So mad I could Vomit with rage!!!! - Page 6

mark129er · 01-03-04, 11:02 PM

It was sarcasm, I refer to the pet store as my grocery store. Did this post ever get blown out of proportion.

scalawag · 01-04-04, 12:50 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Slannesh

So there are no knowledgeable people on the net offering good advice at all. Caresheets don't ever get edited do they? And none of them could possibly be written by anyone who has any knowledge of the subject of course. What rubbish. Books are generally written by people who know what they're talking about. They're edited by someone who cares about spelling and grammatical errors and how many pages of space the book will take up and how many pages of 'useless information' they can crop so it'll all fit into the X # of pages the Publisher decided to grace this particular author with.
then...

As to the astroturf, I haven't kept Shiva on that for several years. Since you've checked my website so closely i'm sure you'll notice the date on those pictures as being from May 99'. I've been using either Repti-bark or fir/orchid bark mulch for quite a while now. Since you brought it up however, what do you house your balls on? I know substrate is probably the single most debated topic for most herps.

The blurb on my page about Balls eating snakes and other lizards could be entirely false, Again it was information I got many years ago

I do know that they don't eat domestic mice in the wild, which was the point I was trying to make. [/B]

You disproved your prior statement , time to update your web site

scalawag · 01-04-04, 12:59 AM

Maybe the snake is a healthy weight and to big meant he didn't want it to get too fat. He didn't say too long.

Dozer · 01-04-04, 01:27 AM

Nice response everyone

Simon Sansom · 01-04-04, 01:59 AM

Now, people need to realize that <html>boids</html> are equipped by nature to go for relatively long periods without food, being generally relatively sluggish, ambush hunters.

I know of breeders of several types of boas or pythons who feed their adults only once a month, except perhaps a bit more for the females during breeding season.

I have personally had an adult male Solomon Island Ground Boa, <html>Candoia carinata paulsoni</html>, go off feed for no apparent reason for a period of a little
over a year, only to resume feeding again just as mysteriously. Unbelievably, the animal lost very little body weight during his extended fast.

I have had other <html>Boids</html> go off their feed for various periods of time, up to seven months, but none quite as extreme as the Ground Boa.

And, it's the same ol' thing - folks quoting care sheets, and hearsay, when they in fact have very little actual practical experience to draw upon.

As our good friend, Mr. Scotty Allen has mentioned, people are beginning to find out that perhaps we are over-feeding many of our captives. It seems that obesity may be one of the main causes of egg-binding in female colubrids, for example, among other things.

Cheers!

Simon

Swampwalker · 01-04-04, 02:53 AM

I've just read this very long and sometimes humerous thread. A lot of excellent post by some great herpers in support of Dave's (ontarioherper) comments. Unfortunately many of them don't post here very often so they may not be as well known as some of the newbie herpers who have 3000 posts to their name. I'm glad to see Cerastes and Lori (yes she works at the T.O. Zoo) get into the conversation, as well as Scotty Allen.

Slannesh, one of the reputable breeders that you quote hasn't even been into snakes for more than a couple of years. I know him, he has an amazing set up and a lot of quality animals, but he is raising them for breeding and he hasn't been around long enough to say that this is the way to feed for healthy long life. I am in no way saying that his animals are unnhealthy, and I would buy from him if I was into high end morphs, but I'm more interested in natural looking animals, field herping and conservation.

I hope you will take some time to think about what some of these people are saying, because they do have a lot of experience.

Simon Sansom · 01-04-04, 12:34 PM

Also, I should mention that I've been keeping Jamaican Boas, <html>Epicrates subflavus</html>, for ten years, and have bred them successfully on two occasions.
My adult male feeds only, on the average, about five or six times A YEAR! During the winter and breeding season he goes off feed totally for months, like most male snakes. He is, in spite of himself, beautiful, healthy and reproductively active. On half-a-dozen meals a year...
...And these are slender, relatively "active" <html>Boids</html>, not heavy-bodied, fairly sedentary ones.

Remember, just because someone has 3000 posts on the forums, or has put out a care-sheet, does NOT necessarily make them an experienced "herper".

Cheers!

Simon

Simon Sansom · 01-04-04, 03:12 PM

I'd also like to reply to Mark129er's original post...

Yes, I understand how frustrating it can be to deal with "ill-informed" people, however we must remember that MOST people don't really know anything about snakes, just old pet-store "folk-lore", lol!

When I talk to people unfamiliar with snakes, they are always amazed that I feed my snakes pre-killed, thawed rodents. They always say, "Oh, I thought they had to have live food!". It seems to be a common pre-conception that snakes need living prey.

You just have to be polite, and try to broach the subject of feeding pre-killed. The guy may never have even thought of it, if he's a relatively inexperienced herper. This is where you, as a more experienced keeper can make a difference, by offering someone the benefit of your knowledge in a positive way.

Just my two cent's...

Hang in there!

Simon

MouseKilla · 01-05-04, 01:08 AM

Holy crap, someone with some actual credentials posted! This is far too rare an occasion. Often, not always but often, someone like myself that is not a total newb but far from an expert will come on here to seek answers to their questions as they advance in the hobby and what we get is this kind of rambling BS. I've said it before and it may never come to be but I think it would be nice to have a forum on this site where we could direct our questions to someone we can trust knows what the hell they're talking about. It's all well and good to do your research, observe your particular animal and ask other keepers what they do but getting answers that are backed by vast experience or professional training is far better. Maybe it's not possible to bring that type of service to this particular venue, I don't know one way or the other, but it would certainly be better than 6 pages of shite and nonsense which is what we have here for the most part.

daver676 · 01-05-04, 10:36 AM

So did you actually vomit or what?

MouseKilla · 01-05-04, 12:59 PM

Not me, I shat in disgust. lol!

Ontario_herper · 01-05-04, 10:54 PM

Nope no vomit! And I don't think you can efficiently censor who says what on a forum like this (or the net in general). That is why books can often be a more desirable source of information. Not that there aren't reliable people on the net but there is a tonne more junk to weed through. It takes much more time and effort to publish a book than write up a web-page. That is a fact!

Swampwalker · 01-06-04, 12:20 AM

Very well said Ontario Herper

Swampwalker · 01-06-04, 01:09 AM

Quote:

I'd also like to reply to Mark129er's original post...

Yes, I understand how frustrating it can be to deal with "ill-informed" people, however we must remember that MOST people don't really know anything about snakes, just old pet-store "folk-lore", lol!

Maybe the guy wasn't ill informed and he just doesn't want a fat overfed snake, as Ontario Herper and others have suggested. Maybe further discussion with the person could have been educational to either person, instead of walking off wanting to "vomit with rage". Maybe this person has a lot of experience and knowledge to share. Just because it differs from the care sheets, or breeders ("breeder folk-lore") in a hurry to raise their animals to breeding size, doesn't mean that his methods are wrong.

Linds · 01-06-04, 02:05 AM

Great arguement.... lol... a bit tense, but otherwise a lot of great discussion

Quote:

Originally posted by Slannesh
Feeding only once per month seems too far between feedings for me,

Snakes are not like people. Of course it would be naturally a little odd and unnatural, since we need to constantly feed ourselves to stay alive, for us to easily accept that another living thing may only need food less than a dozen times yearly. For you, yes! it would seem too far between, but for the snakes, it is not at all

Quote:

Originally posted by Ontario_herper
Simple answer, yes. I don’t believe that a ball python would be able to maintain a healthy body weight on a 3 meal-a-year schedule.

LOL you haven't met one of mine!

Once he became a mature adult, he fasted for 1year 6days, came out of it and ate 4 meals, then has gone back in to another fast for however many more months (or longer

). Maintained perfect body weight, and was/is alert and active.

Quote:

Originally posted by Ontario_herper
It seriously makes me want to run to the washroom and vomit.

Vomit with rage, by chance?

Quote:

Originally posted by Cerastes
For the others out there that are still confused, a healthy ADULT ball python should be fed appropriately sized mice or rats every two to four weeks.

IMHO there is too much emphasis put on shedules that -we- deem correct. We need to follow what our snakes tell us and not we what we feel they need. Of course many snakes will eat when offered since in the wild, food is not as readily available, it is insinct to take what they can (within reason). This is what causes trouble for the most part (well, gives the window of opportunity for keepers to chunk them up). Schedules are a great tool for those that have not learned how to read their snakes yet, as a safety guideline, but not the optimal way to keep them. There are some BP out there that may only need a meal every 2 months, some maybe every 2 weeks, or like one of mine, a few times a year.

Quote:

Originally posted by KristenM
there is much more infromation in the right book, or from the right person first hand and less room for error, because they are edited by people who know what they are talking about. Unlike, the internet where any anybody can make up a care sheet

LOL I don't know about that. Seems most of the books you pick up have some innacuracies or blatant ignorance. Books as well, as only one persons' opinion, much like caresheets. You don't need to be a verified "expert". I have a book kicking around here somewhere that claims iguanas need to eat bird gravel to digest their food properly, and not so long as the other day I was sifting through a book on monitors that suggests they should all be kept at an even 80 degrees

Sure any of these tips will work if your goal is to kill the animal :/ They may have less room, but just because they have an assigned editor, does not mean much.