Better way to thaw frozen prey?

[Mike Schultz]

When I was younger and keeping rat snakes I made the mistake of trying the microwave.... So I have been using warm water to thaw my prey. But it's kind of annoying to have these sopping wet, lukewarm mice to dangle around. Is there another way to do it?

[FatBoy]

Most reasonable way is to lay them out the night before you feed. We lay them out in the snake room. They will not smell real strong until they start to thaw good, SO, quess what, you are prescenting the room. We have an overwhelming feeding response with out boas doing this, 100% almost everytime.

[Royal Tartan]

place prey item in a plastic bag ( think u guys call it a zip lock ? )

defrost in warm water , remove DRY prey item , et voila !

[Mike Schultz]

place prey item in a plastic bag ( think u guys call it a zip lock ? )

defrost in warm water , remove DRY prey item , et voila !

I've tried that and all I get is a floating bag with a half-thawed mouse (the side that was touching the water is thawed while the other side is still cold lol) Maybe I should weight the bag...

Most reasonable way is to lay them out the night before you feed. We lay them out in the snake room. They will not smell real strong until they start to thaw good, SO, quess what, you are prescenting the room. We have an overwhelming feeding response with out boas doing this, 100% almost everytime.

I would do that, but I keep my snakes in my bedroom... I don't want my room smelling "real strong"

[briz]

Put them in a zip lock the night before and let them thaw. Remember if you thaw them too quick you will be cleaning up a nice little mess.

[Mike Schultz]

OK I just weighted down the ziploc bag with a few quarters and it seems to be working

[Mike Schultz]

Put them in a zip lock the night before and let them thaw. Remember if you thaw them too quick you will be cleaning up a nice little mess.

That requires too much forethought... With me it's like

*gets home from work*

Oh crap its feeding day!

*roots around in freezer looking for rodents*

[kc261]

I have done essentially the same thing you just described with the weighted bag. It works quite well.

[cH@0s]

Just make sure there is not a lot of air in the bag, so the prey item is heavy enough to sink, to much air, it will want to float.

[vgibbens]

We buy our mice 12 at a time from a LPS. My wife buys the little resealable plastic bags (small zip-loc bags)that are in the craft dept. at Wal-Mart. I get the job of seperating out the mice and stuffing them into the little bags, making sure i squeeze the air out of them. At feeding time, I fill up a tea cup with really warm water to the top and then put the bag with a mouse in it then put a small plate on the top to keep the mouse submerged.