Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Haven't posted here in a couple of years, but I still lurk in the shadows.
I was wondering, do any of you feed dressed feeders. No...not with a suit or gown, but store bought chicken or rabbit?
Living here in the "burbs" is making it more and more difficult to buy rabbits, and the cost lately of UPS is driving me to the poorhouse.
I can get live chickens from time to time, but
I'm not crazy about feeding them dirty nasty birds. I can easily get dressed birds or rabbits. And feeding only meat and bones has to provide a better source of protein than feathers or hair.And without the entrails there is hardly any chance of worms. Not 100% parasite free, but a better chance.
I thought I saw posts way back when about feeding this to our burms.
Anyone have any input?

My opinion is that dressed meats are not whole foods and not a complete meal. While it may work for a short term solution, it is not a long term diet.

The hair and feathers are not a big deal since they are large, insoluble fibers. But the liver is a valuable source of Vitamins A, D, and iron. The fat under the skin would be a necessary part of the diet as we all need fat and cholesterol to absorb fat soluble vitamins and manufacture certain hormones.

As for what I feed, I either purchase frozen rabbits or buy them freshly killed at a local pet store. They cost about $5 frozen or $10-$12 freshly killed. I feed one 5-6# rabbit twice monthly.

I buy my rabbits from rodent-pro and they also ship buy greyhound express that cost a hell of a lot less then ups.

I order from RPro as well. Yep, that Greyhound shipping rocks! I find defrosting those bunnies is a pain and it's only a 50/50 chance that Sammy will eat them. He spent 10 years eating live, so I guess a defrosted bunny loses something. It is a great deal though.

I understand the short term part of feeding the dressed prey...but has anyone here very tried it?

I've been buying from Rodent Pro for years. But it has gotten to the point where the UPS charges are more than the feeders.
And Greyhound Express actually costs more than UPS.
(I'm in Connecticut)
I can pay about $15 for a rabbit locally. Frozen are nonexistent around here.
Each rabbit I order from Rodent Pro runs about $16.00 if I add the shipping in.

I have been paying $12.00 each for live chickens. Though I don't feed live.I do have to kill them myself, and then I freeze them for at least a week. I wash them thoroughly,after thawing. then feed.

The farm I go to has pigs. I don't know what they'd charge for a 5-6 pig.
I have one 14 ft male that is an absolute bottomless pit.
I've been feeding him one chicken, roughly 5lbs every 7-10 days.
And he is still always hungry...and still growing...but not fat.

After feeding the chickens, I can see where a large rabbit would not be a problem. Up till recently this big boy was eating
6 2lb rabbits every 3 weeks, or 2-3 3lbs.
Time for me to up the prey size. My 7ft Dumerils eats the small rabbits now.
I wonder how nourishing garden fed squirrels might be?
Hell...I should just eat those myself seeing as they should taste just like my tomatoes, and peppers, and eggplants!

UPS
$48.95 *
* Cost of packing materials, dry ice, and insurance are included.
* UPS shipments will be delivered directly to your door.
Greyhound PackageXpress
$79.00 *
* Cost of packing materials, dry ice, and insurance are included.
* If Greyhound PackageXpress is chosen at the time of checkout you will be required to pick up your shipment at the nearest terminal serviced by this carrier.

If UPS Service is chosen your shipment will consist of 1 box having 36% free space available. If Greyhound Package XPress (GPX) is chosen, it will be 1 box having 68% free space available as our Greyhound boxes are twice as large. For an explanation please visit our Ordering Optimization Guide.

Total calculated using UPS: Grand Total: $84.95
Total calculated using Greyhound PackageXpress:
Grand Total: $115.00

Here is the cost for 6 medium rabbits...there is nearly $30 difference between UPS and greyhound.

Wow! I order a variety of rodents, so the rabbit price has not really stood out to me like it does to you.

Have you tried a local breeder? Do you have a herp society nearby that you could contact?

You need to make sure to fill the box or whatever to bring the cost per rabbit down..

For medium rabbits you can fit 10 per box which is roughly $10 per rabbit after shipping, really you should do greyhound and double the order..

For me.. I was in the Indiana area and just picked up about $350 worth of rabbits/rats/mice that will hopefully last me til the end of the year, this probably saved me $200 in shipping costs and I was in the area anyway on vacation so I'm not tacking on gas cause it was being paid for anyway...

The key to buying rodents online is to fill the box to make it worthwhile.. I finally bought a chest freezer for under $200 so I can buy in bulk and don't to have rodents where our real human food goes..

I feel your pain in the shipping costs, but those boxes are heavy and need to get there 2 day, really no way around that..

Still beats paying pet store prices, at our local pet store (chain stores like petco), their prices are ridiculous! I'm talking $8-9 for 1 large rat and $5-7 for 3 hopper mice! No way I'm paying that...
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1.0 Het Albino Burm
0.1 Albino Burm
1.1 Mojave Ball Pythons
0.1 Normal Ball Python
1.0 Albino Ball Python
1.1 Pastel Ball Pythons
0.1 Spider Ball Python
0.2 Het Albino Ball Pythons
0.1 Lavender Albino Retic

Seeking bigger cages for the family

Rodent Helper

Once in awhile I find myself in a bit of a bind and use dressed/prepared food.

You can get several good meals out of a $6 bag of frozen chicken quarters found in your local grocery store.

However, like Laura said, it's not "whole prey" and does lack nutrients 'n such that snakes gain from whole prey items. The blood, organs, and even the hair/feathers. Hair & feathers is roughage that works like the roughage we humans are said to need.

I don't feed dressed prey very often but I believe that it could safely be used as "Rodent Helper" here & there. I don't see anything wrong with adding a few chicken legs to a whole prey meal once in awhile (Whole prey only for one or two meals & then add a few dressed pieces to the next whole prey meal). That's just my personal opinion, though.

As an experiment I have fed one Burmese python strictly chicken quarters (leg & thigh) at one feeding session every 1 1/2 - 2 months for about a year or so now without any visible harmful effects. Granted, she's my garbage disposal and will eat anything you put in front of her, so it was no problem getting her to eat dressed meals. I've only tried feeding chicken quarters to two other Burms and both are finicky eaters that took them without hesitation.

It might be a good idea to dust dressed prey with a reptile multivitamin powder. However, I still wouldn't consider it to be the same quality as whole prey.

I'd canvass your area pretty thoroughly by hitting every feed store & asking them for a rabbit breeder & looking over the ads that are posted in the stores. Also look at Farm Trader type publications, like Auto Trader, and other sale magazines/papers, online classifieds, etc... While there may not be any in this week's publications, keep looking continuously.

When my rabbit production gets low I've got two sources. I can get small - medium rabbits for $8 - $10 from one source and small ones for $5 from another source.

One more time - for the record:
I don't suggest feeding strictly dressed prey on a regular basis. But, based on my personal experience, I believe it's OK to do so periodically, if needed.

Have a great day!
HH
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Due to political correctness run amuck,
this ol' hillbilly is now referred to as an:
Appalachian American

www.natures-signature.com

Agreed...do you find the after chicken poo to be as nasty as everyone says?

"do you find the after chicken poo to be as nasty as everyone says?"

No. I don't know if being dressed has anything to do with it or not, but the odor is pretty much the same. The feces are a bit more loose, but not runny. Not much of an overall difference from whole prey rabbits or rats.

Take care!
Mike
-----
Due to political correctness run amuck,
this ol' hillbilly is now referred to as an:
Appalachian American

www.natures-signature.com

Hmmm.....

I don't think I could handle it if the poo wasn't a nicely formed turd. Sorry for the expression, but I can either be really casual or overly nerdy about it, lol!

Having the snake in my reptile room which is the front room of my house means that I want it to stay as clean and unsmelly as possible. The idea of a 12ft snake with loose stool in his cage and possibly on his body is just...well...undesirable!

But I'd love to try the chicken idea sometime to see if it would boost his appetite. My scale is out of order but I think Sammy's finally starting to fill out a bit. He's 12yo now, 12ft and I think he's over 50 pounds now. Better than the 11ft and 35 pounds when I first got him.

I think I may try and add the dressed birds or rabbits as a supplemental feeding to whole prey.

As far as fecal matter ( you wont catch me saying turd! )
I actually find it more solid and not as stinky after feeding chickens.

Farms are getting kind of few and far between here in Connecticut, and those who do raise game and or chickens can charge whatever they want, and dont blink an eye.
A small rabbit at the farm I go to costs $15.

I try to buy all my rodents locally. My local pet shops need the money. So I try to keep it local. Cost about the same per unit as Rodent Pro if you figure shipping in.
When I attend shows, I stock up then as well, but nobody sells rabbits.

One pet shop was going to start keeping rabbits in stock. But that never worked out.

"As far as fecal matter ( you wont catch me saying turd! )..."

Ha! Ha! The funny thing is that while typing out my reply on what the poop was like, I changed my choice of words from "It's not a nice, big, solid log as usual...." because I felt "log" sounded a bit crude, especially talking to a lady. I forgot that I was talking to a country gal, who is still a lady but has no qualms about throwin' "turds" around. Hahaha!!!

I've never ordered rabbits from RodentPro but on ordering rats from them I've learned that maximizing the order to fill up the box lowers the average cost per animal/item. I just now tried it with rabbits and found that by adding 3 more rabbits to make it a total of 9 medium rabbits, the price, with UPS shipping, went from aproximately $12 per rabbit to $10. By using Greyhound, since the boxes are twice as big, you should be able to get the average cost per rabbit down to around $8.

Catch ya'll later!
HH
-----
Due to political correctness run amuck,
this ol' hillbilly is now referred to as an:
Appalachian American

www.natures-signature.com

Heh heh, I thought "turd" was better than all sorts of other choice words. I guess I could have started talking about fecal matter consistency, but it sounded like my post would gone in a rather strangely descriptive manner.

All ladylike manners aside, "turd" is a word that gives everyone a mental image of a shape and form, lol.

"I wonder how nourishing garden fed squirrels might be?"

I've used squirrels from time to time. No problems thus far.

I was only asking about the squirrels because the decimated my garden this year! Freakin tree rats!

I need to get faster with the pellet gun.

Ducks seem to be heavier than chickens and are shaped much better for swallowing. In the past I've checked with the local 4H clubs and found a number of livestock auctions where you can normally pick up rabbits for $2 or less. (don't go just before Easter). Ducks and chickens are also readily available there, but I hate chickens. Nasty buggers. Buy a cheap used small freezer where you can store a couple bunnies.

Years ago I fed a large chicken to an 11' burm and laughed as the snake squeezed the chicken so hard an egg popped out. Soft-shelled, so it bounced, LOL

>>I was only asking about the squirrels because the decimated my garden this year! Freakin tree rats!
>>
>>I need to get faster with the pellet gun.

Squirrels would be just as good to feed as rabbits or rats. To catch them just get a live trap or two and then use your pellet gun. I would freeze first and then, after defrosting, before feeding make a small insicion to remove the pellet first. You can also use CO2 to put them down.

Anna
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Anna

1.0.0 Ball python (RIP Shane)
1.0.0 Mexican Black Kingsnake {Slash}
1.3.0 Crested Geckos {Harley, Sally, Momma,?}
1.1.0 Jackons Chamelions {Spike, ?}
0.0.1 Bearded Dragon {Stubby}
1.0.0 Short Tail Possum {RIP Eddie}
4.0.0 Pet Rats {Remmy, Blaze, Diablo}
2.1.0 Dogs Lab/Pionter mix,Basset Hound,German Shepherd {Vegas,Shorty,Nevada}
3.3.0 Kitties {Kenny, Sebation, LG, Phoebe, Lily, Jade}
1.1.0 Ferrets {Weasle, Girlie}
4.2.0 Guinea Pigs {Moe, Maddy, Cloe, Page, Nick, Jack}
1.0.0 Betta, Opaque Plakat
1.0.0 Boyfriend {Brian}
3 fish tanks with lots of fish
Lots of feeder rats
And the bugs

Thats it for now.....