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Posted by Terry Parks on April 17, 2002 at 13:11:22:

In Reply to: Actually, Terry, .. posted by Shaky on April 17, 2002 at 10:43:31:

from the forum so long and try to catch up in one shot. I was thinking of Hurley's bairdi which are from the same breeders (Adam Block's) as mine and are a season ahead. Thanks for correcting me. Well, a LIVE mouse worked for you. I don't keep live rodents around either. I buy frozen in bulk. The snakes get thawed frozen on each feeding schedule. If a male refuses, he misses that meal and gets fed on the next schedule. Again, he gets a thawed/frozen meal. I don't like or advocate feeding live rodents to snakes. Females will get a live rodent if she refuses too many frozen/thawed feedings, expecially after laying eggs and leading up to brumation. Weight loss and gain is critical for females. If they don't gain weight back before brumation, I will likely pass them on the upcoming breeding season. Brumation and egg laying is hard on the female if they can't keep their weight up. Alot of males go off feed during certain parts of the breeding season. I imagine it allows females in the wild more opportunity for food. Try keeping hognoses if you don't already. The males will drive you nuts if not eating bothers you. They might eat once or twice after you bring them up from brumation and then shut down completely until after the females pre-egg laying shed and then shut down again up to a month before the female shuts down in preparation for brumation. Its amazing to me they can do this and not really lose weight. I'm sure there are alot of exceptions and some hognose keepers don't have this situation, but its not the norm. Since you opted to go live to trigger a feeding response, I made reference to a live pinkie working for me. A live pinkie shouldn't be able to harm the snake and the snake doesn't generally have to constrict and kill a pinkie before eating it. It's not a brutal display. If you can activate a feeding response, the snake should have the response for a little while. The snake will generally pick up a pre-killed or frozen/thawed after you get the feeding response going. Live pinkies are less expensive than hoppers and adult mice. Just my 1 cent.

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Hognoses! Shaky 04/17/02 (0)

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: from the forum so long and try to catch up in one shot. I was thinking of Hurley's bairdi which are from the same breeders (Adam Block's) as mine and are a season ahead. Thanks for correcting me. Well, a LIVE mouse worked for you. I don't keep live rodents around either. I buy frozen in bulk. The snakes get thawed frozen on each feeding schedule. If a male refuses, he misses that meal and gets fed on the next schedule. Again, he gets a thawed/frozen meal. I don't like or advocate feeding live rodents to snakes. Females will get a live rodent if she refuses too many frozen/thawed feedings, expecially after laying eggs and leading up to brumation. Weight loss and gain is critical for females. If they don't gain weight back before brumation, I will likely pass them on the upcoming breeding season. Brumation and egg laying is hard on the female if they can't keep their weight up. Alot of males go off feed during certain parts of the breeding season. I imagine it allows females in the wild more opportunity for food. Try keeping hognoses if you don't already. The males will drive you nuts if not eating bothers you. They might eat once or twice after you bring them up from brumation and then shut down completely until after the females pre-egg laying shed and then shut down again up to a month before the female shuts down in preparation for brumation. Its amazing to me they can do this and not really lose weight. I'm sure there are alot of exceptions and some hognose keepers don't have this situation, but its not the norm. Since you opted to go live to trigger a feeding response, I made reference to a live pinkie working for me. A live pinkie shouldn't be able to harm the snake and the snake doesn't generally have to constrict and kill a pinkie before eating it. It's not a brutal display. If you can activate a feeding response, the snake should have the response for a little while. The snake will generally pick up a pre-killed or frozen/thawed after you get the feeding response going. Live pinkies are less expensive than hoppers and adult mice. Just my 1 cent.

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