over feeding snakes

[Jungletrans]

One of mine has always been a fussy eater and very small for her age , until a month ago now she is ravenous and cant get enough . l have been giving her small to medium feeds every 3 - 4 days and she is growing like a chook on hormones .

[Niomi]

I have a really stupid question for you experts? Will a snake keep eating if its not hungry?

[hugsta]

I also agree with Hazzard.........nothing like s good Skaarfing I'd say.

[hornet]

i normaly feed weekly but havent fed anything for about 3 weeks now. Will go get more food and start them up again.

[Recharge]

meh, I feed when I remember to do it the youngens are every 2 weeks or so, the adults once a month or so..
all snakes have grown/are growing well, and all seem healthy with no fatso's

my adult coastals are both 2meters long and have grown up nicely (almost 5 years old now) and they were both raised the same. so I see no need to feed the youngens any differently.

[hazzard]

Originally Posted by Sdaji

Happy Skarfing/starving Remember that whatever you do, you'll have people telling you off about it unless you stay quiet

This sounds like your softing it boy! Tell us what you really think! Please :-)

[Sdaji]

Originally Posted by hazzard

This sounds like your softing it boy! Tell us what you really think! Please :-)

I've powerfed, I've 'starved'. Snakes are adaptable creatures, they cope with just about anything in the remotely reasonable range. Don't believe the hype unless you know how to filter it. The vast majority of everything you'll ever hear is a load of garbage and that's especially true of what you hear from reptile people!

Remember: no feeding multicoloured rodents to pythons! It kills them!

[cris]

Sdaji, How big is that water python that you had in a powerfeeding thread some time back?

[Pythoninfinite]

Ha - Sdaji has it one... or is it 2?

Basically juvies will put a huge amount of what they eat into growth, not fat. Graham Thompson at UWA did a lot of work on python metabolism through the various stages of digestion and during non-feeding periods. This demonstrated clearly that snakes which are unfed for longish periods can and do change their metabolism to suit the prevailing circumstances, and this prevents harm to them.

I worked with him (I had a group of 8 neonate M.s.imbricata which were unfed when I got them) and supplied these critters over a period of about 4 years as they grew, in various stages of "fedness" or unfedness", preslough, etc, and he produced some very interesting results.

I also weighed, to the gram, every food item each snake ate for the first 4 years of life, and the total food intake came to about 84kg average, per animal, over the 4 year period. Almost 650kg of rodents for 8 medium sized pythons in 4 years. They would no doubt have eaten more if offered, but the largest animal after that time was a female at about 2.9kg - not a bad size for imbricata.

So - snake metabolic rates can vary by a factor of 5 or 6 if I recall (a huge range). Basically you can feed them however you like. Juvies will grow faster if you feed them more, and adults may become excessively fat if fed very large amounts of food frequently. That's about it...

Jamie.

[nvenm8]

hahahahaha sdaji that's the best advice i have ever seen in the typed form!!! You forgot to add that the recommended housing for such a feeding regime can be located at TrueBlue's Anti-Thermostat Stand on page two. hahahahaha

[eladidare]

for the first 12 months i feed my snakes as much as they can handle, then i start to cut them down...
ive never had pin heads...

[Colin]

Originally Posted by Pythoninfinite

Basically juvies will put a huge amount of what they eat into growth, not fat. Basically you can feed them however you like. Juvies will grow faster if you feed them more, and adults may become excessively fat if fed very large amounts of food frequently. That's about it... Jamie.

And thats it in a nutshell. Interesting stuff Jamie. Are the results of that study available on the net? (link please if you have it)

[Sdaji]

cris: unfortunately, due to difficult circumstances (of my own - nothing to do with the snake) I had to stop powerfeeding her at about a year of age. She is currently about two and one half years old and something like 180-200cm long (she has grown very little in the last 18 months, although I haven't measure her). She is a picture of health. I've moved her interstate this year and not been able to watch her closely during the breeding season, but I plan to have a go at getting some babies from her next season I'll try to get around to taking some pictures of her soon.

nvenm8: just doing my job as a responsible reptile enthusiast who is keen to help others

[juliets]

Interesting, its mind boggling to think of them as wild creatures but to try look after them as best us humans can. I will take note of the overfeeding

[VixenBabe]

Although I tend to agree that young snakes would put the food into growth rather than get overweight, I cant imagine it would be good for their digestive system and other organs putting them under so much stress?