Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I'm a firm believer that giving your snake a varied diet makes for a good, healthy and longlived snake. So, I would like to hear about opinions/experiences in giving your RBs optional prey like small birds and rabbits etc. (At least over here that's usually not considered the primary type of food for large RBs...)

Thanx
Mattias, Sweden

I have a few times, I have Emeralds and have had WC that will only eat birds at first . From time to time I've offered them to my other snakes when I've had extras some have refused them others didn't care and gulped them down. When I was young I once fed 7 black birds to a 5 foot BCI I had just to see how many it would eat. I've always felt rodents were a good balanced diet and mine have always done well on them.
Randy
>>I'm a firm believer that giving your snake a varied diet makes for a good, healthy and longlived snake. So, I would like to hear about opinions/experiences in giving your RBs optional prey like small birds and rabbits etc. (At least over here that's usually not considered the primary type of food for large RBs...)
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>>Thanx
>>Mattias, Sweden
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I don't care if the glass is half full or half empty !
I just want the full glass I paid for !

What you say makes sense to me. Variety, after all, is the spice to life. Certainly I find rodents to be readily available and all my reptiles seem to relish them. I guess I would be afraid to offer something else and find I now have a snake fixated on a food item that is not as easily or consistently obtained.
By the way, your BRB is stunning. I'm guessing you also feel a habitat with some variety is also healthy (believe it was you that had a picture recently of your snake climbing around on a branch). Could you elaborate on how you keep your BRB? And by all means, post more pictures.
Paul

I have some other kinds of Boas and Pythons as well and some of them can be a bit picky at times when offered prey. The possibility that they can get a taste for hard-to-come-by types of prey is of some concern. However, my RBs are the ones that rarily ,if ever, refuse their dinner when offered. I'm not overly concerned they will suddenly refuse rats after one feeding, or many, consisting of small rabbits, for example. Of course I could be wrong in this, as I have yet to try it, and therefore thought it best to seek some advise here in the forum.

I'm not a very experienced BRB keeper, been keeping them for a couple of years but yes, I try to go for a more "naturalistic" approach both in terms of the interior of the cage and in the sense I offer live prey exlusively. I put a lot of plants, moss and other stuff in the cage to give it a more "natural" feel and to help with the humidity which I try to keep around 80%, slightly more with the juveniles. Large soaking bowl and a couple of sturdy branches. For substrate I use peat. As far as temperature ranges go I usually keep an average temperature of 25-26 degrees centigrade with a basking spot of around 30 degrees. It is a lot of work cleaning all the cages...

Mattias, Sweden

Heres another pic, as requested. 04 Female BRB