Captured escapee"s

[Mike Cavanaugh]

A wild one? No... Although in all likelihood it probably wouldn't do any harm... But one that's gone AWOL for a couple of days? I've got no problems with it. These animals are not so tender and delicate, they probably have some of the strongest digestive juices in the animal kingdom which is why they get along so well eating carrion and diseased creatures in the wild. When you think of it, eating healthy clean rodents in the prime of their lives is unnatural. These guys were designed by nature to pick off the stragglers and the weak. So to me, throwing away perfectly good food is wasteful and unnecessary.

You are absolutey right, I am sure in the wild Ball Pythons eat plenty of diseased, paristite infested, weak animals. Exactly why the snakes themselves are so full of parasites and other crap... One of the main contributing factors as to why captive bred reptiles that are properly kept as pets live on average considerably longer then wild.

So you said you would not feed a wild rodent you find. Why wouldn't you?