I was just recently having a conversation with a friend of mine about Bill Hasst, and how he used to "tube feed" his snakes a special diet he had formulated. He fed some of his snakes this way for 15 years with no ill effects. This being an extreme example of course, and my goal is to get my snakes on rodents as fast as possible, but sometimes you just have to keep them alive in order to do so!!

"The cornerstone of Bill's success of being able to maintain venomous snakes alive for a much longer period of time, sometimes for years, was the concept and perfection of a special way of providing food to the reluctant reptiles, a system he called force-feeding"
"It took many years and thousands of changes to the formula, but ultimately the universal diet enabled him to keep some snakes healthy and producing top-quality venom for as long as 15 years, and his system was copied by zoos and others who had need of trying to keep difficult snakes, often irreplaceable specimens, alive. "

Joe

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