Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was thinking, why couldnt you take a meat grinder with the sausage attachement and make rat sausages? I am not saying to grind up rats, well not 100% rats anyway, but use the grinder and then formulate a specific snake balanced formula with high protein, high calcium, vitamens, just enough fat, etc...or whatever? You could use a rats nutritional make up as a starting point and then enhance it from there.

I bet you could use chicken and other meats and veggies even, mix in bones for calcium or a suppliment and then feed it to your good eaters? This would be more nutritional, it would most likely be way cheaper and would hold a long time.

I mean, sick as it sounds, you could even grind some frozen rat into it to switch the snakes over, or just leave some rat in the mix?

I know for other snakes they grind up pinkies...

It may sound sick, but a hamburger is a ground cow and we eat it right?

You could customize different sizes...I think it would work for snakes that eat well and take FT.

~Alan

its been done. snake snacks, I believe??

Ben

I ahve never seen these, are they high quality? I am talking about making a very fresh, high-end and well balanced food source. Not some low grade block of filler. Is this product you mentioned junk?

Some people say they are great, some say they are not. But they have problems. Number one anything made like that is going to be more expensive than the actual mouse...so why not just feed mice? Snake Sausages are expensive.
And some people say they are not as good for the snake...not sure but yeah.
And my last note is...many snakes may not take them because of how forein they are.

Try them if you like. That product has been around for years dont know good from bad, but out there. I stick with whole prey items myself..

Ben

Snakes have high concentration acid in their stomachs for good reason - they need to dissolve bone. Giving them ground food could mess up their chemical make-up over generations - and besides they evolved to cope fine with whole animals.

I'll have some though, if they come with mash and onion gravy!

Willzy

Too much time on your hands?

Yeah right-np!

Seriously though, how many medium to large rat are in a pound ..2 maybe 3? I find it hard to believe I couldnt make combination of meat, veggie, fruit, grain, bone,fat, vitamens...maybe some medicine too, and it would be a LOT cheaper per pound than frozen rats.

Then you consider that if you buy rats from a wholesale place, they have most likely been fed only rat chow their entire lives and then they are stuck in a freezer for 2, 3,...4, 10 maybe??, months before you get them? Then its an additional 1-3 months in your freezer before they are utilized, this cant be the most nutritional delivery method for food to your snakes.

It woud take some effort and study to unlock how snakes metabolize food and which foods their bodies need and utilize best, but I feel it could be done effectively, more nutritionally and would be alot cheaper in the end. However, maybe I am a dreamer...so be it, better this than a lemming following along with what the pack does online.

Wouldn't it be better to just gut load the mice/rats? If the mice and rats eat well before they are frozen or feed live to the snakes, the snake should benefit.

I just bought a bunch of mice to feed my one picky ball and the mice acted as though they hadn't eaten in days. I'm feeding them a high end mouse food so when I feed them off hopefully Bubba will get some of nutrients.

Question - what besides a good rodent food would be beneficial to the snake? More calcium?

Jen

Kale and other fresh fruits and veggies. Lab blocks, no matter how nutritionally balanced, aren't gonna have the same nutrients or vitamins that fresh fruits and veggies have!

Kale is a dark leafy green that's good for just about every animal out there. I like to also add in carrots, yellow squash, zucchini, apples, bananas, and whatever other fruits I happen to have lying around.

Just kale all by itself is a great supplement to lab blocks. Lots of vitamins, especially vitamin C, and I think it even has calcium. Good stuff!

~jenny
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"Polysyllabism in no way insures that what you're saying is actually worth being heard." - Blake (an e-friend of mine)

"I have never made but one prayer to god, a very short one: "O lord, make my enemies ridiculous." And he granted it." - Voltaire

I breed my own black berkshire rats to feed a few certain snakes that don't like white lab rats for some reason, and I also breed African soft-furs for one particular snake. If I have leftover feeders from the ones I buy in bulk, then they get to stay and eat food too. I don't feed them any kind of commercial food at all. I make up my own chow -- multi-grain cheerios, kashi cereal, pumpkin seeds, unsalted sunflower seeds, dried fruits, dried peas, a small amount of cat food for protein, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Then every night they get fresh spinach leaves (I can get these for cheap), carrots, broccoli, corn, cucumbers...whatever I buy and whatever I can bring home from work (leftovers from the residents' dinner that would have just gone in the trash). Like last night, I brought home rutabaga chunks and they went nuts. Plus we give them stuff left from our dinner at home -- chicken bones to clean, veggies, fruits, stuff my daughter turns her nose up at, etc. It may be a bit more expensive than feeding straight up lab blocks, but the rodents are happy, well-fed, very healthy, have great coats and eyes, and they grow well. I believe this makes a difference in the quality of nutrition that my snakes get from them.
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~* Jen *~

Pink Lady Constrictors

You couldn't possible replicate the nutrition in a real rodent, and why would you want to. Your intent to make a "more healthy" food is a good one, but you simply could not make anything better for a snake than an honest to goodness real rodent. As mentioned below, there are already commercial snake sausages, but they are designed for convenience and for those who for ethical reasons would rather not feed a rodent.

JP. I agree. They're rodent eaters, their nutrition comes from that. "Gut loading" per se, isn't necessary as long as the rat is healthy to begin with. If one wants to spend the time and money to do so I don't think it'll hurt but I think it's unnecessary.

Quig
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Don't interupt me when I'm talkin' to myself

I disagree, I think you should definately "gut load" anything that you possibly can if you are going to feed it to another animal. I do it with crickets, mealworms, superworms, rats, mice, etc. You'd be wasting an opportunity to give your pet a healthier meal if you don't.
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~Sara~
"If you look down on me, I am evil, If you look up to me, I am God, if you look straight at me, I Am you"
-Charles Manson

Don't confuse snakes with lizards - it is necessary to gut load for many lizards simply because they don't get the same vitamins being kept inside as they would outside.

Fact is that any domestically raised rodent of good health provides more vitamins and nutrients than our snakes need - the extra gut loading would just be waste (poop) and overloading the animal has a potential for vitamin poisoning the animal.
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Tosha
JET Pythons

Insert Silly Quote Here

nobody said anything about overloading the animal. The fact is, unless you are feeding the rodents m&m's or cardboard, you are probably gutloading it. Any commercial rodent food has vitamins, minerals, protein, etc.. I'm saying, that if you're the type to just get a few live rodents from the petstore when it's time to feed, you should feed them something healthy before feeding them to your animals. You never know what they've been fed or when the last time was that they were fed. And that doesn't sit well with me. Does it with you?

And if you raise your own food, I would hope you are feeding your rodents nutritious food all the time.

"Whole prey" are only nutritionally complete because of all the things that they prey has eaten that are in their gut.
For example, if you feed a dog nothing but breast meat of chicken, without supplements, and nothing but that breast meat, your dog is going to be malnourished. If you feed it a whole carcass, it will eat the stomach contents as well, and be healthy.

And for the record, the majority of what a snake poops out after a meal is fur and bone matter. Providing rats that have been fed nutritious meals to snakes isn't going to make them poop more any more than taking a vitamin pill would make you poop more.
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~Sara~
"If you look down on me, I am evil, If you look up to me, I am God, if you look straight at me, I Am you"
-Charles Manson

Any healthy domestic rodent - irregardless of what they are eating - if it's keeping them healthy then they will provide plenty of nutrients for your snake. Gut loading for snakes is not worth the time and effort to do it - if you want to fine - studies indicate otherwise. Enough said.

Happy Thanksgiving.
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Tosha
JET Pythons

Insert Silly Quote Here

Wrong. Point: red-dye in dog food.
And I'd love to see these studies.
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~Sara~
"If you look down on me, I am evil, If you look up to me, I am God, if you look straight at me, I Am you"
-Charles Manson