• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

How do you feed multiple snakes???

kimbyra said:
All of you who have mentioned feeding on a paper towel, here's a big warning...

Paper towels can stick to the mouse, causing the paper towel to get taken into the mouth of the snake. I've actually pulled quite a bit of paper towel out of a young corn's mouth. I've heard of others who have had this problem, I think one had a fatal result. So I now feed on a plain bottom feeding bin.
Click to expand...

I've been doing this method for several years with zero issues. Perhaps the reason why your mice stick to the paper towels is because they're wet? I don't feed my snakes wet food.

Shoot, if I were to have separate feeding bins for each and every snake it was take me DAYS to feed. :boring:
 
I use wet mice (thawed in bowl of hot water) but I put them on trays on the paper towel. The snakes don't seem to have an issue. Paper towel is nice because the snakes often poop when eating, and when they do it on the paper towel, clean up is easier.

Maybe some paper towel brands are more problematic than others.
 
I appreciate all the answers, i'm glad to knoq that i'm not the only one who is trying to cut the time down. The little cups are great for babies but most of mine are adult and quite big. I don't have the space for separate bins for each one. I have a few bins and just clean them out bertween snakes. I really like the idea of feeding in their reg. bins, as loing as they emain friendly. It seems to be working for many of you. Hopfilly i can cut out some time using these methods.
 
I feed my snakes in their bins. I never feed and clean at the same time. For all the reasons Kathy mentioned and also I don't want my snakes to get the idea they are going to be fed every time they see me. Sometimes they just get cleaned.
 
I only have two corns and one ball python. When feeding time comes around, I have one glass tank that I call the feeder tank. I thaw the mice for the corns, move one of the corns to the feeder tank. When the food is ready, I feed the corn in the feeder tank. Once the snake is done, I move him out of the feeder tank and give the feeder tank a quick rinse. Then, I repeat with the second corn snake.

My ball python will only eat live fuzzies and she doesn't like to be moved to the feeder tank. In fact, my previous attempts to move her to the feeding tank have resulted in me stressing her out to the point where she refused the fuzzie. She also refuses to eat if there is a light on in the room or if she has an audience. So, I drop a live fuzzie in her viv, turn all the lights off and leave the room. In about 5 minutes, she has usually already finished constricting the fuzzie and has half of it down her throat. :)

I'm going to have to try to switch her over to F/T pinkies pretty soon. It's real frustrating trying to find live fuzzies, and even more frustrating to find one and then have the snake refuse it. ugh.
 
It depends on the animals. corns I typically feed in a tub. My larger more aggressive snakes are fed in cage. But when I do feed, I do tend to clean cages as well. I just find it easier. None of my corns have associated being held to being fed.
 
You wanna see some feeding? Watch Brian on SnakeBytes.tv he's gotta feed 35,000+ snakes. Now THATS amazing.
 
35,000 snakes, Wow, i feel silly complaining now lol. I can't get that show but i would love to see him in action.
 
Shoot, if I were to have separate feeding bins for each and every snake it was take me DAYS to feed.
Click to expand...

Which is exactly why when it is feeding night(s) around here it is quite hetic..Not an easy task but we make due ( actually J makes due.. )

Regards.. Tim of T and J
 
TandJ said:
Which is exactly why when it is feeding night(s) around here it is quite hetic..Not an easy task but we make due ( actually J makes due.. )

Regards.. Tim of T and J
Click to expand...
Tim, you didn't really elaborate much there...

I have actually gotten it down to a fairly quick process - providing nothing disrupts the flow of things. Elizabeth, our oldest, and I can feed & clean 100 of our younger snakes in around 2 hours, if we have to do the adults as well on the same night it takes about 3. If the snakes give us hassles - and sometimes they do - it can take up to 5.

When we have hatchlings in deli cups, I can feed 85 of them in under an hour - while my daughter helps by cleaning water dishes and deli cups. I simply set out the feeding dishes, put a mouse in the middle, set the snake in the dish and turn the lid of the deli cup upside down over the snake to keep it in the feeding dish. That also prevents two snakes from getting mixed up as to who is who. If they are too big for the lid to be useful, I keep empty deli cups to use in their place and just set the lids on top.

Once they get moved up to shoe boxes - it takes a bit longer, because by than they aren't going to fit under a lid or inside a deli cup very easily - so I usually place an empty feeding dish over the top to keep them from escaping while they are eating.

The adults we feed in either an empty shoe box or on top of their tupperware lids. Occasionally, I have to use a 5 gallon bucket w/ a lid (with holes in the lid, of course) to feed our big Cali king, but that's only when he's in a particular nasty mood.

Without my oldest helping out though, I wouldn't be able to get them all fed in such a timely manner. Any disruption only drags the process out longer... Breeding season throws off the routine as well, since some females refuse to eat once they are gravid, or the males are are more interested in courting.
 
I only offer food to my sexually mature males once a month during breeding season, they just don't eat if offered more. Most of them except a meal or two right out of brumation, and then just are not interested. One of them won't even do that - not feeding post brumation until after eggs are laid.
 
TripleMoonsExotic said:
Before I feed I spot clean and pull water dishes (they get placed in a bucket of bleach water as I go along). That probably takes me 30-60 minutes. I clean the water bowls, replace water and then feed (3-4 hours total time for that).
Click to expand...

That's similar to what I do - but I clean out and pull out the water dishes as I'm feeding them. I leave the boxes unlocked (the snakes can't get out!), and then put waterbowls in an hour or so later. By that time, most of the mice are gone so the waterbowls go back in and the boxes are locked. Then we know just at a glance which snakes haven't yet eaten and still have a mouse in there, as their boxes are unlocked - so they will be checked again later.

I tend to feed the royals and the baby corns, with stan feeding all of the adults, which splits the workload nicely :)
 
I have no regime to follow. I clean the waterbowls and spot clean everyday regardless of who is getting fed. I never feed any of the snakes on the same day of each week as I feel sporadic and random feeding keeps them leaner and they have a much more intense feeding response. I don't think any of my snakes ever refuse (even in blue) so theres never any left overs.

Adults get fed every 7-14 days regardless of sex.
Juvies and yearlings get fed every 7-10 days
Babies get fed every 5-7 days
Boas get fed twice a month

And of course if theres a wee sad face looking up at me wanting a moose then I will sometimes feed earlier than usual, but not often. For as little food as my snakes get, they seem to be thriving on it as I have 200gram yearlings?!

And thats all there is to it :) To be perfectly honest my feeding methods are probably so sporadic due to me forgetting half the time LOL. Or saying, ack I'll do it tomorrow. No rush to fatten the females up over here thats for sure lol.
 
Last edited:
Sweet! My biggest yearling, a female Abbott's - just weighed in at 195 - but she ate yesterday so it will go down (she was 150 after last shed, I don't usually feed in blue, so that's fairly accurate).
 
FunkyRes said:
I only offer food to my sexually mature males once a month during breeding season, they just don't eat if offered more. Most of them except a meal or two right out of brumation, and then just are not interested. One of them won't even do that - not feeding post brumation until after eggs are laid.
Click to expand...
We did that this year with the adult males - but it's the yearling males that were giving us the most trouble this season. I guess they could smell that some of the older snakes were getting lucky and wanted some action for themselves. lol
 
I stagger my feeding days. This can be fairly easy as some snakes are fed every 2 weeks and some every week. Babies are easy enough, they are on paper towel. Aroboreals are also easy. I can feed all of them in about 10 minutes. Open the door, put mouse on tongs....put it in-grab-move on. Corns are put one at a time in three boxes. While they're eating, I'm feeding the arboreals and changing water that needs to be changed. I also will spray the cages of the arboreals at this time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top