Boa feeding...your opinions?

[FluffyGerbil]

Juniper is my first Red Tail. I've worked with most popular colubrids and ball pythons. I decided I would try my hand at larger snakes by raising a boa (love the breed, hope to get another boa in the future). I've had her since June of 2013, and got her at around two months of age. I guess that makes her 16 months old?...but I suck at math in my head haha ^ ^

I'm feeding her at least once every seven days, more if I happen to come across an extra mouse in the freezer. But in general, she consumes one small or medium rat (very occasionally a fairly large rat, for her size) of around at least 40 or 50 grams. Last time I weighed the snake--probably two months ago--she was about 2 1/2 or 3 lbs, can't remember which. She's a little over 4 feet long. I don't like to feed her anything much bigger than her own girth and certainly don't agree with power feeding.

I know obesity is a big deal with Red tail boas. I've asked a few people when they thought was the appropriate time to switch from one feeding a week to one feeding every other week, since I don't plan on breeding her. Some said at one year, some at two...but I thought a year would be a bit too young and they still have too much growing to get done. I was planning on gradually switching her over to once every other week when she hits 2 years old. What do you guys think? Any advice? Thanks!

[Dan84]

One recommendation for feeding is to offer prey that is 10-15% of the snakes weight. So if your boa is 2.5-3lbs or 1,100-1,300 grams, then you should be fine with medium rats weighing between 110-180g. After about a year, many people suggest feeding every ten days.

[Ddub]

Sounds like you have the prey size down. For frequency you can start to scale back around a year. If you're perceptive enough you'll start to see clues that she's hungry. I like to let those behaviors guide my feeding frequency but that's my preference. Some like schedules. At any rate, by the time a boa hits small or medium rats, weekly feedings IMO are too much.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by Dan84

One recommendation for feeding is to offer prey that is 10-15% of the snakes weight. So if your boa is 2.5-3lbs or 1,100-1,300 grams, then you should be fine with medium rats weighing between 110-180g. After about a year, many people suggest feeding every ten days.

Beautiful post. It's exactly how I feed my animals and how I recommend others to as well.

10 days would suffice if you upped the size of prey.