How much do your ball pythons weight this year?

[Piebald Guy]

Shappire,

Yes it will grow longer (until it reaches it's max genetic length). Shouldn't get fat. If you are feeding one small or medium rat every 3-4days no prob. If its as big as the animal could phycially choke down (like a 450 gram rat, lol) every 3 then yes you have a problem. Snakes are not like dogs, they will not eat, barf it up and go right back to eating more, barfing it up, right back to eating more, until the food is gone. They are more like cats, they eat until they are satisfied then that is it. Can't make them eat you know (sans force feeding, but if you force feed a heathy and feeding snake just to add more weight you should be shot).

Like Jeff F. said, feed 'em as much as they'll take. Just keep them warm.

BTW my "problem feeder" (live only) female just ate another 142 gram F/T rat. Anouther animal gaining good weight. 400+ grams in extra body weight in the last 19 days.

Dave

[sapphire_moon]

Ok well she just ate her last two adult mice, and I've tried her on a small (I think thats what it was) rat, and she ate that......So another question I have is am I correct that the females get bigger than the males? Is it always like that or can the males get bigger than a female?

[Piebald Guy]

Females will grow larger then males typically. It all depends on genetics. Sure I guess there is a chance you could compare a runt, problem feeding female to a good eating male but in general, the females will be larger. Remember the female lays the eggs. Have you seen ball eggs? They are HUGE! and if she needs to lay 12 of them (1500g) and lose half her body weight, you can see why the females are larger.

Dave

Re-check your measurements. They are REALLY out to lunch. 7.5" wide is near the size of a burm! Maybe a REALLY fat blood. No where near what a ball can get to. Get a tape measure, meaure two feet, wrap it in a circle. Is this the size of your ball python? If so, yep she's 7.5" wide (highly doubt it though, not tring to dump on you in anyway, just want you to think about what you say before you say it, if you are under the age of majority I'm sorry, that's a skill that takes a few years to develop after that).

[fanmaninacan]

I thought power feeding snakes is when u force feed em more then they acctually want to eat....

But ur ur ball is just takeing alot of food...
Then ist that a good thing.......


T.P

[Piebald Guy]

No, power feeding is just an expression for feeding the snake more than what "the norm" is considered (7-10 days is the popular misconception for an adult). Force feeding is if I take the rat, kill it, grab my snake that doesn't feel like eating because I fed it yesterday, open its mouth and start cramming the rat down its throat, let it go and see if it swallows. If it doesn't grab the snake, grab the dead rat, open the snakes mouth...... or worse, put a nice big rat in a blender, hit puree and listen to the bones snap!!! suck it up with a nice big syringe, install the 18" tube, open the snakes mouth, ram the tube down the snakes throat and push the ratty goodness into the snake's stomach.

That sounds really, really bad but it is actually what you do in a graphic, biased view when your hatchling won't eat. I would be sick but not surprised if someone ever did it to a healthy eating snake though.

Dave

[TardGirl]

Sorry i just must have said it wrong, She is 7" in. Around her body, like you know wrapping my hands around her, thats what i was trying to say but said it wrong, Sorry

[remsin76]

PIED Ball guy...

so how old is your snakes?
how muhc does he weight?
and how long is he?????

[Piebald Guy]

Age= unknown (I am assuming this year's CH stock from Africa, first shipments)

Purchased on July 6/03 at 341 grams and 1.5' in length. Diameter was 3/4" at mid-body. Ate mice.

July 16/03- Has eaten 5 live rat pups (between 27 and 55 grams) and weighs 544 grams. Length is up to near 2' and diameter is an incredible 1.5". She has doubled her girth (temporary) and over half her body weight.


Not bad but my adult "problem feeding" (live only) female hit AGAIN last night taking her total to 6 medium F/T rats in three weeks. She hits them within 5 seconds of approching her and she takes them right off the tongs. So she has grown from under 1300 grams to over 1700 grams in three weeks(after defications).

Not bad!! Testomony to Mark Mandic's rack design. It produces eating machines. I use it for hatchlings right up to adults. I don't even use a hide box. Every CH or CB animal I have prefers hiding underneath the newspaper. All my w/c's use hide boxes.

Dave