Question?

[dellywatts]

I was just wondering if a snake will try and eat a prey item that is too big for it? What would happen if they did?
The reason i ask is that i sometimes worry that i am giving Jake feeds too big for him.
What do others think he should be eating? He is about 1m long and 1 1/2 years old.

[SlothHead]

They can attempt to eat something that is too big. However, most prey shapes, mean that if they can get the head down, they can generally get the rest down.

If however, they found that they got part of it down and couldnt get the rest down as it was too large etc, they can force it back out, regurge basically

having said this though. i had read something about a african rock python dieing due to asphixiation, essentially the prey item was too large, squashing down the wind pipe.

I dont think though that you would have any troubles at home

[dellywatts]

Thanks for the reply. I generally tend to judge what he can eat by the size of the rats head.

[serpenttongue]

Yes, absolutely. Snakes will rarely consider the size of the prey, the just pick up the scent and thats enough for them to go into feeding mode and swallow whatevers presented to them.

If the prey is definately too big for the snake then they usually regurgitate the meal half way through swallowing it. There are also cases where the snake manages to swallow the meal but then half an hour later or even several hours later they regurgitate the meal as it's just too big for them to hold down.

For a snake that's 1m long i would be giving it fully grown adult mice or young rats. Prey sizes that create a reasonable bulge in the snakes gut.

[dellywatts]

At the moment i am feeding him a medium to small sized adult rat every 3-4 weeks. Is this too big? Not often enough? He will usually wait for more food for a few hours after eating. 3 weeks after he has fed then he starts wait in ambush position for his next feed so i will either make him wait an extra week or give him a feed.
Here is a pic of his last feed.

[serpenttongue]

I personally would be feeding it a slightly smaller meal and feed more often. But since you're using meals of this size then i think its wise to feed every 3-4 weeks, as you're doing.

[TrueBlue]

the main trouble with feeding large prey items is that it dramatically increases the chance of the animal developing canker, ie it only needs to slightly tear the mouth and get a bit of dirt/fur in there and canker can be the result.

[x_aussie_bloke_x]

so just take it easy thats what i say lol

[dellywatts]

hmmmm....maybe i will switch to smaller items but more frequently. He hasn't always had such big items. For about 6 months he wouldn't touch a rat so he only had a mouse. Then when he got onto rats i have increased the feed.