what size mouse is right?

[smrts1080]

I have a gopher snake she's about 2 and a half years old, 5 foot long and silver dollar size around at her thickest.
about 6 months ago I tried moving her to XL mice about 50-60g each as she was eating two large mice that are 25-30g each. she stopped eating them, I tried moving back to large mice she only took them intermitantly. I have now gone back all the way to feeding pinkies, she took them rapidly, moved up and up now back to small mice and she is eating 5-6 mice in a meal at 10g each. should I just try to move back to feeding two large mice or stick with feeding the small ones. is there a good way to make sure she will take larger mice?

[EL Ziggy]

Have you tried offering her rats? I can't imagine feeding 5 mice when one rat will do. It's tough but I starve my snakes out when they go off feed. Keep offering appropriately sized prey items every 10-14 days until she's back on track. The hunger always wins in the end.

[Scubadiver59]

Welcome to sSNAKESs!

Some here will feed by weight, some will feed one large meal (1.5x largest width of the snake) and some, like me, will feed mice/rats the same size as the largest width of the snake, or even a little bit smaller, and will feed multiple mice/rats.

So far it sounds like your snake is saying what it wants, so keep with it, trying larger prey as the snake grows, or else be prepared to waste larger prey it won't take.

And as far as I'm concerned, I move my all my snakes to rats as soon as they are able to take rat pinkies/pups...it makes ordering easier not having to order different prey, and the snake will be used to the taste as I move up in size and not have to graduate from the taste of mice to rats. If your snake is eating large mice, I'd try scenting some rat pinkies with mice and then if it takes them, move up to rat fuzzies or weaned rats (same size as a large mouse).

[smrts1080]

ok, thanks. any tips on getting her to eat eggs. I have heard that chicken farmers have trouble with gopher snakes stealing eggs and I have tried dropping quail eggs in the tank and she just treats it like a rock.
I really want to see in person the crunching and regurgitation of the shell.

[smrts1080]

also what are the numbers before the type of snake in your signature line?

[TRD]

Originally Posted by smrts1080

also what are the numbers before the type of snake in your signature line?

x.x.x

male.female.unknown in quantity

f.e.

3.5.1 L. g. californiae

means that I have 9 Lampropeltis getula californiae (or Cali Kingsnakes) and out of those 3 are male, 5 are female, and 1 is of unknown sex. If there are none of unknown sex people omit that number and then just write the number of males and females.