Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi folks,
While feeding my corns and boa, I usually try to get a good look at the lump in the snake made by the food. When it gets to be not much of a lump, I try to feed them multiple food items for a little while then move up in food item size. I've been doing this with the pine too. Does this sound ok?

My neighbor raises rabbits. I was thinking about talking to him about letting me take some of his one or two day old rabbits to feed to my pine and maybe even my rainbow boa. He keeps them in wire cages outside on his covered deck. Do you think that smaller rabbits would be ok for pines? Any drawbacks to rabbits as food? How hard or easy is it to get a pine back to rats if I was to run out of rabbits?

Thanks for any thoughts and suggestions
Rob
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"I reject your reality and substitute my own" Adam Savage
0.1 Brazilian Rainbow Boa-Ziggy
1.0 Creamscicle motley corn--Cozmo
0.1 Creamscicle corn--Wanda
0.0.1 Normal corn
0.1 Black Pine - Spazz
1.0 Bearded Dragon - Gomer

Rob...

Feeding your pine a diet of rats is all that is needed to ensure a happy, healthy snake. All things being equal, smaller more frequent meals are generally better as they do not tax the snake's systems as much...Can your pine take a rabbit? If it's big enough, probably...Is it a good idea? I wouldn't say so, but that's just one man's opinion...take it for what it's worth...

Another thing to be concerned about...some pines become "imprinted" on a particular prey item...they'll feed on this item and have no interest in anything else..This is great if the prey item in question is a rat, but not so if the animal switches to another prey item that isn't as easy (or cheap) to obtain...You do run the risk of your animal wanting rabbits and nothing else if you deviate from feeding it the prey it's accustomed to...

Just my .02
-AzAtrox

Thanks for the quick response azatrox.
She is not big enough to take rabbits right now. Now shes getting a rat pup and a small mouse. If it was an ok idea to feed rabbits, I figured I'd start getting them now and keeping them in the freezer. The wife would just LOVE that...........

Why would you say that it's not a good idea to feed her rabbits? Is it because of availability of the rabbits? The likely hood that she might not go back to rats if need be? Is feeding rabbits a possible problem?

Thanks again,
Rob
-----
"I reject your reality and substitute my own" Adam Savage
0.1 Brazilian Rainbow Boa-Ziggy
1.0 Creamscicle motley corn--Cozmo
0.1 Creamscicle corn--Wanda
0.0.1 Normal corn
0.1 Black Pine - Spazz
1.0 Bearded Dragon - Gomer

Feeding rabbits in and of itself isn't an issue...they are a nutritionally complete meal...The issue is that a rabbit is a rather large meal, and feeding large meals stresses the snake's systems more so than more frequent smaller meals...

Yes, there is a possibility that once started on rabbits, your pine might not want anything else...this might present an issue if rabbits are no longer readily avasilable to you (or they become expensive). Rats have a lower fat content than mice do, and I feed all of my pines f/t rats...If possible, I try to get them switched over to rats as soon as they're large enough to accept them....they can live their entire lives solely on f/t rats, and the rats provide a decent sized meal even for the largest pines.

Hope this helps....

-AzAtrox

Everything you said makes sense.

I was thinking that a day old rabbit would be small enough. The thing is, I don't know for sure. I've never seen one. I figured that some day my pine will be on larger rats and I thought that the rabbits might be the right size. The guy that breeds the rabbits is pretty cool and I'm sure I could work something out w/ him.

It's just a thought. I know I can always get rats, but I don't know if I can always get rabbits.

Thanks again,
Rob
-----
"I reject your reality and substitute my own" Adam Savage
0.1 Brazilian Rainbow Boa-Ziggy
1.0 Creamscicle motley corn--Cozmo
0.1 Creamscicle corn--Wanda
0.0.1 Normal corn
0.1 Black Pine - Spazz
1.0 Bearded Dragon - Gomer

newborn rabbits should be OK for food. I fed my black pine adults medium rats 130-180g with no problems.
I usually stuck with rats because they were reasonably priced and easily accessible. Some people report that once they acquire a taste for a certain prey item, it is hard to get them to switch or to switch back.

daveb

Thanks daveb

>> Some people report that once they acquire a taste for a certain prey item, it is hard to get them to switch or to switch back.

Thats something I'm concerned with. Nice looking pine you have there.
Rob
-----
"I reject your reality and substitute my own" Adam Savage
0.1 Brazilian Rainbow Boa-Ziggy
1.0 Creamscicle motley corn--Cozmo
0.1 Creamscicle corn--Wanda
0.0.1 Normal corn
0.1 Black Pine - Spazz
1.0 Bearded Dragon - Gomer