gerbils?

[marylyn101]

k, i'm quarenting (sp) and i just got a **** load of gerbils with baby's and pregnant ones. i feed my own mice and was wondering what you thought of feeding my cal kings gerbils. does it make a diffrence? will they accept it? nutritional value?

[annieb_mice]

I don't see any reason why you can't feed them to your snakes, though if they've been raised solely on mice, they might not take readily to the switch. But you never know. I have a ball python who will eat ANYTHING I give him, but my female ball is really quite fussy, if it isn't a rat or mouse, she won't have anything to do with it.
As for nutritional value, sorry, but I wouldn't know. :) I can't see them being too different though. :)
Just a thought.... if the snakes do refuse to eat the gerbils... try rubbing some really dirty mouse shavings over the gerbils to get the mousie scent on them and try again.
Take care
Annie B. <:3 )~~

[vanderkm]

Our experience was that gerbils supported faster growth than mice, closer to rats in nutritional impact, so they won't be a problem in terms of nutrition.

We had many snakes that refused gerbils completely and others that came to prefer them (I would not feed them to ball pythons - they closely resemble the natural prey and balls can become quite fixated on certain prey types). Even our cal kings and bull snakes that are supposed to eat anything and everything did not like gerbils (they are hairier as adults and the babies seem to be 'gummier' than mice).

I would not feed gerbils as live prey (other than pinks and fuzzies) because they can be more aggressive than other rodents and are so curious that they will approach a snake and initiate an attack.

Best of luck using up some of the leftovers,

mary v.

[17730turtlegirl]

Yes u can switch gerbils for mice, i did it with my snakes and they took to it right away.