Once easy-to-feed BP on a feeding strike?

[citysnakes]

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

Has the whole nutritional value not been mentioned?

yes, those two words have been mentioned but no, the specific nutritional values of mice and rats have not been mentioned at all. we also dont know what a ball python's exact nutritional requirements really are. so saying "this is better than that" or "its more convenient to do this" arent opinions that im just going to jump on.

whatever, i feed my balls rats anyways and like the convenience of feeding one appropriately sized meal per week. it works for me and my animals and many other keepers as well but other methods, that we many find inconvenient, work for many others and their animals.

[Aaron_S]

So wait, you're not going to 'jump on' the opinion that it's more convient to feed a single prey time but you admit that that's why you like to do it? So you agree then.

I do not have a chart to compare the two. Snakes grown on mice vs. rats in my own experience tend to be slower growing. (Not including snakes that only get large enough to eat mice) I have no factual data to back that up, it is merely opinion from my own observations.

I tend to find that some people use a more "inconvient" method to feed their animals when they only have a couple of them. They usually use a specific method because they have the time to devote to it. For example some people remove their snakes from their "normal" enclosure and feed them in a seperate enclosure. People who keep more than say a dozen snakes, normally leave them in the "normal" enclosure. It's just a whole lot easier.

[citysnakes]

sure, if thats what you want to believe but thats not what i said.

this thread is has gone way off topic and a new one should be started if this is to be discussed further. have your own opinions and do whatever works for you and you animals. thats all i gotta say.

[Chu'Wuti]

I'll try here Siz.

Feeding rats is just better.

Has the whole nutritional value not been mentioned?

Yes, it has been mentioned, and the first answer is . . . ahem . . . a cop-out.

Come on, guys--I'm trying to learn something here. Feeding rats is better. Why? Because they are more nutritious. OK. I'll bite and ask the question that to you has an obvious answer--Why are rats more nutritious than mice? They are both small rodents, fairly closely related . . . what about rats makes them more nutritious than mice?

I tried to speculate as to a possible reason why earlier when talking about surface area of less nutritional value (hair versus meat). But I don't really know that that's the reason--and I'd really like to know the reason.

I'm willing to take your word that rats are better, and I've ordered rat pinkies to see if that'll help my BP make the switch, as he apparently wasn't happy with rat pups, I think--oops, that's anthromorphizing--he refused to eat rat pups over the past month.

Simply put, I'm genuinely curious about the "why" rats are more nutritious!

[siz]

Originally Posted by Chu'Wuti

Simply put, I'm genuinely curious about the "why" rats are more nutritious!

Exactly my question Chu'Wuti

[Chu'Wuti]

OK, I just did some research on this. The most recent article I was able to find (real research article) is published here:

http://www.nal.usda.gov/awic/zoo/Who...nal02May29.pdf

Unfortunately, that article was published in 2002, and it doesn't address pythons' nutritional requirements. I was unable to find any articles in the Web of Science database (accessed through my university) providing info regarding pythons' nutritional needs.

While the article by Dierenfeld, Alcorn, & Jacobsen (2002; link above) gives info about the gross energy content of rats & mice along with mineral content available, there is a lot of variability depending upon whether the mouse/rat is a neonate, a juvie, or an adult. If we go solely by energy content, a neonatal rat provides more than a neonatal mouse, and the same is true for the adult rat compared to the adult mouse. However, a juvenile rat has a LOWER energy content than a juvenile mouse.

Further, pythons' mineral needs might be quite important in relation to what mice & rats provide. For example, an adult mouse provide more calcium, more phosphorus, more magnesium, more copper, more zinc, and more manganese than an adult rat, but less iron. Even some of these conclusions are questionable, as the sample sizes were (except for adult rats/mice) too small for the conclusions to be reliable (measuring the nutritional composition of 5 neonates does not establish that all neonates of that species provide that nutrient at the level seen in the five!). Finally, the nutritional value of both mice and rats depends upon the quality of their feed!

Without knowing pythons' actual nutritional requirements for each mineral, it's impossible to say whether more of any particular mineral is better or less is better. For example, more iron could be better for some predators, but bad for others if the are susceptibel to iron-storage disease as mentioned on p. 5 of this article.

In addition, the authors explain, "Protein and essential amino acid requirements of zoo carnivores have not been determined" (p. 3). The authors also note that "laboratory-reared rodents contain more body fat and less body protein than sampled free-ranging rodents of the same species" (p. 4; I think that would also apply to domestically reared animals). On p. 6, they add that there is no info on fatty acid concentrations, vitamins D & K, or water-soluble vitamins.

I was unable to find any more recent research, and none at all on pythons' nutritional requirements. It seems that even for zoo animals, the assumption is that if they grow and don't die, whatever they're being fed is OK.

My conclusion? We need more info! I'm even more frustrated now than I was. Somebody needs to do more research.

[mykee]

Here is the most comprehensive compilation of prey food item and their nutritional breakdown I have ever seen. Read the raw data and draw your own conclusions:

RodentPro.com - Nutrient Composition of Whole Vertebrate Prey

[Aaron_S]

Thank you Mykee. That link should answer all further questions to why it's better to feed rats over mice.

[mykee]

No worries Aaron. The above link will answer all.

[citysnakes]

Chu and Mike, great links guys thanks for posting them.

haha but you guys kill me. actually the above links, although very informative and helpful, do not answer "all".

[Aaron_S]

What more do you want?

I took a look only at Mykee's link. I compared an adult mouse to a juvenile rat. I chose these two because we originally started talking about a ball python switching. Which if the snake is eating mice it would at 10g or greater weight, just the same as a juvenile rat.

Except the dry matter, everything else was higher. How does this not answer "all" final inquiries to the "debate"? I explained the convience factor and now we have proof of the nutritional value, which was the follow-up question after I made my remarks regarding convience.

What further questions do you have Julian?

[mykee]

What else do you feel you need to know to make an educated choice Adrian?
All the information you could possibly want is right in front of you in black and white.
Proof? I'll give you some first hand knowledge from my personal experiences:
When I first started out, and didn't know not to buy mice-eating adults, I purchased a group of four related sub-adult female balls; two mouse-eaters and two rat eaters (almost sounds like the perfect set-up, doesn't it?)
I tried and tried to get the two mouse eaters onto rats, to no avail. After two full years of messing with these picky bitches, I sold them. They all ate weekly of roughly 100g meals (I liked to keep my meal sizes small even back then); 4 adult mice for the mouse-eaters, and one medium rat each for the rat eaters.)
After two years of my owning them (they were all three-ish at the time), eating the same sized meals at the same intervals, the two mouse eaters were both under 1200g and the two rat eaters were both well over 2000g.
I realize that four animals does not a theory prove, but it said enough to me that I've never owned a mouse-eater since.

[citysnakes]

Aaron, i have no questions for you and if you feel that after reading that you know everything there is to know then good for you. i dont feel that way and im not here to teach you what questions to ask and what too look for and why. like i said im finished trying to discuss this. think what you want, know that rats are "better" and youre golden.

Mike thanks letting us in a little on your experiences, good info.

[Chu'Wuti]

Here is the most comprehensive compilation of prey food item and their nutritional breakdown I have ever seen. Read the raw data and draw your own conclusions:

RodentPro.com - Nutrient Composition of Whole Vertebrate Prey

The tables presented at RodentPro.com come directly from the published article at http://www.nal.usda.gov/awic/zoo/Who...nal02May29.pdf (the link I posted earlier). If anyone had bothered to look at both links, they would have instantly seen that I had already posted a link to those tables in their original context.

It's very helpful to read the authors' text in conjunction with the tables--the excerpts I quoted earlier give some idea of why the tables are incompletely helpful.

To be explicit, more is NOT necessarily better.

Just because the tables say one particular rat contains more energy and more iron than one particular mouse does NOT mean that it is best for the snake. What we need is the information about the snake's nutritional needs. What if the snake needs more of the minerals the rat has less of? We don't know--that article, including the tables extracted from it by RodentPro.com, does not say what the snake needs. Faster growth may mean a snake got more fat (and hence more energy) but it does NOT mean the snake is healthier. We can make humans grow faster and bigger, too, by changing our diet--but it is not healthy.

I stand by my earlier post. This is something that needs further research.

[mykee]

and you sound like just the person to do that research. Good luck with that........