekly mouse demise). We do the zombie mouse dance as well (thanks Smulkin as I've never thought of term for it LOL). We just grab the newly dead mouse by the loose skin a good ways down the back (use an instrument some type not your own fingers) and put the mouse in a natural position head first to the snake and just wiggle a bit and bingo usually gets a fast strike and coil response (so fast we still jump a bit LOL). We found feeding after dark in a quiet room with low light and then leaving the snake alone to ingest it's meal has worked great with our new snake. As well we don't handle it for a good 48 hours after a meal.

Our snake is about 3.5 to 4 months old and about 19 inches long and is eating one young adult mouse every Monday night.

What are you using as a substrate?

~~Joanna~~