Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I read over the threads below (not every single one) and many presented convincing arguments in favor of feeding lizards.

A few questions

- anyone tried lizards part-time? say, 2-3 in spring, 2-3 in fall, etc

- anyone tried wild mice? I have decent numbers that I trap in and around the house each winter - I'm considering trying them on a select group of alterna

- anyone consider that the problem with lab mice might be in their feed? If you eat nothing but high-fat beef, you'll get fat, too. However, if you eat range beef, you won't (at least not as fast). Perhaps our lab mice raised in bulk are too fat themselves, and could use a diet - perhaps feeding them grain instead of lab chow, etc.

- finally, anyone consider that part of the problem might be in the snake's lack of exercise? Europeans don't keep snakes in sweater-boxes, instead using larger cages where the snakes have opportunties to roam around and exercise. Perhaps this might also help.

I think its time to do some experimenting! LOL

Troy

I have not tried it but I think the 2-3 in the fall/spring could work.
I once had a thayeri that gave me fertile but very thin shelled eggs. Lloyd Lemke told me to inject 1cc of liquid calcium into a mouse once before and once after hibernation and feed it to the female. It worked great.

I usually (time got away from me this year) pull the skin back on the bellies of weanling mice and dust with Calcium, then pull the skin back over the Calcium so the snake doesn't come into contact with it. It does seem to cut down on kinked babies in general, but hasn't seemed to improve fertility.

I'd be willing to bet that fertility in alterna is a complex problem that can be addressed in more than one way - lizard-feeding being one of them. However, unless I buy lizards, I don't have ready access to large numbers without working my tail off with the noose. Not to mention ChrisH's aforementioned concerns about feeding wild lizards/removing wild animals for food.

I think what I'm going to try next year is to feed my 277 trio deer mice that get snapped around the house this winter (I put out no pesticides, so they are "clean". I hope to try to feed lizards (mostly DORs) to some of my other groups at the rate of 2-3 this fall, and 2-3 in the spring (depending on numbers available).

One thing that seems curious to me is that my milks (Pales, Celaenops) don't seem to have any problems on a straight mouse diet - I have no fertility and no problems with kinking, etc. You'd think that milks, especially these small ones, would have similar problems to the alterna.

Troy

You're right about milks not having problems. Like I said down below, When I only kept a few snakes I fed the mice I was breeding parrot food. The adults were thinner but healthy and very active all the time. The lab chow I used before that was made from alfalfa and they got fat from it while eating less of it.
-----
Steve W.

what do you guys mean by the 2-3 fall/spring rate? is that 2-3 months? please elaborate some more.
thanks

2-3 lizards fed during the spring along with the regular mice diet, 2-3 lizards fed during the fall along with the regular mice diet, meant to suppliment the diet for extra nutrition.
Todd Hughes

Exactly. 2-3 lizards before hibernation and 2-3 lizards after hibernation but before breeding begins. We already know that graybands can live a long heathy life on mice but the idea is to supplement them so they have exra nutrition before they breed. It is being suggested that a breif supplementation at the right time may help reduce fertility and hatch problems. This would be as a compromise between feeding lizards all the time, which was stated to work very well.

Has anyone had trouble converting the snakes back over to mice after getting a taste for lizards? What's in the lizard as far as nutritional value? Thanks.
-----
Steve W.

Some of those lubbers I was seeing were huge, black with red wings, looked like they had a whole vitamin store going on inside! I would assume they have lots of varied grains as well as a ton of sunshine packed in 'em.
Todd Hughes

you should try the dehydrated friut in the mix. LOTS of fiber. I did. OUCH!!!
-----
Steve W.

I kid you not, these hoppers were black and had red wings, I had too much trail mix too and wasn't feeling myself, uuurp! S'cuse me.
I had taken a new Olympus Stylus 750 out for it's inaugural voyage and actually took some shots of those ugly b@st@rd$ but they weren't any good so I deleted them. By the end of the trip I was getting the hang of it and got home to find my archaic computer won't accept the new plug in the port so an adapter is forthcoming tomorrow, I do have some decent shots of other stuff finally.
Todd Hughes

Arron
Are you going to have any 277 pin stripe alterna this year and are you going to attend NARBC this weekend.
KC

Briefly, yes I should have a few. I will email you as soon as I post this.