Is Bozo Too Fat?

[axis1]

Hello everyone! How've ya all been?

Since the summer has finally passed us by and autumn has officially reared it's cooler head, I figured this might be the best time to reassess whether or not I should continue to feed my adult corns small rats as opposed to jumbo mice. A healthy, small rat is between 50 & 65 grams and provides a great deal of fat & protein for the little sneaky ones. Besides, they do seem to LOVE them (Lilly charges from under her hide with her mouth open when I unzip the mesh screen door and I never even feed her in her own cage! - The first picture below is of Lilly wrapped around a rat she has decided need some extra constricting to ensure he was really dead!). A rat also reduces the meal frequency from 10 or 14 days to up to 3 weeks for my adult corns.

However, my question is, at 5' long, is 950 grams on the hefty side for Bozo? I've included a picture of Bozo below the picture of Lilly. You can see by his size that the small rat (65 grams!) he is in the midst of casually consuming appears to be no larger than an adult mouse! Does he appear to be on the porky side from this picture? Kinda looks OK to me but his recent weight is causing me to think I should switch to mice for the upcoming winter months. (if he were a person, he might not be able to JUMP to a CONCLUSION!).

Any and all comments will be greatly appreciated!

 

[axis1]

Couple More Bozo pix!

Just because he's so photogenic! (He IS a cute one, no? Just LOOK at that kisser!)

 

[Shiari]

He's overly large large but not outright obese *yet* as he doesn't have fat rolls or hips. I think my 5 1/2 foot long guy is about 850g. I'll have to weigh Eugene soon. Rats are fattening compared to mice, but every 3 weeks should counter that.

 

[hypnoctopus]

He's pretty! Shiari said what I was thinking. Definitely on the large end, but not at the obese stage yet.

 

[axis1]

Thanx for the quick responses! I'm already gathering by both of your uses of the word "YET" that I may have some time before unintentionally causing any harm to my chubby little sneaky one or having to implement any kind of a strict diet. (I really didn't think he was THAT fat but when you live with someone or something it's more difficult to be objective). Then again, how can you tell if your snake has HIPS and how the hell would THAT look? I just HAVE TO research THAT aspect as I am curious. But thanx for confirming that Bozo is not TOO FAT, as of YET, anyway! I think it's time to switch to jumbo mice really soon!

 

[hypnoctopus]

Hips is a term for fatty deposits right at the base of the tail. Instead of having the body taper nicely into the tail, it will have bulges on either side. You can Google some pictures of obese corn snakes to get an idea of what I'm talking about.

 

[daddio207]

You know what they say about pictures adding pounds :grin01:

IMO Boso is overweight based on those 2 dimensional pics. Just because they don't have "hips" doesn't mean they don't have fat deposits internally. Incidentally I had an adult corn snake that had "hips" that could never be classified as fat or overweight. I recall she was around 390g and 4ish feet.
With certain lizards we can see their fat deposits stored in their tails and jowls like my Tegus. They have areas to store the bulk of it that's not in their body cavity. Snakes do not have that luxury.
We know a few things about corn snakes. They are opportunistic eaters. They burn very few calories. They store fat, as most reptiles do, very efficiently. Why? Because they need to store fat for brumation, mating season and times when their prey is scarce. That fat is being stored internally around their intestines and vital organs. In captivity they get the opportunity to eat consistently, rarely are put into brumation and don't get the exercise that their wild counterparts do. Also captive snakes aren't subject to higher temps that rev up their metabolism that wild one's are subject to.
Controlling their diet is paramount to a healthy snake.

There's a good pic of a corn snake autopsy but I can't find it but here's one of a BP. you can see the fat deposits that built up....

GRAPHIC !!

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[hypnoctopus]

I wish there was a picture of that snake before he died so we could see if he 'looked' fat.

 

[daddio207]

I wish there was a picture of that snake before he died so we could see if he 'looked' fat.

There was 2 other pics of fat snakes in the post but not of the one actually autopsied. The topic basically was on power-fed snakes to get to breeding size.
I've had a lot of BP's in the past and present and that one looks like it would be normal looking if it was intact. :shrugs:

 

[axis1]

I wish there was a picture of that snake before he died so we could see if he 'looked' fat.

Good point hypnoctopus!

But I appreciate the dialogue and corresponding information daddio, as I surely don't want Bozo to go before his time, ESPECIALLY due to something I did! He's not even CIRCLING THE DRAIN at THIS point and is only 8 years old. I also believe he was the sire of Lilly's double clutch this past summer, since they were all snows of sorts and the only hatchling resembling my other adult male (Chili-Pepper) was hatched last year (Ozzy, who at 14 months & 200 grams is no slouch himself)! All in all, my snakes seem to have pretty good genes and produce relatively healthy offspring, but people will think there's HAMBURGER in the WATER here if I don't cut down on ALL their diets soon! YIKES! :eek1:

Therefore, based upon the feedback you guys have given me, it's jumbo mice for Bozo and the other adult snakes and regular adult mice for Ozzy, at least for the near future. Many thanks to all who have responded! Your time and feedback have been greatly appreciated!!