Is there any pro/con to using rats instead of mice? I see a lot of posts suggesting rats are more nutricious than mice so why would you not always feed rats of comparable size? Just curious because at a show last month rat pinks looked around the same size as mice fuzzies/hoppers. Is price a big consideration?
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mice vs. rats
jtclark
Feb 22, 2004 07:06 PM
Replies (2)
Tigergenesis
Feb 22, 2004 07:52 PM
It's more an issue of young prey vs older prey. Older prey (adult mice and adult rats) have more calcium (very important in the first few months of life and is what's responsible for growth lengthwise) than younger prey (fuzzy mice and rat pups) which have more fat (great for fattening up).
I've read and heard a lot about the debate over mice vs rats, and it seems that there's no real proof to support one over the other - not too much of a difference unless you look at the age of the prey.
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IcedGoddess
Feb 22, 2004 08:04 PM
I don't feed rats until the snake can eat two or three hoppers at a time, and by then they can eat rat pups rather than pinks. I don't really know why, but I get a stronger feeding response when they're switched over to rats, and with the rats it's one young rat every 8-9 days as compared to several hoppers or small mice every 7. BUT, all of the snakes I have on rats are more than 1 and 1/2 years old. Better a healthy young rat than an aged mouse, I say
Just MHO
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