Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Does anyone here feed their burms live prey items? It seems like everyone is into f/t here. The only reason I ask is mine is only 5 feet so he is just getting up to larger rats that can fight for their life with some ferocity. The last large rat he took scratched the hell out of him with his hind legs as the coid had his torso. I had him out and touched off on of the superficial scratches and he left me know he didn't like it very quickly!
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1.0 Ball Python
1.0 Burmees Python

The reason you see most people using f/t is because it is the safest method for the snake, not to mention typically more convenient and inexpensive for the keeper. Mice, rats and rabbits can all seriously injure and even kill snakes. By feeding f/t, the snake still gets its meal with no risk to itself. With the number of companies now offering frozen prey, there is little reason to still use live, especially with a young animal that can easily be trained to take f/t prey. That said, I do have an adult female that I have not been able to switch to prekilled or even f/t rabbits. However, out of 28 snakes, she is one of only 2 that eat live prey at all - the other is a recently acquired neonate Solomon Island ground boa that I have feeding on live pinkies. As soon as the SIGB has reliably fed a few times, even she will be switched to f/t pinkies.

Raven

I feed my 4 live prey just because I'm used to it... I dont have the freezer space right now for frozen food, but I know my snakes will eat anything that I give to them, frozen, prekilled or live.
I do stun or kill the prey if it fights alot, otherwise they get to hunt and kill it themselves. I've only had one get bit in a year, and it only took a scale off...
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Coastal Carpet Python 0.1 (Lillith)
Albino Burm 0.1 (Kimba)
Columbian RedTail 0.1 (Squishy)
Kenyan Sand Boa 1.0 (Shai'hulud)
Common Snapping Turtle 1.1 (Sherman and Abrahms)
RES 1.0 (speedy)

that nothing serious was going to happen. Then my female boa was bitten, the site became swollen almost immediately. I ended up having to take her to the vet...shots every day for a week does not make a happy boa. Granted that snakes are predators, but we have changed the odds by putting them in a closed environment with a live prey animal that will fight for its life. Just because you haven't had your snake bitten yet does not mean it can't happen. Ultimately it is our duty to care for our snakes to the best of our ability, which also equates to not putting them at risk if it can at all be helped. Feeding live isn't a requirement, it's a choice for most keepers. I will grant that there are a very few snakes that simply will not eat f/t or p/k prey, or situations such as mine where it can be dangerous because of a large constrictor that won't eat anything not moving (and believe me I've tried). The point is if you train the animal when it is small to eat p/k or f/t prey, there is no risk to the snake from an agressive prey animal or one that just gets lucky with a bite or kick during constriction, and no risk to a keeper trying to make dead prey 'dance' for a giant constrictor.

I understand the risk of injury to a snake. Whenever you see a large wild caught boid they have battle scars all over them. No one here or any herp for that matter wants their pet with scars all over him taking away from the beauty of the snake. My biggest problem was that he got mad at me when I touched one of his scratches. All I need is a 20 foot angry burm coming at me cause I touched an injury of his that was my fault.
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1.0 Ball Python
1.0 Burmees Python

I'd like to see your 20'er.

I took an aligator clip and band clamped it to a metal rod. When I feed P/K I clip the end of the tail to get my snake interested. Sometimes he passes right by it but it's like fishing. Make it appear like a live rat and that's a good way to change them over from live if that's what you want.

No I don't have a 20 footer.(Not yet at least)My guys are 4 1/2 ft and 5 ft respectivly. I was just saying that if he is hissing at me me now, at a larger size what will he do if i piss him off you know.
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1.0 Ball Python
1.0 Burmees Python

Depending on your size he may see you as a happy meal or a juicy suckling pig! MMM MMMM Good! LOL

I'm relativly tall (6'3" but a slender 210 lbs so I think his biggest problem would be my shoulders. I have to admit it would be interesting to watch a large biod try to take a human like figure with soulders.I said human like.
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1.0 Ball Python
1.0 Burmees Python

My 14 foot retic got roundworms from a "free" rabbit that turned into a couple hundred in vet bills. It was ugly.

Assumming, in general, there is no difference in parasitazation levels between free and costly rabbits, what did you do? Do you still feed it rabbits?

feeding F/T has another advantage besides eliminating the risk of your snake getting bit and that is the fact that the freezing process will kill all internal and external parasites. Therefore by feeding F/T you are presenting about the most risk free meal possible for your snake. Todd

i thought anything under 40 degrees only slowed/made hibernate the growth of bacteria, not kill it.
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0.1 "Tremper" looking Albino Leopard gecko (Lex)
0.0.1 normal ball python (felix)
1.1 Feral cats that we adopted (Fuzzy, and Bear)

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np
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0.1 "Tremper" looking Albino Leopard gecko (Lex)
0.0.1 normal ball python (felix)
1.1 Feral cats that we adopted (Fuzzy, and Bear)

you also have to put into mind that these snakes do not have people like us looking after them in the wild, freezing their food, feeding them regularly etc. my snake (burmese) WILL NOT! eat pre killed at all. so i have to give him the rats that fight...he lets us help though-while he is coiled we hold the rats head so it cant bite, or we help suffocate it...i know its sad but he has to eat too. thank god he is smart hand hits the head first lol

I had to go back to feeding him home-bred rats in order to give him the Panacur. I had to put the panacur under the rats skin...giving him a dose once a day for a few days, then repeating in two weeks twice. We had to do the course 3 times to get all the worms.

After that, I have just stuck with rats...this way, I have control over what he is eating; I know my rats. Sometimes, I give him 30-some rats for a meal. LOL! Appetizers, yum!

I do buy him a rabbit a few times a year and I only buy from one person, where I drive out to his house and can see the colonies myself.

I did pick up a few rabbit to breed but they aren't reproducing fast enough for me. Hopefully I'll get them going this year.

Your post and the second reply to your post are the reasons people on insist on f/t (frozen/thawed) and p/k (pre-killed).

I'm not an expert or anything, but I stopped feeding live a while ago. One day I had a fiesty rat as it were, so I got worried about the damage it could to my burm, and I broke it's neck.

The only reason I don't use f/t, is because I have a local per store that is only 2 miles from my house and I can just go pick something up, have them break it's neck for me, and just take home and feed. I don't need bags and bags of rats in my freezer.

Its safer for your snake, it's the most humane for the rats and I believe someone before says, it trains your snake to not get use to moving things as food. The last thing you want is your burm one day eating up your friends small dog or something.

Richard

At the risk of being unpopluar I enjoy feeding live to my burm. I video it every single time. I used to only feed him live but they are right! F/T is way safer and convenient. The problem I ran into was freezer burn. I bought a 10 pack of collosal rats and it took my snake over 2 months to eat them (2 each meal). I've been asked why my snake is so skinny but I don't think he is. Allot of owners overfeed their snakes and that's not good either. When I do feed live I keep a close eye on the rats teeth and feet. I believe the snakes skin/scales is really tough. So far no penetration. If the rat starts to bite I'll pinch its nose and pull off so it can't bite down. The other day I hooked it's teeth with a wire after the strike. I enjoy the excitement and interaction. BUT! I do almost always feed him fresh P/K from my cages.

I hope that this does not sound like an attack but to do as you described is totally irresponsible. A rats bite can easily penetrate the scales of a snake. Years agao I had a medium rat that bit a 5' and punctured an eye and caused serious damage. There is no way that you will be able to react to a rat trying to bite in time. It is like playing russian roulette excpet you are playing it with your snakes health and well being on line. Also, once a snake gets bit by a rodent than there is a great possibility that the snake will be traumatized and will not eat that type of rodent again. Some will not even eat things with fur. You all think it is hard to get a supple of rodents steadily wait till you have to find a supply of feathered friends. just my thoughts on this matter. Todd

Ouch! I figured I'd get something like that back. It does sound like an attack. It's all good, I feel your intent. Hear me out though. These things have been eating live animals since God put them on this earth. They were made that way. You're right, I may not be able to react in time and I may be irresponsible, dunno. I feel comfortable in saying I more than ensure my pets are treated well. I personally get a kick out of whatching them eat live once in awhile. I've fed him 1 live rat in the last 3 months. That's 1 out of 18. All the rest I thump with a steel bar before feeding him. Some might say that's cruel also. Kinda funny. I'm also getting ADVICE from people telling me my snake is to skinny, then I hear about how MOST owners overfeed their snakes causing obesity and heart trouble. Thanx for the input though. I figure it's cause you care about animals and everyones entitled to their opinion. That's what makes this forumn so great. There's a wealth of knowledge.

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Your snake will probably not get bitten, scratched and scarred from a dead rat or whatever. This is pretty well confirmed in most scientific circles. You can put the rat in a jar and it will die from carbon dioxide poisoning pretty quickly, and relatively painlessly. If you monitor it, you can feed it to your snake while still naturally warm. If cold, and your snake prefers warm prey, you can put the rat in a jar of hot water, or hold it in front of a little space heater. Given the bad injuries that often happen to snakes due to prey, there's no excuse for feeding live prey. If you care about your snake, you won't feed it live prey. If you are one of those sickos who enjoys the killing act, you are beyond help and either need an IQ boost or other mental help. Plus, even though snakes, of course, kill in the wild, it is often not pretty or painless to the prey. Sorry for the sacrcasm, but really, this should be a dead and long ago resolved issue. I suppose newcomers to snake keeping accepted.