Rejected... :(

[darkbloodwyvern]

OK, cross your fingers for me, I got Ariadne to eat a small weanling-looking rat, but the pet store is out of them, so I ordered some from a rat company online. Here's hoping she will eat these guys. I just tried to feed her a random rat pup i found hiding in the freezer and she flat out rejected it. I am nervous that she won't want any of the guys I dropped $50 on and my other ball is not a rat eater. if anyone lives in northern CA around redding or sacramento and breeds rats as feeders, PLEASE let me know if i can buy some from you if this doesn't work out... :P It sucks living behind the redwood Curtain of Humboldt County. None of the pet stores have any decent rat feeders, all too big for my baby... :(
I really hope i don't have to resort to breeding my own, my landlord would so not approve and there are too many cats in the house to be too optimistic about being able to keep the rats not stressed....

sorry if i sound like a whiner, but I'm pretty sure she's ready to eat, i just don't have the right things to offer and it is really stressing me out! I am prepared to spend what I have to to get her eating, it's just getting a little tight right now, and the local snake owners are no help, I just can't beleive that no one within an hour's drive of this bloody place can help me out!!!
thanks for reading, hope you are doing better than myself... :P

[Mooing Tricycle]

why not try finding a smaller gerbil or a hampster at this point? Hell even several larger mice would do it for ya.

[Cat_72]

why not try finding a smaller gerbil or a hampster at this point? Hell even several larger mice would do it for ya.

Eeesch, the last thing you'd want to do is get her stuck on gerbils if she's already eating mice or rats! And while it's true that feeding multiple mice will suffice, it tends to get more expensive than just being able to feed one rat at a meal. If she can get her eating well on rats now, it will be that much easier when she IS big enough to eat the ones available at the pet stores, and even better if she will take the frozen/thawed.

If the rat pup was hiding in the back of the freezer, it may not have been smelled "fresh". Make sure you have it nice and warm before attempting to feed her, and wiggling it around for them often helps too.

Good luck! :)

[HerpKeeperVA]

I wouldn't worry too much about the cats stressing the rats as long as they're in a secure enclosure. I've always had cats, and as a child I had pet rats and mice (funny how things end up, lol), and those things would reproduce rapidly anyways. The rats would get used to the cat, and eventually no even be phased by the furry blob staring at them from the top of their tank. Do you by chance have a spare closet that you could empty out to house your breeding colony? The cats couldn't bother them there, and they'd be out of sight from visitors. Fortunately in my apartment, my laundry room is a basement like room, on the first floor behind the building (I live in a quadroplex, or whatever you wish to call it), and I have plenty of room to set up my rats there. The only problem would be needing to use a small space heater to keep it warm during the winter. I just need to get in gear with the rat breeding. My group of 19 may be small compared to others, but it's getting to be expensive feeding them all at pet store prices =/

[Mooing Tricycle]

Eeesch, the last thing you'd want to do is get her stuck on gerbils if she's already eating mice or rats! And while it's true that feeding multiple mice will suffice, it tends to get more expensive than just being able to feed one rat at a meal. If she can get her eating well on rats now, it will be that much easier when she IS big enough to eat the ones available at the pet stores, and even better if she will take the frozen/thawed.

If the rat pup was hiding in the back of the freezer, it may not have been smelled "fresh". Make sure you have it nice and warm before attempting to feed her, and wiggling it around for them often helps too.

Good luck! :)


Im only suggesting it since she cannot find any rats currently. not as an all the time thing :P and it sounded as if she was having trouble getting the snake to eat.

[LadyOhh]

But if you try gerbils even once, it can change the preference forever... Dangerous ground to tread on if you aren't prepared.

[droogievesch]

i feel so bad for you! I just went through a similar situation, and I'm crossing my fingers that yours turns out better than mine. If worst comes to worst though you could offer her multiple mice, that's better than nothing! I would also check with your petstore about being able to special order in rats the right size. Most petstores won't have a problem with it, unless it's live pinks in which case they can be jerks like mine and say, "Keeping unweaned animals ties up a tank and a sellable adult, so we don't carry them period." Hopefully my little vent helped a tiny bit.

Jenna

[Cat_72]

But if you try gerbils even once, it can change the preference forever... Dangerous ground to tread on if you aren't prepared.

Exactly.

[Mooing Tricycle]

i feel so bad for you! I just went through a similar situation, and I'm crossing my fingers that yours turns out better than mine. If worst comes to worst though you could offer her multiple mice, that's better than nothing! I would also check with your petstore about being able to special order in rats the right size. Most petstores won't have a problem with it, unless it's live pinks in which case they can be jerks like mine and say, "Keeping unweaned animals ties up a tank and a sellable adult, so we don't carry them period." Hopefully my little vent helped a tiny bit.

Jenna


I agree, special ordering is really a great way to go!

[darkbloodwyvern]

I think gerbils are even harder to get here than small rats! they are illegal in CA
And hamsters are so mean and nasty in my experience, thet whacking the crap out of them might be a good stress relief. However, I ordered some rats from the Screaming Pinky that will be here on Friday.
I am pretty sure the rats she wasn't eating may have been really gross or old, because even I thought they smelled funny. At the time, i thought it was just the different "baby rat" smell versus the adult smell, but they were extra squishy compared with the others. I am hoping these new ones will be nice and appatizing. If not, if anyone likes the rats from any particular feeder company, please post their website here and I will see what they offer.
Jenna-the pet stores here seem to be just as wierd here- they will not for any reason special order something for me. The one store that did just decided this summer that they didn't feel like helping me anymore. I am pretty ticked, but I will be taking my bussiness to those who are doing stuff online. i just hope 25 pups will be enough for her to get fat enough to eat some of the small adult rats so i can use up a few sealed guys I have left over from corn snakes. here's hoping vaccum sealing keeps her food good and fresh!

[droogievesch]

I just switched all of mine over to frozen, and I rocked the University resources and got 100 or so FREE frozen rat pinks/hopper mice from the Zoology Research lab...never said I did it legally though :)

My excitement will be short lived with the arrival of two more snakes that will need to be switched.

*sigh*

But for now I have full little goobers.

Jenna

You may want to break down and buy 2 female mice and 1 male mouse and then raise the babies. They don't take long to reproduce and once she's big enough you can kill them all off and hopefully be set.

Best of luck to you and your frozen adventures.

(oh yea, I was looking through REPTILE magazine today and I noticed an ad you may be interested in. I have never delt with them, but they claim to be able to do live feeders: SOS Rodent Express (no website) e-mail is sosrodents@aol.com)

[darkbloodwyvern]

nice deal on the frozens, the things we do to keep our little brats fed :D

just to wrap this up, she doesn't take live and isn't interested in mice. live scare her and i guess mice just don't smell quite as good. I think i could trick her into eating a mouse if she has already snagged and eaten an FT rat, but as long as I can get rats from someone, i am pretty happy keeping things this way. I actually despise most rodents so raising them would be the last option, and I would only be able to do that for my male.
She is now currently pounding rats like mad, and will be getting big enough to take two at a time in amonth at this rate. I will probably be putting in another order soon.... :D

[tstrenuous10]

I wish mine would take just one a month. If it doesn't feed this time its going to be 5 weeks without eating. Starting to get frustrated/worried. Yes I know they go off feed sometimes but it still worries me. Last thing I want is to wake up and see a dead snake.