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feeding questions? help me out

redrott
06-07-2004, 02:06 AM
I have asked about this before and got a little help. But need a little more detail. My okeetee eats fine he doesn't care if you are looking or not. Kind of like me. LOL. anyway He was eating three fuzzies a week. So a couple of people on here said to move him up a size. Well i bought two small f/t mice. I gave both of them to him but after watching him eat the first one I was scared to let him have the second one. He got it down but it looked like it was going to split him open. How can I tell if this is too big for him. He got it down and kept it down Just don't know if I should give him the same thing next time. Or feed him the three fuzzies for a while longer. Also If the small mouse is fine for him how do i know when he should get two of them at a time? How do you know if they are still hungry or if they have had enough?

Neumann
06-07-2004, 12:31 PM
Redrott,

Corns are known for being little piggies and eat better than other snakes so they may eat more than they can handle.

The standard rule that most people go by for food size is a meal which 1-1.5 times the diameter of the fattest part of your snake, taking into account fur which makes a rodent look larger than it really is. When moving up a size, initially I wouldn't give more than one mouse for two reasons:

1) It may be a bigger meal than it looks (as you described)

2) A larger (more adult) food item is more challenging to their digestive system than a less developed food item and may take some getting used to.

After they've successfully handled a larger food item a time or two then you can start to add more than one, assuming they don't look full with one.

I hope this helps!

moreptiles
06-07-2004, 01:18 PM
You did right to move up in size, but unfortunately you skipped a few size steps. There are two mouse sizes between fuzzies and small mice, namely hoppers and weanlings. A hopper will be about twice the weight of a fuzzy, and this would be the appropriate size meal now. A lot of pet stores only sell pinkies, fuzzies, and small mice, so your choices may be very limited. If you can't find hoppers, then you will either need to just feed multiple fuzzies, or order on-line.

Mark