growing?

[Pookie]

I've owned my BRB since around feb. when i purchased her at the New England Reptlie Expo. She was said to be about a month old (around 6/7 months old now). Since i've had her i feed her about a pinky..now fuzzy once a week or so. She doesn't seem to be growing as fast as i expected. Compared to my ball python and cali king...she's still quite a bit like a baby! Is this normal or should i be feeding her more?

[reverendsterlin]

she should be eating adult mice at 7 months age

[ohh_kristina]

I agree, she should be eating larger prey.

[Jeff_Favelle]

I just had a litter of 22 and they all shed on Monday. By Tuesday, they ALL had eaten a F/T LARGE fuzzy mouse. After about 6-9 feedings (2 feedings per week) they will be on to adult mice. This takes about 1.5 - 2.5 months. By 6 months of age, they are eating rat hopper with ease.

[Pookie]

Thanks for the advice! She seems way to small to graduate to a full adult mouse but i'll work on giving her 2 large fuzzies until she's ready. Do you think i should feed her 2 fuzzies more than once a week?

[reverendsterlin]

I still suggest offering at least one adult mouse to her, she will stretch MUCH further than you may suspect. All we can do is advise.

[wyz]

Rev is right.. I just update mine to adult mice and I was really suprise to see how they can stretch..

They just can't be compared with a Cal King.

Go for it and don't worry.

WYZ

[Pookie]

Ok, i'll try this weekend! I'll keep you posted to see how it goes!

[lordkovacs]

when i was doing alll my research into BRB's a couple weeks ago, i found that at that age, every 5-6 days is the best feeding cycle. someone more experieced, please correct that if it's wrong. cheers,
MIKE

[BoidKeeper]

When I got mine back in December they where taking big Fuzzie mice. Not long after that I switched to rats. Now they take 40+g rats and that may still be too small.

Here is the female.
http://www.ssnakess.com/photopost/data/508/289bryce_and_brb.jpg
She turned 1 in June.
Cheers,
Trevor

[reverendsterlin]

My feelings are if you feed pinks, they have so little nutritional value a 4 day schedule is a must. If you follow what seems to be the trend and feed a too small prey item(that is larger then pinks) a 5 day schedule. If you feed like me and a few others (prey that is 1.5-2.5 the diameter of the snake) a 7-10 day schedule. My rabbit feeders get a 21 day schedule (increasing time between feedings prevents 'powerfeeding'). There are EXCEPTIONS! several species (some milks come to mind as one) that prefer smaller prey, I have a 2 year old pueblan milk that mostly will hold out for large fuzzies(9-12 at a feeding) and that gets too expensive for most. The trick is the larger the prey to snake ratio the longer between feedings.

Pookie, it may take some time for your brb to get it down AND the snake may take a rest or 2 and seem not to eat for a few seconds to a few minutes. Do not open the cage and pull the prey out of the animals mouth. Your going to start getting 3-4 week shed cycles and don't be bashful about offering a second mouse per feeding fairly soon (2-3 feeding down the line).

[ANIMAL5051]

i have a question on the feeding topic i have a 1 year old brb and she does seem a bit small. i feed her 1 hopper once a week should i feed her 2 times a week or mabey 2 hoppers once a week
thanks jim

[BoidKeeper]

Is she smaller then mine? That BRB is a year old and it eats 40+g hopper rats every 5 days.
Trevor

[reverendsterlin]

BTW a 40+gr rat hopper is about equal in size to a x-large adult mouse.

[ANIMAL5051]

trevor
if you where responding to me yes she is alot smaller i would post a pic but i dont know how to.she is eating mouse hopper not rat hoppers. i think i will start to give him 2 at a time.

[Pookie]

ANIMAL, To post a pic try looking at the "how to" forum. I looked there and found a nice explaination on how to post. I'll also try to post a pic when i have time to take one :) I'm curious to see yours, how old is she?

[BoidKeeper]

Animal I would deffinately step up the feeding a bit. Mine will soon be taking two 40g rats for a while.

Rev how big are the mice in Texas???? The biggest mice I ever have are at most 30g and those are retired breeders. I guess everything is bigger in Texas eh? These 40g rats are not much bigger then an adult mouse but they are. I'm not menthioning that I use rats because of the size difference just beacause as you mentiond right now there is very little difference. I menthioned rats because I feel that the sooner a boid that will be eating rats as an adult is switched to them the better.
Cheers,
Trevor

[Emily-Fisher]

Try switching over to hopper rats for a 7 month old BRB.... not FUZZIES!! :\

[reverendsterlin]

Trevor, I usually buy from rodentpro. Their jumbo mice are 35-45 grams and buying 500 at a time and I only pay 0.53 USD per mouse.

[ANIMAL5051]

trevor
i steped up the feeding yesterday i feed him 2 hopper mice i will try to post a pic . well i tryed to post a pic but the file size of 500k is to small for the pic my camera take will try to figure something out keep all posted

jim

[Pookie]

http://www.ssnakess.com/photopost/data/500/2471louise_on_hand-thumb.jpg


Here's a pic of her. So now that you can see her size and she's also able to eat F/T mice (horray!) What size should i upgrade to next?

[reverendsterlin]

pookie, if you can weigh the size mice she's eating now, if they run 25+grams you'll be moving to weanling/small rats next probably in the 40-50 gram range (Walmart carries an electronic scale with both gram and ounce read outs, $29.95 USD very handy). It's hard to give sizes because they vary between folks but a gram is always a gram. (scale will also allow you track your animals growth up to 4.5 lbs). BTW if she's sucking down adult mice with no problems you might go ahead and up her again now.