What a meal-size should be..... - Page 2

Jayson · 09-13-03, 08:50 AM

This summer i found a northern water snake in my back yard that had just finished eating a meal, it was just a juvenil but it had ate a meal that had to have been very close to his own body wait as he could barely even move.
My point is, that snakes can and do eat meals much bigger then most people think.

Cool pics!! Its always nice to see a snake with a full belly

Jason

Lisa · 09-13-03, 01:53 PM

I like to vary the meals, some big some medium once in a while a small one. also i tend to vary the frequency, some times once a week sometimes more for the colubrids, some times everyone has to wait a week. Waiting a week for a regular feeder won't hurt them, specially if we're going to a show the day or 2 after the feeding night, we made the mistake of feeding 2 days before ONCE, it was a real downer.

eyespy · 09-13-03, 02:26 PM

I agree that most folks do tend to underfeed and it's great to see snakes with a nice full belly for a change. Just remember though that skulls and pelvises are large masses of bone and can be tough to digest so don't get crazy with the really large prey items. Snakes are frequently brought in for bowel resection because of large bones they couldn't either digest or pass that get moved too far downstream as the proteins and other structures are digested.

Dozer · 09-13-03, 04:20 PM

I think my most wild eatin' story was not of a snake, but of my Green frogs that live in my mothers pond in the backyard... I've got pics, but this frog took down a sparrow... I'm not jokin', the bird was pretty much ALMOST the size of the frog... I'm not jokin', I'll post some pictures up... I've seen the frogs also lunge into the water at my moms koi... which are twice the size of the frog or more! I know this has nothin' to do with the actual original thread, but I thaught I'd add it for general interest

sapphire_moon · 09-13-03, 04:55 PM

My female BP still looks like she just ate.....a little smaller, but not a whole lot....except the "Bump" has moved closer to her tail. Should I be worried?? She also absolutely refuses to go and stay on her warm hide! Should I put her in something (like a bowl) and put her partly over the warm side and partly off of the warm side? so she will still have a little bit of a choice of how warm to be..?

Invictus · 09-13-03, 06:56 PM

What the hell, here's another pic of a large prey item (I've posted it before, but I think it's a great illustration of how flexible they are):