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Thinking about feeding my snake some wild lizards.

R

RaidenTheAlmighty

New member
My snake is a bit picky. She isn’t very found of frozen mice but she absolutely devours freshly killed mice. This doesn’t seem like a big deal, but when you have to drive across town and pay several dollars for a mouse, it becomes a pain. This didn’t used to be a big deal, but the places selling live mice seem to growing fewer in number

However, in my area there is a large population of very large lizards. Some are over 7 inches long and quite heavy. The ground is literally crawling with these guys; in a few minutes you can easily catch 20 or more. Since I have a pretty large amount of lizards at my disposal, I was thinking about feeding them to my snake. One of them could easily sustain her for a few weeks.

What do you think?
 
Those lizards are going to harbor parasites that will be able to infect your snake. It's probably not a good idea.
 
Definitely not, wild animals can have all sorts of parasites and diseases that you won't be able to know about until it's too late. Plus I'm sure that they are nutritionally different from mice, therefore not an appropriate substitute.

It sucks that you can't find live mice closer. Maybe you can find someone who sells live mice online?If I read your post then I assume you kill the mice before you feed, right?
 
Definitely not, wild animals can have all sorts of parasites and diseases that you won't be able to know about until it's too late. Plus I'm sure that they are nutritionally different from mice, therefore not an appropriate substitute.

It sucks that you can't find live mice closer. Maybe you can find someone who sells live mice online?If I read your post then I assume you kill the mice before you feed, right?
 
What part of florida do you live? I have several friends that deal in mice in different locations.
 
Definitely not. Most wild animals have some sort of parasites or diseases. As Shiari says, create your own breeding colonies of mice as it will be cheaper than buying live mice. btw have you tried cutting the frozen mice open this normally works or rubbing the scent from chicken on it.
 
You say she isn't "fond of frozen mice". Does that mean she HAS taken F/T or that she refuses f/t? Switching to f/t really isn't very difficult if you try all the different tricks there are out there. May take a few trys but we've had a 100% success rate in switching to f/t even with a 6 year old corn who had always eaten live. BUT I have heard of snakes that WILL NOT switch. I've just never experianced it. I'd give it a shot. It's much easier to buy in bulk if you're not going to start your own colony. I'm not willing to start my own colony yet because of the smelliness and the fact that I HATE mice! Of course,the rate I'm going in just the past 6 months and I'm probably going to have to to save money!
 
You know, if you have all the lizards you need, and you can get them as long as you have the snake (it may very well prefer lizards and likely not want to switch back to mice at all), then as long as you freeze them for a couple weeks, you shouldn't have a problem. Many snakes live on a pure lizard diet in the wild. Something else to consider, lizards are much leaner and can very likely help in fecundity, helping to prevent obese animals.

Just some thoughts (and yes, I feed FT mice, with the occasional FT lizard for female alterna and annulata, corns are strictly mice and DOCs).
 
Yep if the supply is steady, I don't see why not. You'll need to store away more than you think you need in the freezer though, in case they disappear in winter. (Don't know what winters are like in FL, but that likely deserves some laughter).. Def. do like Mike says though and freeze them for awhile to kill parasites.
 
Even if you froze them, they still have a different nutritional value, and are probably not going to be a good substitute for mice, I would think.
 
VickyChaiTea said:
Even if you froze them, they still have a different nutritional value, and are probably not going to be a good substitute for mice, I would think.
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You are correct, they would have a very different nutritional value, but it would be more "natural". Many snake species, including some populations of guttata, survive, grow, live and breed on a strictly lizard diet. I know of alterna breeders who have maintained collections on solely lizards, they actually had much better fecundity than collections raised on lab mice, which have a much higher fat content.

I am not saying that you should feed lizards, only that you should not say that you shouldn't.
 
Hey Mike- I thought freezing can't kill all parasites and bacterias though? I could be wrong, but I believe heat is the only way to completely eliminate these things and wild lizards are also subject to carrying all the pesticides and fertilizers from peoples yards.
 
So if the snake is picky about FT mice, then maybe it will be picky about FT lizards, too. Or maybe not- it might like lizards enough more to not care if they are FT.
 
danielle said:
Hey Mike- I thought freezing can't kill all parasites and bacterias though? I could be wrong, but I believe heat is the only way to completely eliminate these things and wild lizards are also subject to carrying all the pesticides and fertilizers from peoples yards.
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What many, many people do not realize, is that these animals (snakes) are much more resilient than we give them credit for. That is what makes them great first time pets, they are very forgiving, especially guttata. That being said, if you know that pesticides are being sprayed in a yard, I would definitely not feed anything out of that yard. Knowing that I do not spray anything, I have no problem feeding my tarantulas yard caught insects, and if I did feed lizards I would not mind feeding out of the yard.

Nanci said:
So if the snake is picky about FT mice, then maybe it will be picky about FT lizards, too. Or maybe not- it might like lizards enough more to not care if they are FT.
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Actually, I do have one female annulata, that will only eat FT lizards, I buy them from a dealer that gets them from kids out in the country. I have no problem feeding these guys.
 
Nanci said:
So if the snake is picky about FT mice, then maybe it will be picky about FT lizards, too. Or maybe not- it might like lizards enough more to not care if they are FT.
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Very good point. It would be worth checking with a FT lizard before you start really collecting them. I don't see any problem with making use of them if it helps you to do so, but it would be a shame to waste the little guys. That many lizards mean they're probably eating a LOT of pest insects..
 
I'm just quickly scanning, but I don't believe anyone fully answered the question that if the lizards were frozen for a few weeks, would they be parasite free, or atleast safe enough to feed when thawed out?
 
ShadowStrike said:
I'm just quickly scanning, but I don't believe anyone fully answered the question that if the lizards were frozen for a few weeks, would they be parasite free, or atleast safe enough to feed when thawed out?
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Who said parasite free?
 
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