Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I sure hope I don't get flamed for this one...

I am curious if anyone has any info on feeding rabbits to BPs. I cannot convince my husband to raise rats, and he has come up with rabbits as an alternative food source. I must admit that I was squemish at first, but dealing with rabbits is much nicer than dealing with rats. My concern, first & formost, is the health and happiness of my snakes. Does anyone have any nutritional info or experience with using rabbits as food?

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Tammy

0.2 Ball Pythons
0.0.1 Dwarf Caimen
0.0.1 Baby Sav
0.1 Siamese Cat (Rescue)
1.0 Yellow Lab (Rescue)
0.1 Bernese Mountain Dog (Rescue)

Burms and rocks and retics eat em if that counts for anything. I don't have any nutritional info, but have been considering going that route myself. Anybody got any " don't do that's"?

Quig

Well...

My big female was happy to play "guinea pig"... She's NEVER jumped on a rat that fast!!! This was a "fuzzy" rabbit, eyes still closed and was the size of a good sized medium rat. Our first litter of rabbits consisted of 7 babies. I figure 2 or 3 breeder female rabbits should keep me in food at least until my husband replaces the Argus Monitors he sold.

If anyone knows of a reason I should revert back to rats, please let me know!!!
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Tammy

0.2 Ball Pythons
0.0.1 Dwarf Caimen
0.0.1 Baby Sav
2.2.7(make that 6) Feeder Rabbits
1.3 Chickens
0.1 Siamese Cat (Rescue)
1.0 Yellow Lab (Rescue) "Perfect Dog"
0.1 Bernese Mountain Dog (Rescue) "Brainless Wonder"

Not sure if there is any drawback nutrition wise - but as you know balls can be very finicky eaters. If you start feeding them rabbits be prepared to continue feeding them rabbits for the rest of their life. Make sure that you have a continuous supply as it's a good possiblity that they may not switch back to rats (maybe you can continue to feed both). Also - if you plan on selling them down the road, you may not be able to find someone willing to take snakes that will only feed on rabbits. Of course there is the possiblity that they will go back to rats without incident.
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Tosha

8.13.0 Ball Python (Harry and Fluffy and currently un-named)
0.2.0 Feline (Pippen and Pandora)
0.0.1 Dessert Tortoise (Pope)
7.9.5 Fish (1,2,3,4...)
0.0.1 Frog rescued from pool skimmer
0.0.2 Lizards rescued from pool skimmer

Tosha, you're right, it may be difficult to switch back to rats after a ball accepts something else. I wonder if trying to keep the rabbits and rats at least a similar color would fool a stuborn one? Thinkin' out loud again.

Quig

As a side note...................occasionally I'll feed mine live trapped chipmunks, and I'm aware of the possibility of parasites from wild prey. My point being, they never hesitated to take rats after taking chipmunks. Maybe it's the similarity in looks.

Quig

Hi there,

One thing you might consider is the difficulties involved with breeding rabbits vs. rats. I have bred both - rats for the snakes and rabbits for many years in my youth.

As far as I am concerned there is no comparison - rats are WAY easier to breed. Momma rabbits often lose their first litter and some never get the hang of mothering. If you live in the North, unless you keep them in a climate controlled area, each mom is only good for a couple of litters a year (three to four if you REALLY stretch it). Also, only large rabbits have big litters - so often you are talking a litter of six and one is going to die.

I'm sure there are folks out there who have rabbit breeding down to a science and have faired much better than me. But the point is, it's not as easy as the expression "breeds like rabbits" makes it sound!

Also - do you know how cute four week old bunnies are? That's about the size an adult ball would eat. I could not do it, haha!

Christy

That's true enough. I raised rabbits as pets when I was young and I'm from Michigan. Don't remember much about it, but we only had a buck and two does and never an overabundance. I do happen to know a breeder here and he seems to have several litters almost any time I go there, but then he has thirty adults as breeding stock. Guess it's just nice to know there is an alternate food source out there if it's needed.

Quig

We bred 100 rabbits before, 20 males and 80 females. We had about 30-50 litters a month, most of our litters are between 6-10 babies, our largest litter was 13 babies, we only sold them as pets,now we are down to three a grey one, white one, and a black one. I hope to breed some rexes and a couple more in a few months. Thanks Scott Glover

Depending on where you live Rabbits would have the advantage of being outdoors or the curse of it. Back when I had burms I had to bring the water bottles in every morning to thaw. I remember one day after a hard morning with the rabbits sitting down in the walk in burm room to warm up and thinking how cute it was that all the big guys came over to check me out - until I realized they where looking through my coat pockets for the rabbit they could smell!

Rabbits don't have to get very big before they have formidable back legs and claws. Given both the cute factor and the tendency of ball pythons to want live food there may be some disadvantages of feeding rabbits over rats.

I fed a fresh rabbit pinky to a small ch ball once and it ate it right up. I didn't try feeding them long term but suspect they might be a little fatty. Also, newborn rabbits grow so fast it would take a good-sized rabbit colony and careful planning to have a large quantity of rabbit pinkies small enough to feed many hatchling balls at a time.

I have a ball python that loves f/t pinky rabbits (kits). We thaw out 4-6 at a time, put them on a paper towel and lay them in his cage. He scarfs them down like popcorn.