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All our snakes are under 3 years of age and the oldest are around 1,200 each just from eating rats for the entire time of having them. And when I do up their feeding size they definitely show a big spurt of growth. They grow up so fast :')
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Thx for posting chris. I would like to see the nutritional values compared when rats outgrow their mice equivalents. For example, what are the nutritional differences between, one medium rat and two large mice or one large rat and two or three xl mice?
The growth of ball python after four months would still show a huge difference in size. I have fed female balls exclusively mice and they take a LONG time to get to size (years longer than rat-fed females).
Youre saying, you have fed female balls a similar amount of mice (as in same weight of food overall per feeding) and they took longer to grow to adult size than those fed a similar amount of rats? While interesting, even if that were true I suppose that would only matter in the end to a breeder like yourself. For a normal keeper, it shouldnt matter in the least, especially when talking about a male snake. I think there is actually a more common problem of power feeding snakes to get them big as fast as possible, than there is a problem of slow growth, especially when it regards their health.
Sorry Chris, I hope you didnt think I was meaning to start a brawl or anything. That was definitely not my intention. I was merely wanting to show that there is still a lot of information beyond what you are showing here that makes it perfectly reasonable to feed either prey in a very healthy way. My post was an attempt to try to make the choice between mice and rats a more even playing field in light of your rather one sided evidence.
Incidentally, what problem are you referring to where a newbie killed their snake? Was it simply not feeding it enough?
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The plural of anecdote is not data
Thx for posting chris. I would like to see the nutritional values compared when rats outgrow their mice equivalents. For example, what are the nutritional differences between, one medium rat and two large mice or one large rat and two or three xl mice?
Good question. The link Shaun supplied shows the details.
From the perspective of micro nutrients there is more of a balance. From the perspective of macro nutrients there is actually a greater differance.
More specifically a drop in ash and statistically significant increase in fat and protien percentages.
Gram for gram you are going to get even more with an adult rat v a sub adult rat. Where we know that fat and protien has 9cal/g and 4cal/g respectively we are now providing an appreciable increase in calories per gram (adult rat) v the same number of grams in mouse feed.
Protien goes to 61.8% (v mouse @55.8)
Fat go to 32.6%. (v mouse @ 23.6)
Both an increase over the Jeuvenille rat used in the original comparison.
The higher protien will help to further support increased growth, tissue repair and basis physical maintenance. The higher fat content provides a very calorically dense fuel source per gram.
This is likely why we see long established breeders (see:Mykee) pick rats as the snake snack of choice. (Especially with females around breeding time)
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1.1 Us (Chris & Heather)
0.1 Yellow Naped Amazon Parrot
9.80+ Various Ball Pythons (give or take)
Rabbits are even better
Nice little write up. Cost of prey is a big consideration.
I never feed mice. When the snake gets big it would cost a fortune if they were stuck on mice.
Ooops I just saw this was in the ball python section. Sorry. I guess rabbit is not a likely choice.
Rabbits are even better
Nice little write up. Cost of prey is a big consideration.
I never feed mice. When the snake gets big it would cost a fortune if they were stuck on mice.
Ooops I just saw this was in the ball python section. Sorry. I guess rabbit is not a likely choice.
I noticed rabbit is better choice nutritionally. According to the chart a 1 lb rabbit is = to an XL-Rat. (Big females can get up to 5000g so N.P.) not sure if anyone is doing that. Couldn't hurt I suppose. My lemon blast, Olympia, hits food items like the rat stole her car. (Pissed) when she grows up I'm sure if I let a small rabbit sleep on bedding that smelled like rats... It would be a short story.
No reason to I guess.
__________________
1.1 Us (Chris & Heather)
0.1 Yellow Naped Amazon Parrot
9.80+ Various Ball Pythons (give or take)
I noticed rabbit is better choice nutritionally. According to the chart a 1 lb rabbit is = to an XL-Rat. (Big females can get up to 5000g so N.P.) not sure if anyone is doing that. Couldn't hurt I suppose. My lemon blast, Olympia, hits food items like the rat stole her car. (Pissed) when she grows up I'm sure if I let a small rabbit sleep on bedding that smelled like rats... It would be a short story.
No reason to I guess.
A female what weighs up to 5,000g?
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I used to be a nice guy but that don't get you anywhere. So now I'm just a piece of ****, idiot,
who's too stupid to care.
I noticed rabbit is better choice nutritionally. According to the chart a 1 lb rabbit is = to an XL-Rat. (Big females can get up to 5000g so N.P.) not sure if anyone is doing that. Couldn't hurt I suppose. My lemon blast, Olympia, hits food items like the rat stole her car. (Pissed) when she grows up I'm sure if I let a small rabbit sleep on bedding that smelled like rats... It would be a short story.
No reason to I guess.
Again, what makes you say that?
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The plural of anecdote is not data
Rabbit has great protien with low fat. If you look it up like I did you realize how much better it is compared to beef,pork,chicken or turkey for humans too. This is why we eat it weekly now. It's an awesome meat period.
Have you seen this? This snake could eat a bunny. Not normal in size but not a typo by Chris.
Yup. It was indeed the Grundy's snake I was thinking of. I think it's roughly 5500 these days. (I wonder if there is a little blood python mixed into that girl to get her over 5kg.
From a food item perspective: they don't eat rabbit in the wild so that's why I said there is no reason. It "feels" like it makes sense for a large, older, snake as the macro nutrient makeup seems to be a better fit for an older animal with (perhaps) a slowing metabolism. Just like with people I suppose.
But if they needed rabbit as established adults they would change their diet to include a large amount if rabbit. Lots of animals modify their diet with age....ball pythons on the wild don't really. They keep eating mostly rats.
That's why I thought there is no reason to feed rabbit to a large female. If they needed what rabbit has to offer they would hunt lots of rabbit.
__________________
1.1 Us (Chris & Heather)
0.1 Yellow Naped Amazon Parrot
9.80+ Various Ball Pythons (give or take)
They grow up so fast :')
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