hi I’ve been planning on getting a ball python and though of something I haven’t done with past snakes.giving it cooked and seasoned meats as a rare treat I was wondering if this would be harmful or if the snake would even enjoy it obviously seasonings would be light and mild ( a steak or chicken with salt pepper and maybe a bit of garlic as a example) this is something I just think would be nice and I tend to bond well with my other animals when sharing food any help is apreaciated!
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Snakes don’t have the same taste receptors as us, and most alliums (garlic) are toxic to most animals that aren’t human.
I doubt salt or pepper would do the animal much good and could do harm. A snake would never naturally eat food that has been cooked and it might not be able to digest that properly, as it is evolved to eat live or raw meat.
If you want to vary up your snake’s diet and give thems some special things once in a while, different prey of the appropriate size might be interesting for your snake to try.
Ball pythons sometimes fix on one food type and one only, but you could always see if they will take things like quail reptilinks, small quails and then chicks, mice and eventually african soft furs or gerbils as well as rats…
If your snake is a good eater and you think it won’t be put off by different offerings. They’re all different about that in what limited experience I have had.
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Agreeing with athleticshoelace…I don’t know how well a snake’s digestive tract could handle a cooked meat. And it’s especially a bad idea to feed seasoned meat.
You can probably try a feeder quail or a bit of uncooked chicken thigh meat if you wanted to offer a change of pace or ‘treat’. These are all things my retics take eagerly, but ball pythons are very much a creature of habit. If you do get them stuck on something like chicken meat, you will have to make sure they are eating chicks in order to meat all the other nutrition goals that just some thigh meat can give. Another thing you can try is repti links. They’re special made sausages for snakes and lizards.
A lot of times we need to step back and really reconsider how much we are anthropomorphizing our animals. Even for a dog or cat, unseasoned meat is recommended for any ‘treats’. Seasonings that we think make food tasty can easily cause pancreatitis in a sensitive animal.
I have to be very careful about what kind of dog treats I pick up for my own dog and cook her own meals because she’s actually allergic to a lot of things in regular dog food or treats. And needed to have her gallbladder removed because of genetic issues in her breed, so fatty meats can upset her tummy as well.
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Seasoned meat is definitely a no-go… a lot of seasonings and herbs that are perfectly fine for people can be or are toxic to animals (garlic is a big one).
As for cooked meat snakes and reptiles in general aren’t evolved to eat it… cooking meat breaks down proteins and nutrients a lot that reptiles rely on to sustain themselves and it may even make digestion harder on them.
For ball pythons I’d offer them “treats” like quail/chicken chicks but I’d be careful with this because they may chose to prefer that more than their regular meals if they are fed chicks too often. A good thing you could do is even offer your BP African Soft-furred Rats if you have them readily available and are easy to get ahold of, this is their natural diet in the wild so the only downside would be just getting ahold of some (at least for me anyway, they are really hard to find where I’m from and I have to travel upwards of hours just to get a few…)
Plus Idk if theres scientific evidence that giving BP’s treats actually makes them bond with you, like a dog or cat… if you really want a good bond with your snake respect and handling is key!
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