Assist fed babies- today too soon?

Hi there! I have some babies that I took on, knowing they were problem feeders. I have a photo thread on them, if you'd like to look. When we got them home, 3 ate independently, but 3 didn't. One passed away, so we decided to assist feed the other two. We did so last night. These little guys are so small, and we didn't want to hurt them, so they each got only half a pinky mouse head. Now, that sure doesn't seem like much to me, but I'm glad we started slow, rather than tearing them apart with our first assist, then I'd be devasted we hurt them.

They swallowed on their own, but the piece was so small that they don't even have a lump. They've been out and cruising around, so I'm wondering if we should feed them again so soon, or wait, and if we wait, how long? Til we see a poop? A certain number of days? And what parts are most nutritious to feed, considering the assist and the need for a little substance to push a wee bit and encourage them?

Thanks for the help, and I'm sorry if there was a faq or caresheet that I neglected to read. If so, point me in that direction and I'll do my homework before asking more sillly questions.

Even though the feed was so small you may be tempted, I'd recommend waiting 4-5 days before trying again. The stress of a regurge would possibly be the last straw for those little ones. I re-habbed a tiny non-feeder on 2ml pinky puree at 5 day intervals until she started to put on weight, and it worked well without her regurging, then got her straight on to day old live 'reds', missing out feeding pinky parts.

Well, we took a look at our two problem feeders, and, the nice thing about them being so skinny, you can actually see through the ghost, and through spots on Norm. They were totally empty, so we decided to do the assist feed again, and we had another success!!!! They both took 1/4 of a pinky, without much protest. Do problem feeders stay problem feeders for life or do a good percentage of them "grow out of it"?

I haven't had to do it, so what exactly do you do when you "assist feed" a problem eater?

Tom

Have you tried "tease" feeding? Do you know how long they've been not feeding for?

Tease feeding is where you hold the snake so that only a bit of it's head/neck is free, then get it good and mad at a f/t pinky so they strike ^-^ But the snake doesn't have enough leeway to pull back well. I found if I just don't let them detach from the pinky (but not really forcing it in either) quite a few will decide to go ahead and eat it. I'd say this has worked on about half my problem feeders.

The other half usually start eating on their own after a few weeks of offering them a thawed pink every 5 days. I think it helps to offer them the pink in their own enclosure (rather than a feeding container) because they are more secure. Of course, I have them on paper towels or something so they don't eat substrate!
I used to offer live pinks to try to stimulate them but I haven't done that in a while. Usually I give non-feeders to someone who's willing to work with them, but I haven't had too many this year and whenever I do work with one they seem to start up in a few weeks.

Good luck!

tbroaddus said:

I haven't had to do it, so what exactly do you do when you "assist feed" a problem eater?

Tom

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I'm also on another forum, thamnophis.com, (love them garters!) and there was a whole thread on "force vs assist" feeding. The commonly accepted definitions there were that force feeding is when you open their mouths, put food in, and keep pressure on the food to make them take it. Assist feeding, would be opening their mouths, putting food in, and letting them swallow on their own, no further pressure on the food. We don't even have to hold the food in place, they start working it down after a moment or two.

It's like our babies are, well, not too bright. A moment or two after the food goes in, they realize that it's food and start swallowing. However, it seems that left to their own devices, they'd never strike at anything. I've tried the teasing and the making them mad by tapping them with the "prey" but they never strike at it at all.

On the bright side, I guess we never have to worry about them biting *us*.