And then there was 12

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

What does length have to do with weight of a prey item? Wouldn't it be best to weigh the snake and use a percentage of that to figure out what size meal to have? You can have a length-y "fat" build or a length-y "skinny" build, it's still relative to the weight of the prey item.

Personally I'd use about 15% of the body weight of the snake on a 3 week schedule.

No, because the older and bigger a boa gets the less food it should be eating. An adult boa eating 10-15% of its weight is eating more food than a baby eating 10-15% of their weight. This is taking into consideration a rat/rabbit 10-15% of an adult's weight is bigger compared to their girth, and adults have only a fraction of the metabolism of a baby. None of my adults get anything larger than a regular large rat (150-270 grams on average, no larger than 290 grams at the most). If they require rats any larger than that, I do a mix of larges and whatever size rabbit I deem necessary, but I'm not thinking I'll go with a rabbit over 1 lb even if I had a monster 8'-9' boa.

That means my 13.5 lb female is getting rats 2.4-4.7% of her weight. She has yet to be fed rabbits, but I'm thinking 1/2-1 lb rabbits every other feeding will be sufficient. I will have to tweak that as I see how her body tone does over an extended period of time. So the rabbits are 3.7-7.4% of her weight. She gets one of those every 4 weeks.

My 8.5-9 lb male gets the large rats and 4-10 ounce rabbits once every 4-5 weeks and is fasted 90 days each winter. At his lightest he's getting rats 3.9-7.5% and rabbits 2.9-7.4% of his weight. At his heaviest that's rats 3.7-7.1% and rabbits 2.8-6.9% of his weight.

Feeding an adult 15% of its weight every 3 weeks is a good way to obesity and fatty liver disease.

I do also want to add in the case of the smaller male, the rats are very close to his girth. A rat 15% of his weight could easily be 2-2.5x his girth. The rats are about 3/4 of the female's girth, and a full 1 lb rabbit would likely be about equal to or larger than her girth. A rat/rabbit 15% of her weight would easily be 1.5-2x her girth. Vin Russo says in his book that all meals should leave a barely noticeable lump. These size meals would leave a quite considerable bump.

Originally Posted by GyGbeetle

BSG: The boas were babies when they got big. Neither of them are even a year yet! They just really like to eat. So your suggestion of feeding babies every 7-10 days I think will be helpful. We have 3 more babies that we've been feeding every 7 days (all of our babies are fed every 7 days, so I don't know what happened with these 2. But they're leaning out now, on every 2 weeks feed, so that's good).

For the new one, Hennessy, I'm worried about throwing in a rabbit. Will she go back to rats once she gets a taste for the better stuff? I don't want to confuse her at all. She's had 1 feeding with us, and she took it like a champ, no regurg or issues. It was a jumbo rat, which is what her previous human claimed to be feeding her. Honestly, I don't think he really was. We picked her up from ... I can't even describe it. They smoked inside the house. She had no heat source. Her enclosure was filthy, and she was curled up in a spot in the this HUGE cage, almost in fear. Still angry about it. So I take what he said her feeding schedule was with a grain of salt. All I can control is what we give her moving forward.

I just found a good online rat source. Do you know of a good online rabbit source?

Actually, I advised 10-14, the usual advise is 7-10 days, but I feel that's too often for a baby.

I get my rabbits for free from my father, so unfortunately I do not have an online source to share. Layne Labs sells rabbits, but their shipping is cost-prohibitive for me (I live on the opposite coast), I'm not sure what it would be like for you. Rodent Pro also sells them, but I'm leery about using or advising them.

[Skipper7]

Beetle- Are there any small weekly animal expos or small farms near your house? Generally either of these would have someone willing to sell you rabbits. Unfortunately, they would probably be live.

BSG- Why don't you reccomend RodentPro?

[GyGbeetle]

Originally Posted by Skipper7

Beetle- Are there any small weekly animal expos or small farms near your house? Generally either of these would have someone willing to sell you rabbits. Unfortunately, they would probably be live.

BSG- Why don't you reccomend RodentPro?

We have a few shows, but I'm cautious about going to those shows, because the last show we went to, we brought home mites. So unless I'm willing to strip down in the garage, and go immediately into the shower when getting into the house (and most likely we will be taking kids to these things), I try to limit going now because I don't know how we brought home the mites (maybe in my hair? I just don't know, and do not want to go through this again). I will ask my husband to look around for a local resource. He's fine with handling live; I'm not. The sounds they make, and death hugs from the snakes, I just can't do it.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by bigsnakegirl785

No, because the older and bigger a boa gets the less food it should be eating. An adult boa eating 10-15% of its weight is eating more food than a baby eating 10-15% of their weight. This is taking into consideration a rat/rabbit 10-15% of an adult's weight is bigger compared to their girth, and adults have only a fraction of the metabolism of a baby. None of my adults get anything larger than a regular large rat (150-270 grams on average, no larger than 290 grams at the most). If they require rats any larger than that, I do a mix of larges and whatever size rabbit I deem necessary, but I'm not thinking I'll go with a rabbit over 1 lb even if I had a monster 8'-9' boa.

That means my 13.5 lb female is getting rats 2.4-4.7% of her weight. She has yet to be fed rabbits, but I'm thinking 1/2-1 lb rabbits every other feeding will be sufficient. I will have to tweak that as I see how her body tone does over an extended period of time. So the rabbits are 3.7-7.4% of her weight. She gets one of those every 4 weeks.

My 8.5-9 lb male gets the large rats and 4-10 ounce rabbits once every 4-5 weeks and is fasted 90 days each winter. At his lightest he's getting rats 3.9-7.5% and rabbits 2.9-7.4% of his weight. At his heaviest that's rats 3.7-7.1% and rabbits 2.8-6.9% of his weight.

Feeding an adult 15% of its weight every 3 weeks is a good way to obesity and fatty liver disease.

I do also want to add in the case of the smaller male, the rats are very close to his girth. A rat 15% of his weight could easily be 2-2.5x his girth. The rats are about 3/4 of the female's girth, and a full 1 lb rabbit would likely be about equal to or larger than her girth. A rat/rabbit 15% of her weight would easily be 1.5-2x her girth. Vin Russo says in his book that all meals should leave a barely noticeable lump. These size meals would leave a quite considerable bump...

That's a lot of words for not answering my question. I asked, what does length have to do weight of a prey item? You went through a lot of numbers and explanation that didn't prove your original fact.

For the record, I made a recommendation for this specific snake, not your well taken care of since birth snakes. That is why I went with a 15% weight of prey item every 3 weeks. That's a regime I'd begin with and then move further out. There's also a possibility this snake may be bred which is why I'd want a little more weight on her now and then slide back her feeding amount/frequency.

I do not like leaving large lumps in my snakes either so I'd trim down to a 10% food item to avoid that.

[GyGbeetle]

So I just picked up a boaphile 3' x 2' x 18" cage today, along with a 6' long monster of a boaphile cage (to be used for one of our large babies). The only issue is that the top of the cage is net, not solid, but it's all enclosed. I'm bordering on whether I should use this, or still purchase an Animal Plastics cage for the CRB. I'm going to try and purchase the snake this weekend, and ask if they'll hold her for a couple of weeks while we figure it out. He's done it for other customers, and we've spent about $10,000 of product since June of last year in his store, so I'm thinking he won't mind. Assuming she's still there.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Skipper7

Beetle- Are there any small weekly animal expos or small farms near your house? Generally either of these would have someone willing to sell you rabbits. Unfortunately, they would probably be live.

BSG- Why don't you reccomend RodentPro?

Because of low quality feeders and zoonotic outbreaks. Even if they never happened, you can never be too careful, and there's been multiple reports over the years.

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

That's a lot of words for not answering my question. I asked, what does length have to do weight of a prey item? You went through a lot of numbers and explanation that didn't prove your original fact.

For the record, I made a recommendation for this specific snake, not your well taken care of since birth snakes. That is why I went with a 15% weight of prey item every 3 weeks. That's a regime I'd begin with and then move further out. There's also a possibility this snake may be bred which is why I'd want a little more weight on her now and then slide back her feeding amount/frequency.

I do not like leaving large lumps in my snakes either so I'd trim down to a 10% food item to avoid that.

I had re-read the thread because I had no clue what you were referring to.

The length is important because a boa that's over 7' starts getting too big for a regular large rat by itself to be an adequate meal by itself. By 8' a mix of rabbits becomes almost a necessity just because of the sheer size of the snake. As a snake grows, so does its food size, so I just assumed anyone reading would have been able to apply that knowledge to my reply.

Once a boa reaches 6', I've found that the increase in prey size can be measured by the foot with maybe a little adjustment made for the individual if they show to have a particularly fast or slow metabolism. Whatever helps them to maintain a healthy body shape. I figured knowing the snake's length would give me a good idea of the size and a good place to start with prey size, so that it would be easier to adjust to the snake's needs if necessary.

I provided the numbers in an attempt to show why length was important. My smaller male gets smaller rabbits and my bigger female gets bigger rabbits, but both get the same size rats simply because I do not trust the fat content in retired breeders. So that's why there's a discrepancy there.

Even a female being bred doesn't need to be pumped full of food to breed - in fact, building up fat reserves is what kills females or contributes to failed litters. You don't want fat, you want strong muscle mass, which can be achieved by just feeding them like you normally would and offering chances for exercise. If you did increase feeding before breeding, I wouldn't do it by much. Maybe a week more frequent or a slightly bigger meal while courting, but 10-15% is a huge jump to make from what they should be eating normally, that's double or more the size of what I feed mine. My proven jungle had a perfect litter (no stillborns or slugs) at only 9 lbs, I think she was around 7.5 lbs after giving birth. They key was that she was mature and muscly, not built up for breeding. If the snake was emaciated, I would advise a slightly different feeding schedule, but a slightly underweight snake should do fine on a similar schedule. The meals don't have to be quite as small as mine while the snake needs to gain weight, but even in a case like that I believe 10-15% to still be too much. You want a slow, steady weight gain so as not to flood their system.

Also, I'm fairly sure GyBeetle has addressed they do not want their husband breeding the boas, so I think it's safe to assume that for the time being these females will not bred, at the moment anyways.

[GyGbeetle]

BSG: none of our females are ready to breed, so we're safe this breeding season. I'm going to try and find a good rabbit resource. But I'm worried about switching them from rabbit to rat. Has that been an issue in your experience?

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by GyGbeetle

BSG: none of our females are ready to breed, so we're safe this breeding season. I'm going to try and find a good rabbit resource. But I'm worried about switching them from rabbit to rat. Has that been an issue in your experience?

Nope, boa constrictors are garbage disposals. Which is both good and bad, they're easy to feed, but that means it's easy for people to overfeed them.

I wouldn't go to just rabbits, I'd still give rats every other feeding. Rabbits are nutrient-dense and even though they're lean on fat, they can still get chubby on them very quickly. If you fed just rabbits I'd go more to every 6-8 weeks. I only feed my rabbits as often as I do because I try to keep them about equal to rat size, and I feed a rat every other feeding. I don't start them on rabbits until they're at least big enough to eat rabbits that are fully mobile so they're either weaned or close to it, so 6'+.

[GyGbeetle]

Originally Posted by bigsnakegirl785

Nope, boa constrictors are garbage disposals. Which is both good and bad, they're easy to feed, but that means it's easy for people to overfeed them.

I wouldn't go to just rabbits, I'd still give rats every other feeding. Rabbits are nutrient-dense and even though they're lean on fat, they can still get chubby on them very quickly. If you fed just rabbits I'd go more to every 6-8 weeks. I only feed my rabbits as often as I do because I try to keep them about equal to rat size, and I feed a rat every other feeding. I don't start them on rabbits until they're at least big enough to eat rabbits that are fully mobile so they're either weaned or close to it, so 6'+.

I only have 2 that are this size; Fang and Hennessy (the new girl). Edward and Bella both aren't yet a year old. Fang I'm worried about; he was eating every 2-3 weeks before we started babysitting. We switched him to every week, then went back down to 2-3 weeks. But I can feel some fatty lumps going up him. He's leaned out quite a bit, and we try to exercise him often. He had these "lumps" when we first started to babysit. I don't know if that's just his skin, or if it's something to be concerned with. Since all of our other boas are babies, I have nothing to compare it to.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by bigsnakegirl785

...I had re-read the thread because I had no clue what you were referring to.

The length is important because a boa that's over 7' starts getting too big for a regular large rat by itself to be an adequate meal by itself. By 8' a mix of rabbits becomes almost a necessity just because of the sheer size of the snake. As a snake grows, so does its food size, so I just assumed anyone reading would have been able to apply that knowledge to my reply....

Interesting....you use length of the animal and then determine the correct WEIGHT of the prey item off that. You understand you're using two different units of measurement and trying to correlate them correct?

Length has nothing to do with prey item in my eyes. It's about weight of the animal versus weight of the prey item. There's exceptions to every rule and sometimes you need to make adjustments for specific animals or prey items, etc. (I added the disclaimer because someone will come and tell me about their ONE animal)

I won't be responding to any more of this, only because it will become circular at this point.

Originally Posted by GyGbeetle

BSG: none of our females are ready to breed, so we're safe this breeding season. I'm going to try and find a good rabbit resource. But I'm worried about switching them from rabbit to rat. Has that been an issue in your experience?

Boas are beasts when it comes to food. I don't expect you should encounter any issues switching.

[GyGbeetle]

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

Boas are beasts when it comes to food. I don't expect you should encounter any issues switching.

good to know! I did have a picky boa baby at one point, but she didn't survive, sadly So I'm hypervigilant now whenever there's even a slight issue with feeding. One of our latest babies regurged her first 2 meals with us back in November, which terrified me. But everyone has been on a steady feeding schedule, with no issues ever since.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by GyGbeetle

I only have 2 that are this size; Fang and Hennessy (the new girl). Edward and Bella both aren't yet a year old. Fang I'm worried about; he was eating every 2-3 weeks before we started babysitting. We switched him to every week, then went back down to 2-3 weeks. But I can feel some fatty lumps going up him. He's leaned out quite a bit, and we try to exercise him often. He had these "lumps" when we first started to babysit. I don't know if that's just his skin, or if it's something to be concerned with. Since all of our other boas are babies, I have nothing to compare it to.

I think once they get them, they never go away. I unknowingly power fed my first boa, and even 3 years later he still has those fatty balls down his sides. As long as the boa is healthy now, I wouldn't worry too much about it I don't think, since it's been there for a while.

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

Interesting....you use length of the animal and then determine the correct WEIGHT of the prey item off that. You understand you're using two different units of measurement and trying to correlate them correct?

Length has nothing to do with prey item in my eyes. It's about weight of the animal versus weight of the prey item. There's exceptions to every rule and sometimes you need to make adjustments for specific animals or prey items, etc. (I added the disclaimer because someone will come and tell me about their ONE animal)

I won't be responding to any more of this, only because it will become circular at this point.

Boas are beasts when it comes to food. I don't expect you should encounter any issues switching.

It's...actually not? The only ones I do by weight are my rabbits, and that's because I get them from my father. How else am I supposed to size them? I can't just walk up to him and ask, "Hey can I get an xx-small rabbit?" He wouldn't know what I meant, and I don't know how old a rabbit is to get to a certain size. So, going by weight is the easiest method.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by bigsnakegirl785

... If she's under 7' I wouldn't go over maybe 9-10 ounces. If she's around 7' I wouldn't go above 1 lb, and 1/2 or slightly larger may be better. ...

Originally Posted by bigsnakegirl785

...It's...actually not? The only ones I do by weight are my rabbits, and that's because I get them from my father. How else am I supposed to size them? I can't just walk up to him and ask, "Hey can I get an xx-small rabbit?" He wouldn't know what I meant, and I don't know how old a rabbit is to get to a certain size. So, going by weight is the easiest method.

I quoted both so you knew where I was getting my information from. Your first quote is using length to measure the weight of the prey size of rabbits. Your second quote is taking that back...

Why use length to determine weight/size of prey items?

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

I quoted both so you knew where I was getting my information from. Your first quote is using length to measure the weight of the prey size of rabbits. Your second quote is taking that back...

Why use length to determine weight/size of prey items?

I'm saying that because that's the size of prey I am feeding my 7' female, and I am using those weights because that size of rabbit is roughly equal to her girth or smaller. It's literally just like saying "feed this size of snake a small rat etc." I'm just using a weight range instead of the size name.

A 7' boa will roughly have the girth to accommodate the size of rabbit that is between x and y weight, while a 6' boa will roughly have the girth to accommodate the size of z and x weight. If they have the girth to eat something larger without getting a bulge, chances are they're overweight and the smaller prey size would still be appropriate.

If you reaaaally wanted to insist on a weight-based method, adult boas should be getting no more than 5-7% of their weight monthly on average (a little more or less every once in awhile is fine). This includes slightly underweight and overweight/obese snakes. Emaciated snakes would require much smaller meals more frequently with the prey size and frequency moving up and out until they put on weight.

Unfortunately a weight-based method would still have a grossly overweight/obese snake eating far too large of meals, and would not facilitate weight loss in the same way feeding a set prey size for x size snake would. Or an underweight/emaciated snake eating too large of meals.