They are actually really easy to keep, I’m more fond of them than mice but not all of my snakes prefer ASFs so I gotta keep producing the mice
They don’t smell anywhere near as much as mice do, they work better in larger colonies of females- but their care is essentially the same. The only two downsides is they aren’t as domestic as mice… at least mine are much more prone to being flighty which makes handling difficult and I’ve heard from others that they wont hesitate to bite, mine haven’t but I wouldn’t doubt that they would. And they grow a lot slower than mice or rats…
Yeah, I’m 95% sure I’m going to jump into it, I just want to make sure I’ve got my T’s crossed and I’s dotted
I had a five tub rat rack about ten years ago which I used to breed feeders, but I quickly developed allergies and don’t want to produce on that level.
I also raised a litter of mice from a pregnant female that was shipped into the pet store I worked at as a young adult, and that single-handedly convinced me that I NEVER want to raise mice again- the smell was unbearable
But the main reason I’m considering is because I’d like a steady supply of live feeders small enough to get hatchlings started, which makes the winner clear when its between ASFs and mice
I don’t mind that they grow slowly, that honestly suits me and my small collection just fine given that most of them eat f/t small rats that I buy in bulk online. I buy the “transitional sizes” from locals so that I don’t have a large amount of the wrong size taking up space in my deep freezer, so the ASFs would ideally help cover those.
And if I don’t have any hatchlings and I start to get overrun, I can try selling extras to help offset bedding/feed/frozen feeder costs.
I live in the largest city of my state, and all the people I see advertise ASFs are 1hr+ away.
Not that I’d be relying on that, but it also wouldn’t be the end of the world if I have to fill the snoot deep-freezer/grow them out longer for my adult BPs.
Just trying to think about this from different angles before jumping in and making more work for myself
Forgive the dirty baby in this pic, they like to dump their water dish and saturate their coconut husk bedding
Is this… paradoxing? I hadn’t noticed it before and will probably wait until next shed to take some really good pics.
I’ve been handling them pretty minimally as I get them established eating, which I think is why I hadn’t noticed before.
