Questions about Lickity's feeding.

[Leighanne]

Ok, all this week. Tell me if I'm doing anything wrong, besides the update from fuzzies. I'm going to the Pet Store this Tuesday to sit at the freezer and do some research on sizes. What they offer in mice, in Rats, etc. I'm defiantly getting a Rat. hhhmmmm. Sunday she ate two mouse fuzzies. Lets see todays October 18th. 3:00 a.m Tuesday, last night I gave her one fuzzie. Hope that wasn't confusing. That one fuzzie just kind of happened. Jakers eats every Tuesday and I defrosted two for him initially but then was looking at him eat and thinking of sizes, and he probably could of handled it but it made me squeamish! So Lickity got the other mouse from the cup. I also want to feed her on Friday though. I wanted to give her four fuzzies. That will be a total of seven fuzzies in one week. lol Until I get to the Pet Store and getting her feeding regiment worked out, how does that feeding lay out for this week look to you guys?? To much in one week?

See I called some Pet Stores and they don't seem to offer Hoppers at least over the phone, from what I got. I can always pick out larger mice, or Rats from singles though. I'm going to have to go there and see. I've never looked before because I always knew what I need for Jakers ya know.

Once I get the appropriate size worked out it will be probably every Tuesday like Jakers to make it easier on me to remember. I'll make it simple. I never got an answer on another post to but how many is two many?? I've read the BP posts here and have read up to three mice at one time. I'm not sure myself though. lol Thank you for your info. See ya later! :)

[droogievesch]

I personally feed my hatchlings 2 mouse fuzzies every 3-4 days. The only reason I do mouse fuzzies is that they are free, and hey! free works right? Just be aware that it's harder for a snake to digest many small meals than it is for them to digest one big meal. With balls being such finicky eaters it would be my assumption that she's not going to gorge herself, so if she accepts it you might as well feed it to her. Her growth rate is also dependent on feeding, so if you want her to grow slower cut back. I don't recommend power feeding though to make them grow faster.

[Leighanne]

I agree! I don't believe in power feeding either. My concern is not getting her to grow big, or trying to keep her small for that matter. Right now its just getting some weight on her. I also agree with one big one as opposed to many smaller, but thats what I have right now until next week. Then I would like to get her on bigger prey and feed her one or two of those and stay with it. This just, well how its been going. I defiantly don't plan on having weeks like this every week. No way.

[droogievesch]

I think she's eating for a reason, and as long as you don't force it you should be fine.

[Leighanne]

Kool, Thank You! I feel bad, poor baby girl was hungry!

[Clay Davenport]

I must say that I have to disagree that multiple small prey items are more difficult to digest than one large one. I actually believe the opposite, that to smaller prey items are digested more effeciently, in terms of length of digestion, than one larger one.
The reason is a matter of surface area. Two small prey items have a greater percent of exposed surface area than one large one. This results in a larger area being exposed to the digestive system causing quicker digestion as opposed to one larger prey item, assuming total mass is equal.
This effect becomes more pronounced as the total mass of the meal increases.

This doesn't mean you should feed ten 5 gram fuzzies rather than one 50 gram mouse to a larger snake, but two 25 gram adults would be digested more quickly than a single 50 gram.

[Cat_72]

I must say that I have to disagree that multiple small prey items are more difficult to digest than one large one. I actually believe the opposite, that to smaller prey items are digested more effeciently, in terms of length of digestion, than one larger one.
The reason is a matter of surface area. Two small prey items have a greater percent of exposed surface area than one large one. This results in a larger area being exposed to the digestive system causing quicker digestion as opposed to one larger prey item, assuming total mass is equal.
This effect becomes more pronounced as the total mass of the meal increases.

This doesn't mean you should feed ten 5 gram fuzzies rather than one 50 gram mouse to a larger snake, but two 25 gram adults would be digested more quickly than a single 50 gram.

:iagree: