Reptile & Amphibian Forums

As I posted earlier, I received a green het burm on saturday morning from Bob Clark. he is almost 5 months old and is very pretty snake. Now I generally put him in his settup and dont mess with him for at least 5 or 6 days then handle him and feed. Now this guy is so active every night ( I know they are Nocturnal) but he looks as if he is either cheking his new home out or "hunting". Should I try and feed him already? and if so even though he is kind of skinny Im told they can eat small rats right away. Should I try a small rat? or large mice first. thanks

I would try a weaned rat for a five month old burm. If you think by looking at the girth of your snake that that is two much try rat pups, but i honastly think that the average 5 month old should be able to take a weaned rat with out any problem, Goodluck, Todd

Weaned rats? well the problem is all I can get is small rats...will a few large mice be ok?

If you are unable to obtain weaned rats then yes large mice would work. HTe only reason I suggested the rats is becuase the snake will quickly outgrow mice of any sizes and you will then have to transition the snake to rats. Start with rats and you will only have one transition, to rabbits that you have to deal with. Anyway, mice should work just fine. Hope this helped, Todd

Small rats should be fine too. I feed even newly hatched babies small rats or freshly weaned rats (almost the same thing in my book) or large mice if the baby happens to be finicky. But they quickly outgrow mice so I try to avoid them if possible. But 5 months old? That burm should be over 3 feet easy in which case it can handle even medium rats.

Don't feed live! Kill the rat first, otherwise you will get your snake bitten and possibly hurt and most certainly with nasty scars. If you don't know how to kill a rat, just slam it into a concrete surface as hard as you can. This should kill it easily. (watch, i'll get crap for this, lol, but it's a heck of a lot easier than explaining cervical dislocation to a novice herper)

>>Weaned rats? well the problem is all I can get is small rats...will a few large mice be ok?
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"If I had 365 enemies it would only take a year out of my life to settle all scores." Mia Miselfani

I never feed live, only f/t rats. I am going to try feeding small tonight. Will give update tomorrow.

thanks guys

I got a female het green burm from bob clark about 2 weeks ago. I was wondering how big ur guy is. The girl i got was also really skinny compared to my other burm.

I got him from bob as well..last week. he was born on july 20 and is kinna skinny but not too bad..hopefully he will eat tongiht...a small rat, hes thwaing right now

Well just to let you all know he ate a small rat without any problems. I was surprised seeing as I ve only had him since saturday. Anyhow A nice big lump in him and he is plenty happy.

Now lets see how fats his metabolism works, though I only want to feedhim around 1 every 6-7 days. Is this ok for a baby burm?