3mo boa vomited and now in water bowl

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

So your original question was I still overfeeding my snakes. When I recommend my feeding regime it's for pretty much every species. I've tested it out on boas, pythons, colubrids and since I own all three currently which one would you like to discuss?

So for me a 2500 gram animal is an adult ball python. why would I feed her a 50 gram rat once every 3 weeks?

If you want to strictly talk about boas we can do that. All of mine, from sonoran hypos to amazon tree boas, grow at a moderate rate. None have ever reached this obese state you speak of with 5 feet of growth in a year and are breeding. Even my males aren't breeding ready by year 1.

My female albino BI is pushing 6000 grams but she's about 7 years old now. She's fed on a 4 week schedule because her meals are 600 ish grams and well that's a fair sized meal so we space them out.

Now I can certainly see where your animals on your feeding regime would be gaining weight considering they hadn't eaten in what did you say? 4 months? Of course they'd put on weight if they never really drank water, ate or had adequate heating. You're lucky you have boas and not harder to keep species.

I will FOREVER disagree with your statement. I know a few boa breeders myself and they are completely different than you with great success over a long period of time. They also don't see animals get to 5 foot in a year or grow to this obese state you speak of.





I can't speak for other people specifically but what I can do is say maybe they weren't on this forum, maybe they didn't see your cry for help or maybe, like me, lived in a different country and didn't want to deal with CITES. The pics that were referenced were posts of yours with one of your 2 year old snakes in the palm of your hand and you thought it's growth was just fine. I won't get into your personal issues at this time because that's something people go through and sometimes we can't foresee how bad things get and are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

I figured if you were gonna ask me if I was underfeeding, I'd ask you if you were overfeeding. I haven't gotten an explanation as to what you consider successful when raising boas, I'm sure your boas are surviving just fine, and may breed for you just fine. But I'm not sure how long you've been keeping boas, or how old your oldest boa has been. Beyond the 10-15% rule, I haven't seen much of your feeding regimen. I do not view 10-15% as a universal rule, it seems dangerously close to power feeding to me. 10-15% (and as much as 20% or the occasional 30%) is fine for retics, but idk if I'd use it for bps. You're more experienced with that species than I am, so I'll trust your judgment on the beeps at least, I just don't like the idea of such large meals being the go-to regimen for every species as it's become over the past few years.

This thread was specifically on boa constrictors, and my experience lies mostly with boa constrictors. Ball pythons are not related or pertinent in this discussion, but I agree 50 grams is a little small for a 2,500 gram bp.

As for my boas, no, they went a total of 2.5 months without food. 4 months was actually the total amount of time they spent with my mother. The first 1.5-2 months of that time, I was going over to her house and feeding them when I was able to make the trip to feed them, but during the feeding days I couldn't make it out there, she wouldn't feed them for me. So, they skipped several feedings, and that still probably slowed down their growth as well.

At the time I also had 2 BRBs, 2 garters, a ball python, and a retic. She was giving them water at first, and spraying down their enclosures, so they weren't dehydrated for very long before I went and got them out of there. (Whereupon SD offered to care for my ball python, the albino garter, and my last remaining BRB.) She stopped watering them after she let Crona and Homura escape their tubs, and told me she'd refuse to take care of them any longer for me. Homura is gone, but she found Crona quickly and I still have him.

The growth I mentioned has seemed to be about the norm lately from what I've been seeing in boa groups. To be fair, historically, I've seen much better (slightly slower) growth in most boa breeders/keepers in the past. I have just been seeing more and more rapidly growing boas as of late, which could just simply be observational bias, but does still worry me such overfeeding has become the norm.

As far as the last bit in your reply, I posted ads on Tumblr and Facebook as well as on here. I mostly got comments along the lines of "if I was closer I'd help!" or just flat-out silence.

Which 2 year old snake are you referring to that could fit in my palm? I don't have a 2 year old snake that can fit in the palm of my hand, other than my eastern garter snake (who is almost 5 and supposed to be that small). My 2 year old anery motley boa male just turned 2 years last month, so he couldn't have been much over 1.5 years old when I posted those ads. He is more the size of my entire hand now. My only other 2 year old at that time/around that time was my hypo BRB, and she was larger than my entire hand. She is the same size as the average 2 year old of the breeder I bought her from, and when other BRB breeders commented on her size, they agreed she was about average-sized for them as well.

I suppose I could have made some posts on Fauna or something, but I didn't like the idea of making an account there at the time when I was ultimately able to squeeze the remaining snakes in at my current residence, and then being a bit downtrodden at the lack of help given on other sites. I don't know how fast those classifieds moved, so I was also worried it might take a long time to get any attention on my threads.

[TRD]

I think one shouldn't generalize feeding schedules ... individual snakes have individual metabolisms which depends on the animal and its environmental variables. One should target a healthy animal representing how it should look... if that can be reached with an 8% weight feeding every 3 weeks in animal A, and a 15% weight feeding every 2 weeks in animal B, and a 10% feeding every 7 days in animal C shouldn't matter.

I have some very active psammophids that are basking at temperatures of 115F and are very active, and milksnakes that wouldn't tolerate such temperatures. Obviously the milksnake can not have the amount of food that the psammophids are having because they'd get obese in no time... the psammophids' metabolism is just so much higher, and they are slim snakes to boot.

I do agree that many boids and pythons are grossly overfed in captivity. These snakes particularly are made for having a large prey sometimes, not small preys all the time. Their whole metabolic system is made for that..

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by TRD

I think one shouldn't generalize feeding schedules ... individual snakes have individual metabolisms which depends on the animal and its environmental variables. One should target a healthy animal representing how it should look... if that can be reached with an 8% weight feeding every 3 weeks in animal A, and a 15% weight feeding every 2 weeks in animal B, and a 10% feeding every 7 days in animal C shouldn't matter.

I have some very active psammophids that are basking at temperatures of 115F and are very active, and milksnakes that wouldn't tolerate such temperatures. Obviously the milksnake can not have the amount of food that the psammophids are having because they'd get obese in no time... the psammophids' metabolism is just so much higher, and they are slim snakes to boot.

I do agree that many boids and pythons are grossly overfed in captivity. These snakes particularly are made for having a large prey sometimes, not small preys all the time. Their whole metabolic system is made for that..

15% is beyond some of my snakes’ ability to physically swallow, such as my bp. 15% of his weight would be a 210 gram rat. The largest rat I ever gave him was 160-180 grams, and he struggled to get it down. He literally had to push against the wall to force it down his throat. He normally gets a 45-80 gram rat, and anything above that and he begins to refuse food. Those small rats are 3.2-5.7% of his weight. If I feed him mediums, he starts to refuse food after 2 mediums in a row, even when spaced out to 3 weeks.

10% seems to be pretty close to what I feed my young boas, but is on the larger side of what I’d consider acceptable, since even just 10% leaves a noticeable bulge. Each individual has their rate of metabolism, but I’m not sure that necessarily justifies a 15% meal for a boa constrictor.

A larger meal here and there is one thing, but when your normal feeder size is 10-15% (again talking boas here), it is too much food. I don’t consider my meals to be small, they are roughly the same size as the snake’s girth, making them a moderate sized meal. Not small, not large. My juveniles and subadults are allowed to have a slight noticeable bulge, but my adults generally do not have a bulge. Any meals I feed that are larger than normal is followed by a skipped feeding day, and then a smaller meal the next time they eat. A big meal here and there won’t harm them, it’s when you feed them the majority of the time that hidden fat deposits start forming, and their long term health starts to be affected.

[TRD]

Most snakes in captivity are heavily overfed, specifically boids/pythons, almost being kept on colubrid feeding schedules.... 10-15%/2-3 weeks... that's an incredible 260% of the snake's weight per year in feeders. While they need more food during growth, it's very bad to maintain them on such schedules.