Quote:
Originally Posted by Aaron_S
First off, what are you talking about? 10 - 15% if a bit too much? 5% is more adequate to you for a baby snake?
BSG you need to understand the life these animals live in the wild. They are small animals and prey to most things out there. The reason they are opportunistic feeders is not solely because they don't know when the next meal is it's also because they need substantial growth in the first two years.
Baby snakes in general have fantastic growth rates in the first year because they need to be able to defend themselves and sustain themselves with lesser food. An adult snake can better handle a year of starvation vs. a 200 gram animal.
We can't starve them because they are in captivity. We need to feed them adequately. It's why we feed them one meal a week or so instead of every 2 days.
Most ball pythons can "thrive" on a small rat every 2 weeks? Again you're out of your realm here. Ball pythons, especially breeding ones, need more substantial meals than that to produce viable eggs and not endanger their health.
My breeder males eat a small rat once a week once they can eat that size. My females get a medium a week. I've had snakes in my collection of both sexes that are no less than 15 - 18 years old (wild caught adults) who regularly produce eggs and have no ill effects. Not only my collection, but many other breeders who I consider close friends have the same age of animals. We can't all be doing it wrong with literally 10's of thousands of animals at this point.
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No, 8-10% is probably more than adequate. They don't have to be 1,000 grams at a year old, a slow grown snake is healthier than one growing too fast. I don't personally believe any species
has to be adult size by 2 years old, including ball pythons. Plenty of species stay tiny for a lot longer than that (granted I am more versed in boas and they can stay 3' or under for 4+ years in the wild).
I seriously doubt getting something barely under 10% of their weight, especially weekly, is anywhere near starving them. Colubrids with metabolisms several times higher than a baby ball python don't even need 10-15%, maybe 6-7% if they're a growing baby or a gravid female. So I find it hard to believe a slow-metabolism snake like a ball python, even a baby, requires that much food on a regular basis. It's a tried and true method so I'm not combatting it too much, but it's more than I'd feed my own bps.
I have seen breeders feed their breeding females small rats every 2 weeks, and get viable clutches with little to no difference in body tone to the female. Fattening them up right before becoming gravid does more harm than keeping them lean. (Gravid females are at an especially high risk for fatty liver disease.)
Granted, my bp isn't very big, but he went from 1,245 grams to just over 1,400 grams eating a single small rat every 2 weeks. If a small rat every 2 weeks was starving him, he would not have been able to gain his weight back after a fasting period (plus another odd 20-40 grams on top of his original healthy weight). Bps over 2,000 grams I might offer a medium every other feeding (or two), but I wouldn't make it a staple for one under 3,000 grams. They require a lot less food than you would think.
As far as the breeding, that would be different stroke for different folks. They don't require copious amounts of food when breeding, despite popular belief, a (healthy) gravid female doesn't use a significant amount of energy beyond what she would normally use, especially if she's eating throughout the gestation period.
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