Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have 2 BP's I recently picked up which I was told do not eat rats. I have been feeding them mice once a week but I think they are still hungry after they eat. I just realized the scale the guy gave me is completely off so I don't know how much they weigh. If you guys could recommend a scale that would be cool too. I do however have some pictures of them, Can anyone tell me if I should feed them jumbo's and I want to get them on f/t too, Can someone recommend a reputable rodent dealer as well. I'm not sure if I should be feeding them 2 mice instead of 1.

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Have you tried feeding them rats? I don't know how many times I've been told "oh this snake only eats X" until I get it home and get it to feed on what I want it to.

That can eat small rats all day long...
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http://ballmorphs.webs.com/

Hector

I have rarely had problems converting Ball Pythons over to eating whatever stock I have on hand. Converting to frozen/thawed can be a greater challenge, but mice to rats is usually easy (for me).

I have hatchling Ball Pythons that will eat a small adult mouse in one sitting easy. Anything larger than hatchling size will probably eat jumbo adult mice more than once a week. Depending on the rat size, crawler or weaner rats might be ideal for the size of Ball Pythons you have. Soon they will be on to small rats though.
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26 year old 0.1 from Lincoln, NE
Ball Pythons - 0.1 Silver Bullet, 0.1 Pastel, 1.0 Pastel het Pied, 0.1 Pied, 0.1 Cinn, 1.0 Black Pewter, 1.0 Woma, 0.1 Yellowbelly, 2.1 Normals
Kingsnakes - 1.0 L. m. thayeri, 0.1 L. m. thayeri X L. alterna, 1.0 L. g. californiae
Other - 0.1 Whitesided P. catenifer sayi, 1.0 H. nascicus, ?.? Chrysemys picta, 1.0 husband, ?.? Mini-human

You were told they do not eat rats, but have you tried?

A trick. See if you can get a box with some used mouse bedding. Put a rat in the box overnight so it picks up the scent of the mouse.
See if the snake will take it then. If it does, doe it again a few more times. Then, try it without a scented rat. Usually works well.

They could clearly eat rats based on their size.

As for scales - I think the MyWeigh is really nice and works well for Ball pythons. You can see it
Here.