Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Backround: My GF has a pet rat that she loves (it is a kinda cool rat) and she is just that kinda girl that loooves furry animals etc etc.

Ok . . So i bought a fuzzy mouse today and i went to feed the snake and i told my GF to leave the room she asked if it would make a noise, so i said no not really. So she said she would just watch tv and not look.

Well she looked . . . .

And she sees this baby mouse cute as can be just sitting there defenceless and she FREAKS. She starts pleading to me not to feed it. telling me to please take it out etc. I told her no and she started BALLing i mean hardcore crying . . so my heart melted and i took the mouse out (the snake was still asleep and hadnt even woken up, let alone seen the mouse) So i took the mouse out.

Now i figure i have to go to frozen now . . . But most of these website sell them for 25 or 50 in a "pack". I duno whether to get a 25 pack of fuzzies or hoppers because i want to get him on a 1 mouse every 4 days scedule. That means that 25 mice will take like just over 3 months to feed off . . I think this little dude will grow out of fuzzies within 3 months . . . Should i get hoppers? or fuzzies? I duno . . . For now ijust have to try to get my GF out of the room so i can feed my snake . . .
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Russ
Baby Brazilian Rainbow Boa
Melbourne, Fl

Personally, I'd go fuzzy but I know there wil be lots of votes for the hoppers. i just don't like to overfeed my snakes and when the animal outgrows the fuzzys you can feed two at a time until you run out.

Hey, is Frankies Wings N Things still in Melbourne? Best chicken wings ever!
MMMMMMMmmmmmmmmm.... wings of fire (drool)
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Mike Lockwood
www.tooscaley.com

I would not resort to an alterative feeding method, when feeding live doesnt bother you. I would recommend instead, explain to your girlfriend that no matter how the mouse is killed, it will still have to die to feed the snake. If she finds it sad, tell her not to watch, and remember that snakes eat cute mice in the wild too.
In the end, it is your choice, my boyfriend had the same issue with me feeding my snakes live. I told him I refused to feed F/T and could knock out the mouse by hitting it on a hard surface before I feed it, which is more violent on my part as the food-provider. he backed down and now stays away when the snakes feed.
IF she cant get over it, then resort to F/T. I wouldnt change my snake's feeding plans for someone else though. I am their caretaker.

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Jess
1.1 adult brazilian rainbows
1.2 baby BRBs born 6/18
1.0 normal corn
1.0 african brown house snake
0.1 hypo Boa constrictor
0.1 normal ball python
1.1 crested geckos
1.1 western hognoses
0.0.1 unhatched crested gecko egg
Oodles of mice and rats
1.1.2 teddy bear hamsters
0.1 paranoid parents "too many snakes snakes!"

She finally settled down and i got her to go into the living room and play with her pet rat (Bella) Then i closed the door and fed the snake the mouse.

I have a plan for my snake that i want to follow. 1 mouse every 4 days and i only feed him at night, in the dark with the only light being from the blue bulb i have shining in. I take all the stuff out of the cage exept for the water bowl.

I hope that this way the snake understands that it is only feeding time at night when the stuff is out of the cage.

That being said i believe i am going to be able to talk her into letting me feed live, which is what i would like to do.

My whole theme is keeping it as close to natural as possible for my snake. i have it on a 12 hour light 12 hour dark schedule etc etc. this includes feeding live.

She has a lot to do with it because we live together and the snake lives in our bedroom. . .

thanks
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Russ
Baby Brazilian Rainbow Boa
Melbourne, Fl

Russ,
Feeding live is the natural way to go. Definitly do what Jess suggested and knock them out. If you don't your snake will eventually get bit. No dought about it. Getting bit is also the natural way to go, but who wants their beautiful, expensive BRB scarred up?
Unless you end up breeding your feeders you'll want to eventually go F/T. THE way to go.

Paul

Feeding live is the natural way to go.

Most snake species readily consume dead food in captivity and in the wild. I have found a variety of wild snakes consuming obviously dead food that they hadn't killed. So I don't know what you would regard as more "natural" about live food.

I have been keeping snakes for over 35 years and I NEVER feed live food to snakes other than live pinkies to neonates that won't take dead yet.

As for the girlfriend, I think feeding frozen shows you respect her feelings and the well being of the snake (live rodents can and do injure snakes).

I would order food items that are just a little bit large for your snake now and use them up. In the selection of 25 hoppers you will get there will be variation in size. Feed the smaller ones first and them move on to the large ones.

Also, I would order about 6 months worth of mice. Ordering more often can get expensive when you factor in shipping. If you need hoppers, order 25 hoppers and 25 weanlings. When you are through with those, you can move up to the next size if necessary.
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Chris Harrison
San Antonio, Texas

'So I don't know what you would regard as more "natural" about live food.'

It was a general statement made to lead to my next point about the getting bit part. I'm not sure if you got past the first line of my post, but I'm with you on feeding dead prey items. Thought that was obvious. But lets not kid ourselves; most of what snakes consumne in the wild they killed themselves (nope, don't have proof of this, just the truth). I like the idea Russ wants to try and create as 'natural' a condition as possible in a captive environment. It's what I try to do also.
Pretty interesting you've been lucky enough to have stumbled across a variety of species consuming obviously dead food items. In nearly 40 years of kicking around fields and woods I've yet to find a snake feeding on anything (and I've found lots of snakes). Just shows I need to get out there more often!
Thanks for elaborating on F/T; good info.
Paul
Paul

It was a general statement made to lead to my next point about the getting bit part. I'm not sure if you got past the first line of my post, but I'm with you on feeding dead prey items. Thought that was obvious.

I did read it, I just didn't get it!? Sorry about that. Clearly we agree. I have seen several snakes permanently scarred by rodent bites.

In nearly 40 years of kicking around fields and woods I've yet to find a snake feeding on anything (and I've found lots of snakes).

That is surprising. I have found a couple of dozen snakes feeding in the wild, at least. The most common dead food I have found snakes feeding on was DORs.
For example, I have seen
- several Thamnophis sp. feeding on DOR anurans.
- both Nerodia rhombifer and taxispilota feeding on obviously dead bloated fish
- a Sonoran Gopher peeling a DOR K-rat off the road
- a scarlet kingsnake which was hit while trying to swallow a DOR smooth earthsnake (the kingsnake was twitching while the earthsnake had obviously been hit earlier)
- a Desert King with a DOR juv gophersnake halfway down
- an atrox trying to consume a DOR Neotoma
- a cottonmouth eating an obviously dead bloated Nerodia

I guess I have been lucky enough to stumble across this stuff, or have wasted too much time out looking?

Of course, Troy Hibbits has me beat because he photographed a male gophersnake mating with a DOR female! Snake necrophilia?

I have also found a few snakes eating things they had probably killed themselves. My most recent was this one in Chiapas, Mexico a few years ago -

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Chris Harrison
San Antonio, Texas

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Mike Lockwood
www.tooscaley.com

OOOOK

Well i guess i'll give in. I certanly dont want my pretty snake scrached up etc. So i guess ill feed it frozen. Im going to feed live for another week or so untill it gets out of fuzzies. So i can take it straight to hoppers because i think that if i go right to hoppers it might be a little to much atm.

Not sure my roomates are going to appriciate me having frozen mice next to their ice cream in the freezer but they'll just have to deal

Oh and while i am at it. Who do you guys order your rodents from? (those of you who order frozen)

Thanks
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Russ
Baby Brazilian Rainbow Boa
Melbourne, Fl

I go through Rodentpro. So far, they've been very reliable. Friendly too.
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Mike Lockwood
www.tooscaley.com

I Just found a place that is fairly local that sells them (it is about a half hour drive) So im just going to forget about the shipping and drive down and pick them up!

Which solves a lot of problems.
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Russ
Baby Brazilian Rainbow Boa
Melbourne, Fl

Oh and while i am at it. Who do you guys order your rodents from? (those of you who order frozen)

I have used Rodentpro several times (two weeks ago in fact - they have a big sale on) but I probably won't use them again. My problem is that they don't vacuum pack their rodents which means they don't last as long. I own a vacuum sealer and reseal them, but that takes me several hours with a big order.

Big Cheese rodents and the Mouse Factory have always given me good quality and vacuum sealed rodents.
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Chris Harrison
San Antonio, Texas

rat's and mice can seriously harm your snake when fed live. I agree with that to a point. If the proper sized rodent is fed and observed the chance of a bite bad enough to scar a snake is very little. Why do I say that, because I feed exclusively live. To my ball pythons, to my BRB's, to my columbian boa's to all the retics i've owned and to all the burms I've owned. In over 15 years of keeping snakes I've only had one major bite that left a scar from a rat and that was to my finger not to a snake. A properly sized rodent is neutralized sooo quick it's amazing. The trick is to never leave a live rat/mouse in an enclosure unsupervised. If a snake strikes at a rat and misses twice that snake isn't hungry and is just mad so I remove the rat before it has a chance to take revenge on the snake that's pissing it off which is where my bite came from but then again I didn't throw 2 quick coils on it and squeeze as hard as I can either which I'm positive would have stopped any fight from the rat. Granted with a small collection of a few animals it's no trouble to feed a few frozen rats at a time, but when it comes down to feeding several hundred rats a week, I'm not going to spend all that time when I could be cleaning snake or rat cages or actually enjoying my snakes, not trying to get them to eat or defrosting more rats. To make it sound like feeding live is wrong is crazy, most of the really large breeders in this country and around the world feed live and rarely do I hear of other breeders talking about their $20k snake getting mauled by a small/med rat. There's my 2 cent on the subject.
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Josh & Krysty Hutto
J&K Reptiles

Various Ball Pythons:::

1.0 striped vanilla
1.2 Citrus Ghost and hets
1.2 Albino and hets
2.3 het Pied
1.1 Pastel (male has additional gene going on with him)
a bunch of female holdbacks and several rescue normal males

0.1 columbian boa, she's a feeding monster, controls my
over production of rats, lol
0.1 brazilian rainbow boa, another rat eating monster
1.1 corns

a BAD dog is MADE not bred, support the American Pit Bull Terrier as the greatest breed of dogs on Earth!!!!!