I’ve always started my babies on live rat pups! Get turned off seeing nice animals fed on mice, what are if any benefits to starting them on mice? don’t give me this sheeze about mice having more movement, baby ball pythons cue in perfectly off rat pup heat signature? Why start them on mice?
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I prefer rats, 100%
I did have one very frustrating hatchling 2 years ago though who hatched at 27g, didn’t absorb much yolk and was just weak, so immediately was assist fed a fresh pinky mouse just to get something in her with as little struggle as possible.
She was assist fed a couple times after that. Rat pinkies, since I breed them as feeders. When she finally did take her first meal on her own 3 months later it was because I broke down and finally picked up a hopper mouse. She had been refusing rat pups and pinks. She took the hopper after a couple minutes. I fed her one more after that and then was able to get her on rats no problem.
A hatchling last year was refusing rat pups while her 5 other siblings had already eaten more than one meal. Before she lost too much weight and needed to be assist fed, I tried her with a hopper and she practically flew across the tub at it. No idea why. Just took a bit longer to switch her to rats but now she’s doing great.
So I think sometimes there is some weird ingrained preference for them… But thankfully I’ve been able to get all my babys changed over no problem.
Right now I have a trio of mice breeding because unfortunately one of my new pickups is being particularly stubborn on switching and he’s small enough that I didn’t want to stress him out more while he was in quarantine. I might try to wait him out now that he’s clear and try and switch him over as well.
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I know some people start on mice because that’s what’s readily available for them. They also might have a tiny boob egg hatching come out at like 12 grams, and a mouse pinky is the only thing available to feed it (unless they have asf pinks).
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Some animals really do trigger better off of one than the other
As Anna noted, live hopper/small mice are often more readily available than live rat pups for a lot of people. It is not “sheeze” that there is a difference in both the heat signature and the motion of the prey item and some animals are thrown by those differences. Further, there is a “smell” difference between them. Mice “smell” more akin to the natural prey that millions of years of evolution have made instinctual to them
As for me personally, I start and keep all my males on mice because even adult males do not need a meal any larger than a large mouse and it is significantly cheaper to buy 50 large mice than it is to buy 50 x-small rats
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My 2000+g boy loves his small rats. 
He’s not the norm in BPs though. I agree that 95% of males probably don’t need large meals at all. My other males all eat weaned rats mostly.
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Another benefit of feeding my males only mice, none of them even approach 2000g 
My largest male might be 1200. Most are closer to 900
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How often do you feed your adult males?
I feed mine all rats besides the one that is picky and only eats mice, but I may consider swapping all of my adult males to mice if it’s a viable, cost-effective option. I know most if not all of them will take mice, they’re little piggies 
As for my babies, I usually start them off on hopper mice and then switch them to rats later on. Hoppers move around more and I generally have gotten a better feeding response out of them. Once they’re eating solid it’s fairly easy to get them swapped over.
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I got him as a hatchling ‘captive hatched’ back in 2000 so for all I know he could be volta. Lol
All my other males are sub 1200g
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I generally see at expos that people start them on live rat pups. I prefer to feed rats in general because out of my five ball pythons, I have two that are about 5 feet long and they’d need like three mice a week but a nice jumbo rat will them for a while. I have actually kept a bag of slightly freezer burned fuzzies for fussy eaters. Works well getting them onto frozen (don’t want to breed feeders so I just get frozen) as they give off a stronger smell. I definitely prefer rats in the long run though.
Every 10-14 days, depending on time of year
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Okay, yeah sounds about right. I’ve been feeding mine a weaned rat every 2 weeks or so, swapping them to mice probably wouldn’t make too much of a difference in regards to the meal size.
Thank you!
That’s an alarmingly large amount of food for a ball python, I’d strongly recommend scaling down
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Agreed. I find there are very few reasons to ever feed a ball pythons anything bigger than a small rat, even my breeder females don’t get bigger than a small rat
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I always assumed that at least part of the reason is just that mice seem to be more readily available than rat pups in many areas. The smallest f/t rats I can buy at most pet shops in my area are small adult rats. The only place that sells rat pup feeders is a pet shop I try to avoid because the owner is a bit of a creep. 
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I use them specifically for my very very large females. These girls are 3000+ grams and I get my jumbos on the lower end. I buy them local and they range from 250-280 grams usually. Not the typical 350+ gram that I buy online for my red tail. These jumbos really aren’t jumbo, they’re just labeled jumbo because it’s the biggest our local rat breeder gets her rats. Just to clarify they are frozen/thawed when purchased, in case there was confusion there since the breeder does raise them in a breeding rack live. I definitely still follow the general 1-1.25x the size of their body, never really thought about scaling down though. Is 250-280 still too much you think? Her larges are 220ish if you think I should switch to those maybe? Certainly would save me some money
I can’t get pups local either. I would just recommend buying online or stocking up at expos. I always buy a bag or two of what I need whenever I go to an expo whether it’s for a new animal or just to look around. And when I need I just buy from Big Cheese Rodents or Rodent Pro. I like Big Cheese more I think and they make it really easy to buy in bulk and or the exact number of rodents you want. When I get a new animal I usually buy like a bag of 30 or so pups from them because I often waste a few the first few days trying to move from live to frozen. And then once they outgrow them I do twice a week until there gone or if I still have a ton of the pups left I vacuum seal and leave for next time.
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Way too much, imo. This is great advice for hatchlings or even up until they’re yearling size. After that this rule of thumb is going to cause over feeding issues. I think you’ll find changing your feeding structure you likely won’t get animals that are 3,000+ grams, unless they’re quite a bit older.
How frequently are you feeding? As I mentioned, I feed my breeder females small rats. They get 1 rat every 2 weeks during the off season, and sometimes during breeding season I’ll do 1 a week.
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What is your opinion on Str8Fire Reptiles animals?
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I don’t really have enough snakes (or freezer space) to do online orders. My blood python did fine switching from jumbo mice to the smallest small rats I could get, and I suspect my boa will make that switch easily as well when the time comes. Thus far I’ve avoided species that tend to be picky eaters.
That’s far larger than I would ever feed, and I suspect your snakes are 3000+ grams not because they’re mature and well developed adults, but rather are just obese. The problem with the whole “feed 1.25x their size” rule is that if the snake is already fat, you’re going to end up feeding far larger than they need, which will make them fatter, so you’ll end up feeding even larger. I’ve seen too many Kielbasa shaped “breeder ball pythons” due to overfeeding.
My adult females (2000+ grams) get a medium every few weeks (maybe slightly more frequently if they’re gravid nearing ovulation) , and my adult males get a small every few weeks. Everybody is healthy, fertile and has a great body condition
Overfeeding is very, very prevelant in the hobby to the point where people almost expect ball pythons to look completely round, and it really isn’t healthy for them.
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