Dead Feeding (continued from \"Rat food? What do you use?\")

[ChrisRezendes]

Hey, I noticed both of you guys pointed out not to hit the snake in the face with it. Just so you know, I rarely touch the head of my snakes, or any snakes for that matter. The only exception is sometimes I kind of poke a snake lightly on the nose (fine, rostral [img]modules/Forum/images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img] ) when it is trying to get into something I don't want it to get into.

I also should point out that whenever I try (or have been successful in) feeding dead, I've used freshly killed mice. I can't freeze/thaw, as my mother won't let me anywhere near her freezer with anything dead, mice included. I really don't blame her. She also won't let me breed my own mice, and I don't blame her for that either. Yeah, that was kind of off-topic.

I have kind of an interest story. The very first time I tried to feed dead (not counting mice that had been killed pre-killed for me in the store), I had no idea how to kill it. I threw the mouse in a pillowsack, walked out to the back porch, and whacked it against the wall. When I opened the bag, there was guts everwhere. I thought for sure my snake (a gopher) wouldn't touch the gory remains, but for some reason I decided to try it anyway. Well, after I had scooped all the insides out of the bag and tried my best to pack it back into the mouse (not an easy task), I dumped him in there. My snake ate it within five minutes. It usually took him about 30 minutes before he would show any interest in anything. I'm thinking maybe I should cut open dead mice before I put them in there. Maybe that will make it more enticing. What do you guys think? [img]modules/Forum/images/smiles/icon_confused.gif[/img]
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[eddie]

That's where the braining works out, it gets the blood and other body fluids outfor the snakes to smell and whet their appetites with.

It's simple actually, either cut the skull open a little bit with a safety razor, or poke a few holes in the skull with a strong needle.
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[ChrisRezendes]

What about at the midsection? Would that work? Because this mouse had some serious insides poking out, and the snake seemed to (I'm not sure) be attracted to this.
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[eddie]

Aside from the cleanup and nastiness, it can work also, but it does the same if you do the head pokes.
I had one that hit a f/t hard one day, I heard a pop... it ate it anyways but the smell and the mess.... whew!
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	Frozen/Thawed A rodent or other prey item that is frozen and then thawed to be fed to a reptile or other animal.

[JuliusSqueezer]

LOL...I don't think I have ever had a pituophis snake of any kind ever refuse to eat anything I put in front of them.
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[ChrisRezendes]

There was something seriously wrong with this one... I'm not really sure what it was. When my mom first got him for me, he ate voraciously, absolutley a feeding monster. This was the point it really came to my knowledge that dead feeding is better (although I had experimented with it before). So for about two months, he ate anything I put in front of him, which, except for the first two feedings, were dead hoppers, or at least they looked like hoppers to me, they weren't really that big. I got them from Patnaude's, and their mice were always small. But anyway, after that period, he went off of food for no real reason. At first it didn't bother me. I just kept offering. After about maybe a month, I started getting nervous. I have a strong tendency to get very nervous about non-feeding snakes, often too nervous. So I offered live and he started eating again for about a month. Then he stopped eating altogether. So I started offering dead again, and no success, so I started offering both. I went to the pet store he was purchased at at least 4 times, once to have him sexed, once to show one of the employees how he was doing (as for some strange reason he was interested... Hmm...), and at least twice to see what was wrong with him. Well, both times, I was told nothing was wrong, and that it was just that time of year, and that a lot of reptiles go off feed about that type of the year. I also brought him over to a friend's, a dude who had kept several colubrids, boas, and tegus during high school (I was also in high school at the time). He thought nothing was wrong either. But I knew something was wrong, and I couldn't shake off that feeling, no matter how much reassurance anybody gave me. Then he died.

At first I felt bad, as if somehow it was my fault, that through poor husbandry I had somehow killed him. But then I reviewed the facts- I had done nothing wrong whatsoever. I never had him on a rock. I always had him heated, via heat lamp. I always provided him with a hide. He always had water. His cage was always clean. And, I had always offered food, and when feeding live, I always payed close attention. Then I started reviewing other facts. The people at the pet store seemed to be nervous every time I came around, except for that one guy. And he seemed too interested. My mother told me she picked up some weird vibes as she was buying the snake, but she took it to think that they were trying to hide that it was snappy (which it wasn't anyway, not with me at least). She only got it for me because I had personally picked it out and was very excited at the prospect, as I always really wanted a Pitouphis. Another thing that I thought about was the fact that it only cost $30, which is almost unheard of for such a snake around where I live. You can't buy a ribbon snake for less than $20 around here. And I HAD known them to have priced down baby Kenyan Sand Boas that weren't feeding, although only after the fact. And recently I found out that Lori has had bad experiences buying snakes from those people, too. Unfortunately, it burned down about six months or maybe a year ago.

Every since that incident, I've been even MORE paranoid about snakes going off feed. I hate being paranoid. That snake was my absolute favorite snake at that point. It made me sad to see him go. It's kind of strange for me to have not let this go yet. Perhaps I should.

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[ChrisRezendes]

Was that last post unnecessarily long? If so, you can just delete it, as this whole thread really probably isn't going to go anywhere I won't be soon anway. Besides, I really don't think everyone needs to hear my stupid sob stories. I hate looking like a wuss.
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LOL. Chris.
The mice that patnaudes sells as full growns are hoppers imo.. small ones at that too..lol.
In regards to that pet shop where you got your snake from. That one that I got screwed on was a ball python, that at the time they were the only place with em in ..UGH and I was looking to get one for my son Andrew, course I went against my better judgement and bought it from them [ there was just something weird about the people running that place imo]. Two days later the snake died...I found it that it had IBD..arghh. good thing it came nowhere near the rest of my collection at all . Great reason for quarantining new stock [img]modules/Forum/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]
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	Inclusion Body Disease IBD

	In My Opinon IMO = In My Opinion and IMHO = In My Honest Opinion

[JuliusSqueezer]

so the snake died?

hmm...ever look for parasites?
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[ChrisRezendes]

If you are talking to Lori, I'm pretty sure she did, or at least that's how I remember her telling me it. If you are asking me, the answer is no, because at the time I had no idea how to treat or look for any parasites more advanced than typical mites/ticks. That's one of the things I really wish to learn.

The 3 things about snakes I still really want to learn are-

1. Treating diseases (I consider this the most important)
2. Breeding (Just so I'll know, someday I might want to)
3. Probing (Again, just so I'll know; colubrids are usually easy to tell by visual examination of the tail)
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	Mites Mites, close relatives of fleas and ticks