This sounds like a TROLL post to me.
Love the Fatman
I tend to agree. This days even fairly young children have the ability to reseach a topic on the internet, and there is plenty written about this particular subject.
There is also a ton written on the internet about corn snake care but people still come here to ask. By your post you are saying those people are trolling as well. I don't see my post as trolling. I am trying to find out why people make such a big stink here on these forums about it. Frankly all the posts constantly nagging people is getting a bit discouraging and I do like these forums, but it makes me not want to come here anymore. Especially when I only have a little bit of time between school and other real life things to read, learn and enjoy peoples posts about their snakes.
Googling a bunch of articles, in my opinion, is no substitute for hearing peoples own opinions from this forum in a constructive manner.
@Kali: You brought up some good points that I had forgotten. Which is part of why I started this thread, thanks!
@Susan: I do agree that it can be good to get a snake that has gone off feeding back on again. I have a male who this past spring went off feeding for so long he was starting to loose a lot of weight and I was getting really worried. Live did help him get back on track.
@Lenny:
Can get expensive going to a local store to buy live if you are only buying for a few snakes. (you don't know what they are feeding them. Pet store source.?????)
Where I live there are two choices for feeders locally. Petsmart which charges an arm and a leg. Or a badly run local store. This store is disgusting, it should be shut down. But it cant be because they have relatives that are police that handle every complaint for them. She also does not have a set price on mice, we could go in there two separate times, get the same size mouse, and get charged two very different prices. We do have one local supplier of f/t and live but he is several hours away and I cannot drive (eye sight problems) and my bf works 50-60 hours a week so it is not easy to get to him.
If ordering through the mail (rodent pro, mice direct etc) then you dont always know what you are getting and can get some bad surprises. ( this can sometime be worked out by contacting the supplyer)
Not always. There was even just recently a post on one of the threads here where they contacted a supplier with their concerns and they never got an answer. I also have a friend who had this same issue. Her and a few others spent a couple hundred on a mouse order for their ferrets only to have them show up with bedding and feces mixed into the frozen mice.
There is also a debate on the break down of nutrients from being f/t.
I had thought about this but I was not sure of its validity. What made me consider it was the green giant commercial that advertises how soon after being picked their vegetables are frozen, to lock in nutrients.
As you see I don't agree with the list but...so what!!
Exactly. I am not asking people to agree with me. I am not saying they have to agree with me. I am just asking for a nice discussion and peoples opinions on the matter.
@GSDlover
I do F/T since I find it a lot cheaper, I also don't want to keep a hamster cage with a bunch of dirty mice. I don't know how you figure live is cheaper, unless you're breeding your own.
We do breed our own and like I posted above, even with the cost of bedding and food each month (runs us about 20$), it is cheaper because of the price gouging that goes on in our area.
@shiari
Con of Live: relatively short window of pinkies being appropriate size for hatchlings
Another good point. Right now we have 3 baby corns, about 20-26grams each. They are getting F/T.
Pros for F/T:
Able to buy in bulk and thus prevent shortages (I have 13 hatchlings I'm taking care of. It would take a LOT of mice to give me 13 pinks every 5 days)
Less smell. Mice stink!
Take up less room when you live in a small space. I have several hundred mice in the bottom of my freezer.
Another good point, a lot of it comes down to peoples living arrangements when it comes to space. We built our own mice/rat rack that takes up about a 4x4ft section, maybe a little less.
And yes hatchlings seem to never stop eating so that is huge valid reason on why feeding f/t has its pros.
As for the stink, I was battling that for awhile, we would clean, a few days later it would stink. We found a way around that and we still clean just as often as before, but now the stink is not noticeable unless you go right up to the bin in the rack and take a good sniff.
@Nanci
Do you seriously think the snake enjoys hunting?
I think this boils down to the individual snake. Each snake has their own personalities and quirks.
@strasevol
A better analogy is
"would you rather someone bring you your meal, or have a live chicken thrown at you to kill yourself?"
Good point. But then what do hunters do that go out hunting deer, turkey, boar etc every hunting season?
@Outcast
I have a snake that is somewhat of a problem feeder. He just happens to be my Cali King, and he prefers live, but today I got him to start eating on a F/T pinky. I hope he will grow out of the "Give me live" stage pretty soon, because once I can get a small chest freezer I am going to start ordering Frozen mice and that is what I will be feeding my snakes. I also have a baby Glossy Snake that just took its first pinky from me, that happened to be live also, I plan on trying to switch it over to F/T after a few feedings, and seeing how that works out for me.
A chest freezer is another valid point. Not everyone has access to one so freezer space is at a premium (especially when feeding people with the appetites of teenaged boys). Good luck on getting them to completely switch over! I know, from experience, it can take a lot of work.
). What else is the "enrichment" we use in zoo's...
