Alright, Loki is a PIG!

[pumba]

Well now, I am almost positive that at any time Loki is going to leave me a snake skin presant in his tank. His eyes have cleared up a bit, but I can tell his skin is faiding fast and when the light hits it it looks a bit blue like his eyes did.

Having this in mind, I was supprised to find that he ate today. Not only did he eat, he ate two hoppers. If I am not mistaken, he was looking for a third. I noticed last week when I fed him one hopper he kept looking around after he ate and began exploring like he was hunting, so I decided today to not only try a feed in the shed cycle (Figured what could it hurt, If he ate, so be it, if not I had a pet hopper for another week.) But I also figured after I fed him, I would see if he was interested in another. I read on here if he needed more food he would eat and if not he would not be interested...Well,,, he was interested. Snap, Crunch, Gulp and that was that. Like I said, I almost thaught he wanted another.

Have any of you guys or gals ever had a snake that ate more than two pray items? I know I do not need to go up in size yet, the first hopper that I fed was a bit large, not too large, but I wouldn't feed any bigger.Just wondering, I do not want to over feed if that is possible, but at the same time I want to feed enough. Suggestions?

have a good-en
Ray

[frankykeno]

Hey Ray congrats on the multiple feeding. Good for Loki! Sounds like you have a winner there!

Baby our 6 month old eats shed or not. We're just going into Punkin's first shed with us so not sure if she/he will take prey or not this Saturday night (maybe shed will be done by then).

I'm no where near qualified to advise you on feeding more than 1 or 2 prey items but I'm sure one of the many experienced people here will chime in shortly.

How big is Loki btw? estimated age?

~~Jo~~

[pumba]

I have no idea how old he is, I also have not gotten a real good measurment on him yet but the best I could do was between 20 and 21 inches long. If that tells you something about his age, please share it with me.. I do not know anything about aging a snake.

Thanks
Ray

[BallPythonBabe448]

All I know is that at 21 inches long, he could easily down an adult mouse or POSSIBLY a weaned rat.. thats assuming he is not malnurished or anything.

[Forrest]

My rule I go by is feed them until they are full. After you see how much they can eat ajust your feeding. If Loki is eating two hoppers and still is huntng/looking for more, then it is time to move up to small/medium mice. I just fed my snakes. Cleopatra (Cornsnake) eats two mice every 5 days. King tut (Adult BP) ate 1 jumbo rat and 4 mice ( I need to up his to 1 jumbo rat 1 medium rat) every 7-10 days. Cesar (juvenille BP i'm watching for a friend) ate 4 mice ( He is ready for a 1 medium rat). I have a baby Central American Boa (He is 2 1/2 months old) and I still have not fed him yet, but I plan on his first meal being a small frog/and 2 fuzzy rats then he will not be fed again until he/she (Unsexed) poops. The boa has eaten in store just not at my place. I'm lucky enough to have an abundance of toads in frogs in my area so I catch them during season and place them in a feeding holder. I observe them for 2 weeks then pick the best eaters out of the group and they are snake lunch. I know I know I'm feeding wild caught prey but hey it has worked for years for me.

[tigerlily]

I'm gonna get myself in trouble here. I don't agree with the feed until they're not hungry thing. You wouldn't do that yourself, or if you did it would still be unhealthy. You need to decide on what a good portion of food would be and deliver that. Now deciding on what is necessary is the hard part. I don't overfeed my dogs and I want to try and apply the same thing to my snakes. (Now my cats are fat lazy things and I can't seem to get them to diet. They just go out and kill themselves some more voles) Anyway, my point being it's not healthy to eat as much as you can. I like to feed something about the same width or slightly smaller than the widest part of the snake. With the max being a small rat once a week. Of course this is just my opinion but it's working well for me. No fasting and good growth.

[drdingo21]

My ball is about 21 inches long and eats adult mice with out a problem. Actually, you can just barely see the lump after she swallows them.
Two feeding ago after I fed her she looked like she was looking around (like you said) so the last feeding I dropped two in and she didn't hesitate. I think I'm going to alternate 2 one then 1 the next week.

But you should give adult mice a shot.


And tigerlily, doesn't everyone eat till they are full? I mean thats how you know to stop eating....

[tigerlily]

Have you ever seen a overweight dog? They obviously don't have the higher brain function that says ok I've had enough. They just keep going and going. Until they are fat and their health suffers. And with the percentage of obese people in the US I'd say no that too.

[elevatethis]

If your ball is eating multiple mice, you can simplify your life by switching to rats. A "small rat" is usually considered the next step up from adult mice.

A ball python can, however, survive on mice for life. Remember though, SURVIVE and THRIVE are two very different things.

I wish there was some kind of ideal meal size formula that could be computed for these guys. For example if your snake weighs 500 grams, an ideal meal would be around 60 grams or something like that (60 grams worth of a rat, a couple of mice, etc).

[Adam_Wysocki]

but at the same time I want to feed enough.

Ray,

Not to worry ... 1 or 2 hoppers a week is fine ... these are animals that have evolved to eat a handful of times a year in the wild ... captive feeding schedules are like heaven to a ball python.

Many years ago I used to stuff my ball pythons full with as much food as I could each week. I like you, never wanted them to be "hungry" .... at the same time I was having problems with snakes "going off feed" and frequently refusing meals after many consecutive weeks of aggressively eating large and jumbo rats until they looked like blimps.

Then, one day, a very wise ball python breeder that had been working with these animals for almost as long as I had been alive showed me the light .... They explained to me that ball pythons have a very slow metabolism and don't need a whole lot of food to thrive .... but, that in their native environment, the food is plentiful for only a portion of the year due to wet/dry cycles, so they are instinctively able to "binge" feed and "fill up" on food when it's available in order to survive the many months of the year when it is not. After that conversation I began to feed my ball pythons much much smaller meals ... even my largest adult females that measure 5+ ft are only offered small rats .... the result is a large collection of ball pythons that feed much more consistently and in my vets opinion are overall healthier. I will be forever grateful for the advice.

-adam