Reptile & Amphibian Forums

About what tempt are the mice/rats when you feed them to the snakes? My ball will eat a few times in a row & then not eat for a couple times and then go back to eating. I'm wondering if the weeks that he's not eating, if my temp on the mouse is wrong.

I take my mice/rats out of the freezer and let them thaw for several hours to room temperature. For me that means about 70F to 73F. I don't do anything to warm them up beyond that.

Rob

Who wants to wait a couple hours? I just put the rodents in a zip lock baggie, fill a bucket with hot tap water, put a weight on the bag to hold it under water, then in 15 minutes, change the water with hot tap again and then wait 5 min. and feed. The feeding behavior you refer to is the nature of BP's, if you want a snake that feeds "on demand" get a garter snake.
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You got your regius's to the wall, man!
1.0 pastel Python regius
0.1 mojave Python regius
0.1 normal Python regius
0.2 Terrapene carolina thriunguis
2.3 Terrapene carolina carolina
4.1 Kinosternon baurii
1.0 Malaclemys terrapin terrapin
2.1 Ambystoma tigrinum
1.1 Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.0 anerythristic Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.1 Iowa snow Thamnophis radix
1.1 heterozygous for amelanistic,carmel, and stripe Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 anerythristic motley Pantherophis guttatus

You want the mouse to be warm to the touch...not HOT, not room temperature, just warm the way a live mouse would be. I thaw the food in hot tap water, and if the water cools before the mouse is done thawing, I just dump out the water and fill it back up with hot water. Just don't ever microwave the water or boil it, you don't want to cook the mouse!

~kasey

I have no issue with waiting. I just take the rats out, get some stuff done around the house and then take care of the snakes. No problem. I have made mouse/rat stew using hot water and that was not fun so I don't do that anymore. If I do need an animal to be warmer than room temps I use the light bulb method mentioned in the other post (sorry, I already forgot who posted that). It is pretty rare, however, that I need an animal beyond room temps. I was not saying that what I do is the only way, just relaying what works for me.

Rob

The body temp of a living rat is around 98* - so you should shoot for that - as long as the body is fully defrosted (room tempish) - then you can just stick the head on a light bulb for a few seconds until it feels warm and you should be good to go - some need a bigger heat target and would require you to heat the whole body - I prefer a couple minutes under a heat lamp as opposed to soaking them in hot water as that seems to cook them making them less appealing to the snake. But you can play around with a few methods and see what works for your snake.
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Tosha
JET Pythons

I let mine defrost to room temp (about 2 to 3 hours) and then put them under a 40 watt bulb. I use a temp gun and check them often but my balls seem to hit them at 90 degrees - give or take 5 degrees.

steve