Technically, she's a milksnake/lemon king hybrid, but she exhibits typical milksnake behavior, so I'm gonna post this here....

How do you know when to feed 2 pinkies? Dingie's gotten about 3" longer and maybe 2x as thick as when I first got her. I thought about feeding her 2 pinkies, to see if she would go for it. She ate the first one, and I dangled another one in front of her. She went at it like I go after a rack of ribs. I just want to make sure I'm not "power feeding" her, because I heard that WILL kill your snake.

Incidentally, while I was wiggling the first pinkie in front of her, it fell, and when I went to pick it up, she attempted to attack my finger. She's still pretty small, so she kinda bounced off my thumbnail. She also tried to get my index finger a few times, but she can't open her mouth wide enough to bite. It was so cute....

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How many of us have ever thought seriously about eating a rat, just once, to see how it tastes?

Nobody?

Me neither.

Since Milks are a species of Kingsnake any way its cool!
My personal preference is to feed one item at a time. If you think that one pink is not enough, step up in size, unless you already have a bunch to use up. There are parts of each rodent that aren't very disgestable and by feeding multiple small prey instead of one appropriate sized one you are creating more waste matter as well as costing yourself more money.

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Merlin,
What's Life Without A Little Magic!

I would say that if your snake has grown by 3" and is twice as thick s/he should definately be moved up to more food items!

Power feeding is where breeders feed a snake many more food items much more often to get them to adult size sooner than they naturally should be, in order to breed them sooner. It does shorten their life span and is not very healthy.

You are not power feeding - it is natural for the snake to eat more as it grows. How big is the snake in total? And how old? Our smallest snake right now is our blotched king, who at last weighing was 100g, and is approx. 24" long and smaller than an inch at her thickest part of her girth, she is about a year old,, she eats a small-med mouse each week, or upto 4 rat pups! Even then she would eat more if we allowed her to, and could probably easily manage more but we don't want to allow her to over-feed.

Generally after a couple of sheds a snake is ready to move on to 2 food items, and on to 3 after another shed or two, and then upto something larger after the next few sheds.

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"If you know everything you may as well blow your brains out because the reason for existence is to learn more everyday." - Mark O'Shea, 2004