Feeding Questions

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by shaunyboy

when us men get the cold.....

we are dying...

when we have the flu we're on deaths door

cheers shaun

P.S.and we need good women,to fill us hot bottles,change the tv channel,plump our pillows,etc,etc,etc,etc,etc,

We need good women so they can call our moms to do all that!

[Gungirl]

Lol... oh boy.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by Gungirl

Lol... oh boy.

Funniest cold medicine commercial EVER!

[Snakefood]

I WISH the moms came and took care of you guys!! in my experience, they just laugh and hang up the phone!!

[Aaron_S]

I just take care of myself

[Gungirl]

I have never once complained about caring for my man when he is sick. I rather enjoy it... being needed is awesome as long as it doesn't last more than a week tops.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by Gungirl

I have never once complained about caring for my man when he is sick. I rather enjoy it... being needed is awesome as long as it doesn't last more than a week tops.

Yeah I just got no one. I should train my daughter to.

[StudentoReptile]

Originally Posted by shaunyboy

imo theres no way anyone,would be fast enough to stop a rat biting the snake,should the snake grab the rat by the as*,ribs,etc

you would need to get your hand in and grab the rat in under a second,not even Bruce Lee was that quick mate

cheers shaun

But I assert...if the snake is healthy and hungry, there is no need to.

Sorry if I gave the impression that anyone can "intervene" quick enough to stop that. I apologize. I'll just explain what I do:

I open the enclosure and put the rat in. I'm mainly observing just to make sure it eats, because as I mentioned before, in my experience, if the snake doesn't catch it within 5 minutes or so, it probably isn't going to eat at all, and I'll remove the rodent.

I watch until the snake strikes and constricts. At that point, I know the snake has it under control and requires no further supervision from me. I walk away.

In 20 yrs of feeding live, I can count on one hand with fingers remaining how many times the prey bit the snake and actually drew blood. In those cases, the injury was minor and had practically healed on its own by the time of the next feeding. By the next shed, one couldn't even tell a bite had taken place.

[StudentoReptile]

Originally Posted by shaunyboy

as far as i can find out there is nothing to say,frozen prey is any LESS nutritional than live mate

Neither of I...just going by general knowledge of food preservation. It mainly depends on exactly how long the frozen rat has been sitting in your freezer. I wasn't really talking about the quality of frozen feeders while they are still frozen.

What I was referring to (go back and read the post) was during the process of thawing out the rodent. This isn't like thawing out a pre-cooked burger patty. You're basically taking a frozen dead animal, and laying it on the table to thaw. Some people stick it in warm water, others stick under a low wattage lamp. As I said before, there have been no studies this, but someone has to ask the question...what are you exposing that dead rat to during the thawing process? I mean...I dunno, does it start to decompose on the microscopic level somewhere? Are there some forms of bacteria that start proliferating on the rodent before you actually feed it to the snake?

That was what I was getting at.

[exwizard]

Reptile Student I agree with these points you've made. It has been my experience that live feeding is the way to go for me as long as it's supervised. I have never had an incident and my snakes prefer live.I'm not here to change anyone's mind. I'm just relaying what works for me.

[Wildside]

Just wanted to point out that it's October and he's a Ball Python.

[StudentoReptile]

Exwizard...Yeah, I do understand that for some people, frozen is a better option:
- it's more economical for them personally
- a significant other or housemate won't allow live feedings
- the aforementioned "better safe than sorry" mentality

That's fine, and I do acknowledge that; been there myself a few times.
--------------
My main point here is that aside from the above faction, there is a much larger demographic that is diametrically opposed to live feeding, usually for the wrong reasons. I was talking to someone on another forum who was having trouble with a new snake that was refusing F/T, and in her own words, she said feeding live was not an option, because she just couldn't handle it. I told her politely that there will be times when she will have snakes that refuse F/T and she will be forced to feed live. This is just part of keeping snakes; if she couldn't deal with that, then she probably should not be keeping snakes and should stick to other reptiles. I wasn't being harsh or belligerent, just laying it straight for her. For the record, the person did acknowledge this, and said between her and her boyfriend, they would feed the snake live if they needed to.

And that's not the first person I've encountered like that. There's this old woman in my area who will adamantly only keep snakes that eat F/T. If they refuse to eat f/t, she'll sell them or trade them off. Wasn't a matter of economics or safety...she just didn't like feeding live mice to snakes.

When I used to work at the pet shop, I don't care what anyone says; it is so difficult to explain to a new snake keeper how to properly thaw out frozen mice and feed them to your snake (Wildside can probably testify!). Unless they're herpers to begin with, it's like teaching someone Chinese. It is so much easier to sell them a live mouse, and tell them to go home, and drop in the cage, and watch to make to sure it eats it.

[Wildside]

More economical is the only reason I switched

[mykee]

Not sure if this is going to be a popular view, but I feed all of my babies live. My adults all eat f/t only due to the fact that I spent years culling out live feeders (removing, not killing). I can speak from a bit of experience with feeding live as I used to feed adults live and feed all my hatchlings their first three or four meals live.
My experience may be different from many of yours, but with regards to me feeding live rats, I am more concerned with raising up rats in my colonies that aren't chewers. They get culled (killed, not removed) I find that a calmer rat is less likley to be aggressive when in a snake bin. I've probably fed 10,000 live rats over 15 years, and not once, not one single time have I had an issue with biting or even scratching.
Regarding live mice, aside from my hatred of them, they can be a little nippier, but even then, a hungry baby ball python is no challenge for a mouse.
My experiences have been favourable, this is not everyones case though.

[shaunyboy]

Originally Posted by StudentoReptile

But I assert...if the snake is healthy and hungry, there is no need to.

Sorry if I gave the impression that anyone can "intervene" quick enough to stop that. I apologize. I'll just explain what I do:

I open the enclosure and put the rat in. I'm mainly observing just to make sure it eats, because as I mentioned before, in my experience, if the snake doesn't catch it within 5 minutes or so, it probably isn't going to eat at all, and I'll remove the rodent.

I watch until the snake strikes and constricts. At that point, I know the snake has it under control and requires no further supervision from me. I walk away.

In 20 yrs of feeding live, I can count on one hand with fingers remaining how many times the prey bit the snake and actually drew blood. In those cases, the injury was minor and had practically healed on its own by the time of the next feeding. By the next shed, one couldn't even tell a bite had taken place.

i was'nt having go mate,just a polite disagreement

i hear what your saying.....

i have novice keepers/newbies in mind when i post about live feeding...

i should have explained myself better as well mate

cheers shaun