Rat prey size question

[Ciccone07]

Hi, this is my first post here. I have had my BP for two months now. I got it from petco (not the best place to go after reading about snakes from there here). She had a RI but i got that cleared up after a trip to the vet and some meds.

She got weighed about three weeks ago and was 208g, shes about 6 months old and roughly two feet in length. I feed her one F/T adult mouse every friday. So my question is i want to switch her to rats to avoid feeding multiple mice and i have read rats are better for the snake and i want to know what size rats to feed. i have read that rat pups are about the same as adult mice. So is that the right prey size?

[AMC]

Prey size should be the same size as the widest part of your snake.

[Emilio]

Be prepared sometimes they don't switch, she'll be fine on mice it will just be more of pain for you. Most of mine love rats but I have three that won't even look at them. Good luck

[frankykeno]

Depends on the adult mouse, depends on the age of the rat pup really. Just compare your snake's largest girth (empty - not full of prey or poop) to the largest area of the rat (the hips & butt end as rats are pretty much triangular in shape). You want the rat size to fit that girth basically so the snake is full after eating but doesn't have a huge, distended belly.

[Ciccone07]

Thanks for the help. Hopefully i can make the switch to rats with no problems. I was thinking of rubbing an extra mouse i had on the rat before feeding it. Would that make the switch easier?

[kid_mustango02]

Thanks for the help. Hopefully i can make the switch to rats with no problems. I was thinking of rubbing an extra mouse i had on the rat before feeding it. Would that make the switch easier?

I've known of people scenting the rat with a mouse, but try the rat alone at first. If the rat alone doesn't work you can poke a whole into the top of the head and squeeze a little brain goop out to make the scent stronger. This worked for me. I know it's dirty job, but you should only have to do it a few times to get the snake started.