black mouse

[pyythonboa]

brought a rat for my boa and two mice for my bp.the lady in the pet store ask me if my snakes is racist,i say no why she says one of the mice is black i say so and buys em.i get home and feeds my bp the white mouse first and then i feed my boa its rat.them i give my bp its second mouse the black one and she won't eat it.so i leave it in the tank over night,wake up mouse still there.so i give the mouse to my king snake to eat it trys to catch it but can't.my king just got off frozen food and this would have been its second live meal.so i give the mouse to my boa she ignores it,i think she was to full thats why.so now i feed my pet mouse socotese crackers in his own tank.

[Good 'N Plenty]

them i give my bp its second mouse the black one and she won't eat it.so i leave it in the tank over night,wake up mouse still there.so i give the mouse to my king snake to eat it trys to catch it but can't.my king just got off frozen food and this would have been its second live meal.so i give the mouse to my boa she ignores it,i think she was to full thats why.so now i feed my pet mouse socotese crackers in his own tank.

:eek::mad:
There are 2 sentences in this story that truly terrify me:

"so i leave it in the tank over night,wake up mouse still there.so i give the mouse to my king snake to eat it trys to catch it but can't."

You left a live mouse in a tank with your snake overnight????
http://bellsouthpwp.net/j/b/jbuncc/dont%20feed%20live1.JPG

That is what happened to a bp left with a live mouse in it's tank overnight (not my snake, not my picture)

Mouse bites snake to death - Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/3353107/Mouse-bites-snake-to-death.html)

This took all of 30 minutes, let alone 7+ hours.

Fine, I understand some snake won't eat F/T prey (most breeders don't sell a snake until it's had it's first meal/shed and many go F/T from the get-go, so you can almost always find a snake used to F/T if you look).
Still, some will insist certain snakes will only take F/T, and if the snake was raised on live prey from a neonate, sure, it can definitely be the case.
But even so... to leave a mouse in overnight is akin to rolling dice for it's life.

I have to step back and check this thread later. I'm so disgusted I may spout off something over the line. Back later

[Good 'N Plenty]

Back again, I'm sure I'll see more reason later

my king just got off frozen food and this would have been its second live meal.

Why would you train a snake OFF F/T??
If it was eating F/T, keep it that way! Live feeding can be done with low risk, F/T feeding can be done with no risk.

[siz]

Hmm...GNP beat me to it. Never, NEVER leave a live mouse in with your snake unattended. Not even for a minute, let alone overnight, 7, 8, 9 hours?! Didn't you already have an incident where a mouse bit your snake? Why are you trying to get all your snakes eating live? That is so ridiculous and IMHO quite irresponsible. It's a completely different thing if your snake won't take FT and will only take live but you are switching your snakes over?! I agree that feeding live is cool to watch but the "cool factor" should come after the safety of your animals. Not cool.:mad:

Also, if you plan on keeping that mouse as a pet, they need to eat more than crackers.

I honestly can't believe you would leave a live mouse in overnight with your BP.

[mary10]

all i can say is that poor snake in the pic and your snake is damn lucky it didnt end up like that one in the pic! i cannot understand for the life of me why anyone would choose to go to live prey when so many pray that there snakes will take or switch over to f/t. and i also agree if your keeping the mouse for a pet feed it properly..if your keeping the mouse until you figure that one of your snakes will eat it..feed it properly because its your snakes diet and it shoudl be healthy as possible! shakes head...nuff said.

[pyythonboa]

my bp is really big i feed her mice cause she kills rats but won't eat em i guess i kept her on mice so long she dont like the taste of rats or dont like to work as hard.i saw that pic of yours before and that snake was over night wit a rat.im not saying i was right but my snake compared to that mouse is like a handicap cat vs a pitbull prize fighter.as far as the king snake goes the feeding was supervised cause he is still a little small.didnt leave him unsupervised.yeah my boa got bite before shes my biggest snake so she eats jumbo rats and sometimes those rats fight back,now if i leave them unsupervised that would be crazy.my king have ate live once before he just gotta get that hunting thing down packed.only if i have baby snakes will they eat ft as soon as their old enuff live food and live food only.sorry just the way i do things.

[siz]

Errr I wrote out a response and it got erased...here's the short version.

Never, NEVER leave a live mouse in with your snake unattended.

It doesn't matter whether it was a jumbo rat or a mouse that did that to the snake in the picture, both can do damage. If you care about your snakes, ALWAYS, ALWAYS supervise live feedings. No exceptions. It doesn't matter how big your snake it, damage can still be done. Even if you are watching, an incident like that can happen too quickly for you to even intervine.
To compare your snake and the mouse to a "handicap cat vs a pitbull fighter" is a poor comparison..snakes are efficient predators and mice are prey, it's not some battle royale where you pit them together and hope your snake emerges the winner. If your snake decides to go off food or isn't interested in the mouse, it could easily get hurt or even die. And we all know BPs are notorious for going off food.
I have no problem at all with people feeding live, but you seem to just want to do it because it's cool to watch. Which it is, I suppose, but if you have any respect for your animals you should at the very least supervise them during feeding. WHY would you train your snakes off FT?? You say as soon as they are big enough you switch them...is there any reasoning behind this at all?

[Good 'N Plenty]

im not saying i was right[/qutote]
If you knew it was wrong, why do it? Making sure the $2 you spent on the mouse doesn't go to waste is not worth risking your snake's life

[quote]but my snake compared to that mouse is like a handicap cat vs a pitbull prize fighter.
1) Unecessary and thoughless stress on the snake. I'm bigger than most dogs but I wouldn't want to be left in a room with one that might attack me, even if the odds were not in it's favor to do so.
2) Scratches and scars hurt, even if the snake lives. Why risk even non-fatal injuries to your snake?
3) Good thing snakes never get tired or sleep. Even if BPs are more active at night, being in a state of stress is exhausting, regardless of what type of animal you are

yeah my boa got bite before shes my biggest snake so she eats jumbo rats and sometimes those rats fight back,now if i leave them unsupervised that would be crazy.
No less crazy than what you did. Mice will fight back too. They aren't as big or tough, but then again cat scratches aren't lethal to people either, but we still don't like em.

my king have ate live once before he just gotta get that hunting thing down packed.
Typos aside, I will offer up 1 word:
Instinct

1 a : a largely inheritable and unalterable tendency of an organism to make a complex and specific response to environmental stimuli without involving reason b : behavior that is mediated by reactions below the conscious level

Snakes aren't reared by their parents and taught how to hunt. They are born ready to go. There is no need to have a snake "practice" something it was born knowing.

only if i have baby snakes will they eat ft as soon as their old enuff live food and live food only.sorry just the way i do things.
You would voluntarily expose your snakes to additional risk.

I had some rather vehement last remarks on the notion of "just the way I do things" but I'll withold those prior to hearing the rationale for switching them off FT.