Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My 6 foot male will only eat live white mice. He inspects his meal very carefully first. if it is not what he wants he refuses. He went for 5 months with no food and still refused anything but his white mouse.

Tried other colors... NOPE. Tried white rat pups... NOPE. Tried feeding F/K and F/T mice... NOPE. Tried tricking him into taking a rat as he was finishing his mouse... NOPE. Tried puting a rat in a tub with mice for the day then offering the rat... NOPE. Tried sewing a F/T rat to the tail of a live mouse... (1/2 hour of entertainment. He finally threw a coil over the rat and pulled it off the mouse)NOPE!

Am I stuck feeding white mice forever?

-----
Bennett
www.beardiedragon.com

You can get them for cheapers than rats and would be chaeper than mice at least. Then if she takes those try using chick scented rats.
-----

Thanks, but I have found that poultry produces looser stools than rodents, more clean-up. after eating pultry it can be just as hard to get them off of it on to something else.
-----
Bennett
www.beardiedragon.com

You might try not feeding him for about a month. It shouldn't hurt him, and by then he might be hungry enough to try at least another color of mouse.

Jake

only offered rats for 5 months, still didnt make him hungry enough to bite
-----
Bennett
www.beardiedragon.com

You might try making him fast again, and then offering a mouse followed up by a mouse-scented rat.

Jake

What time of the year did you try to starve him?
Bear in mind that a lot of male pythons have supressed appetites during the winter and will quite happily ignore food of any kind.

G

yes you are correct. as with my other males he stopped eating december. everyone else resumed eating after breeding season. So to answer your question, no food from december to may.
-----
Bennett
www.beardiedragon.com

when i first got my female she would only eat mice when she should have been eating medium rats. i stuck a small rat with a pan of x breeder mice and she happily ate that then today she ate her first medium rat with mouse smell on it. next week i plan to try the rat without the mouse smell.

try running several other methods of triggering feeding like splitting the head or something else used to trick non feeding snakes into eating.

hey, be glad that he doesn't only eat dark brown mice, or black mice.. be happy that at least he's eating something that's Relatively easy to get.

whatever you do, don't try gerbils or hamsters. mind you this is only MY advice, but i have seen far too many people where i work having to buy gerbils and hamsters because they gave their snake one and it now won't eat anything else. i have one guy that comes in and drops $30 a week on dwarf hamsters for one snake.

i'm lucky enough to have a jungle who will eat anything at any time (including my hand if i'm not careful).
keep trying other foods, but try to keep a positive outlook on things - at least he's eating.