Today I had the privilege, misfortune, whatever you want to call it, of feeding the snakes. Granted, feeding the boas was easy, gave me another reason to like boas more than pythons (sorry to all you out there who prefer pythons, I think there great, but still slightly prefer boas). The boas ate prekilled thawed mice no problem, straight down the hatch. The ball pythons refused to eat prekilled, and throughout the day I attempted to get them too.

I've heard balls can be a bit finicky about their food, and someone decided to feed them live food when they came in. After that no one's really done much other than shaking a thawed mouse over the boxes. I feed them in in the back room to try to get them eating prekilled. I really would like to get all the snakes eating prekilled. All the arguments over food aside, I think it's hands down the best way to feed any snake.

However, today when I went to feed them even when I eventually gave it up for the day and fed them live, only one of them ate a live mouse anyway, the rest just sat in the box with the mouse. To make this easier I'll explain how I'm feeding them.

I take the snakes out of their cage and put them in a brown cardboard Petco box. When feeding prekilled I thaw the prekilled in a bag in a bucket with warm water, then place them under a basking light to warm up a bit more. Then, with a gloved hand, I dangle them in the box by their tail. The boas took to this fine. The ball pythons wouldn't, so I put them each in their own box in the back and dropped one live mouse in each box (not before smacking the mouse's head into a wall a bit to disorient them).

When I left only one of the pythons had eaten the mouse (one of them is injured, and going through a bad shed, but has a puncture wound, so the vet says to keep the humidity as low as possible (is this right, because I think it's stupid. Maybe something about infections or whatever)). The other 3 had not even looked twice at the mice. I thought maybe it could be a size thing, but the other one was about the same size as the rest.

I'm curious if maybe I'm doing something wrong, or if there's a better way to do it. Any advice on switching a ball python from live to prekilled would also be appreciated. Sorry about the rather long winded question, but I'm trying here.
Also, just curious, what's the best substrate for most snakes (particularly the ball pythons), I would guess Eco Earth or pine shavings, but I'm not 100% sure, and don't want to give people asking the wrong advice.

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"Nobody can do Everything, but Everybody can do Something."

I'd recommend that when you're talking about frozen/thawed mice that you use that term, or F/T. I went the whole way thinking you were were talking about fresh-killed (FK) until you mentioned thawing them Just to clarify things anyway.

I also don't believe there's one substrate that's best for snakes in general, there are too many different species with different needs. But for ball pythons I know a lot of people use cypress mulch, aspen, or paper towels. NEVER EVER use pine for ANYTHING though. Pine is toxic and isn't suitable for any snake, rodent, cat, bird, or anything really. I wish they'd stop selling it, aspen fills the same niche without containing the toxins. Cedar is also toxic, even more so than pine.

That mentioned though, if you're having trouble feeding them, you could try using fresh-killed mice. I personally have found that there is a difference between FT and FK. At least with the frozen mice I've bought. FK is basically just like eating a live mouse....only it doesn't move. In my experience with frozen mice, they're a little soggy (even after drying them off), and they smell different. Maybe I just got bad mice though. And if you don't thaw them quite enough then they'll be colder on the inside or a little stiff. Even when thawed the limbs and tail aren't always as limp as a FK mouse. The core temperature of a FK mouse seems to stay higher longer than FT as well.

When I use FK, I usually put the mouse or rat in a sturdy plastic bag and whack it against a hard wall, floor, or counter-top. You want to hit them hard enough to kill them instantly, but not so hard that they explode or break through the bag (or both....that's a mess). Don't hit them too softly though, or they'll just be injured, and it's best they die quickly before they know what happened. Some twitching of the legs happens sometimes, it's normal.

That might help, but I'm sure someone else will come along with some better suggestions.

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"Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines." - John Benfield

When I bought my ball python they were feeding him live mice. I do not like to feed live mice! The first time I fed him it was a prekilled. He ate it with no problem. So the next week I tried a t/f one. No problem there . I don't know what to say about getting a ball python to eat a t/f because I never had that problem. I guess I got lucky. But I would try prekilled mice. It is much safer.

I have never had an issue getting a ball python to eat f/t. The first and most important thing to do is to ensure that the mouse is completely thawed. I would thaw them in hot water, let that cool, refill it, let that cool, and then go for the trifecta and let them sit in there for a few minutes before attempting a feed.

Once I took them out of the water, they went on a towel and were dried. I then used tongs to pinch the tail and opened just one one end of the box. I would then play "peek-a-boo" with the ball python (notice ball python, not pythons) and they took almost every time. Those that didn't take it from the playing would have the f/t mouse tossed in with them, the box closed, and they would be put to the side while I went about feeding everyone else. I always started with the BP's. Those that didn't take when I was dancing it would normally eat while I fed everyone else.

If they didn't take the f/t, they didn't eat that week. I also placed EVERY snake in their own box at feeding. If we had 30 snakes, I used 30 boxes. lol

I think the gloved hand is part of the issue. It looks as if you are reaching in even though you aren't. For the stressed out bp's, that could be enough to dissuade them from taking the rodent. Try feeding them like I mention above.

Just so you know, it is against company policy to feed live rodents to the snakes. If you are caught, you will be terminated. If your manager knows and allows it, they will be terminated. Every managerial position between you and the corporate office that knows you are feeding live would lose their job as a result of allowing it. I would suggest you keep hush hush about that because it will cause more harm than good. (Especially if we have any animal rights activists that read from this site and see you posting how you whacked it against a wall before tossing it in with the snake.)

While we can get away with doing things like that at home when we need to, you can't do that when you are dealing with a situation that involves animal rights and the safe and humane treatment of animals in a petstore. lol

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each snake always goes in a box by themself at feeding time, as for the live food, no comment on how far that goes up, but id have rather not fed them at all if they wouldnt take prekilled, most snakes eventualy give in to hunger and will eat thawed, but ive been told im not allowed to starve them into eating prekilled. Working with corporations is great fun...

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"Nobody can do Everything, but Everybody can do Something."

Perhaps you could try scenting the f/t mice with a lizard or even chicken broth? I've known people that have both methods work for them. Luckily I was blessed with a ball python that wants to eat too much. For the snake's sake I hope everything works out at work.

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"If the world were a logical place, men would ride sidesaddle."

You are not starving a snake by skipping a meal. You are not starving a snake by skipping 2 meals. You certainly aren't starving a ball python. lol They will and are known for going off feed for months at a time.

If the snake doesn't take the f/t, he doesn't eat that week. If the snake doesn't take f/t the second week, he misses a meal. Come the third week, if he hasn't eaten, he is taken off the floor and placed out back in ISO for observation.

Typically a single feeding miss will be enough to get them to take the next week. Stop using the glove and go to tongs. You want to have as much separation from you and the mouse that you can. Also try what I described with the whole "peek-a-boo" setup. It works very well.

By feeding live, you are setting the customers up for problems right from the start.

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Thanks for the ideas. I really dont like feeding live, but off the record, its something im told to do by someone above me, not what I want to do.

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"Nobody can do Everything, but Everybody can do Something."

Though this is true, I'd like to clarify for other people that may be reading this that it won't apply to a python that's already in a starved condition. For example, if the pet store just got a new shipment of ball pythons, and they're already really thin and haven't eaten in many months, then missing feedings will be more of an issue for those snakes. If the snake's relatively healthy, and perhaps it ate a month or two ago, it's not as much of a problem. If it already looks like it could die any day, it's time to worry. I know I'm pretty much stating the obvious, but you never know who else is reading these.

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"Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines." - John Benfield

Ryan, perhaps part of the issue is that you're not getting the mice warm enough. Is there any way you can apply heat directly to the rodents just before feeding with something like a hair drier? It sounds like they probably aren't much warmer than room temperature after being under the basking lamp, and it could be that the pythons just need something more identifiable as food. I could be wrong about that, of course.

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