Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi guys,
Here's the situation, I need some advice:
My ball, who was full grown when I got him, I've had him for about 6 or 7 months now, was raised on F/T (apparently). I have never been able to get him to eat anything other than live, not even freshly killed. Also, recently, he has only been taking mice. He wouldn't even look at a rat (incidently, this morning I put a rat in, just to see what would happen, and he took it, so, this whole post might be moot). My question is, is there a good formula (ie: body weight X amount of food) that will indicate how many mice he should eat a week? I know rats are pretty straight forward, but he was rather thin when I got him, and he doesn't seem to be gaining any weight with the 2 or 3 mice a week he's been getting. I think he needs to be bulked up a bit, he doesn't have that typical bp girth around the middle. Any suggestions?

Mouse eaters (In my expereince) as well as males (also in my expereince) tend to be thinner and leaner - more muscle less fat. With that in mind I beleive wieght-wise you are supposed to feed 20% of the snakes body weight - I usually go by looks (matching girths) but if you are feeding multiples that's kinda hard so for my mouse eaters I just keep tossing them in until they are finished eating usually around 3 or 4. Hope this helps.
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Tosha

"One of these days i am going to wake up..look around...and realize my place looks more like "Ace Venturas"s than my own." Coldthumb

7.33.0 Ball Python (Harry and Fluffy and gang)
1.0.0 Angolan Python (Skywalker)
0.0.1 Green Tree Python
0.2.0 Feline (Pippen and Pandora)
0.0.1 Dessert Tortoise (Pope John Paul "JP"
2.2.1 Fish (1,2,3,4)
0.0.2 frogs rescued from pool skimmer
0.0.1 lizard rescued from vicious feline

Excellent, exactly what I was looking for. Much appreciated!