If you’ve been looking for information on what pet pythons eat, you’ve come to the right place. Here you’ll find information on live prey, frozen/defrosted prey, and whole animals. If you have a garter or ribbon snake, be sure to read this article to learn more about how you can best feed your new pet. You can also find out about the food preferences of other snake species.
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Live prey
The best way to provide your snake with live prey is to scent the food with liquids or bedding. Brains are not suitable as prey for pet pythons. If you cannot find a live rat or mouse in your local pet store, you can purchase frozen ones online. Many sources sell frozen prey, including Big Cheese Rodents and Layne Labs.
If you can’t find live prey, you can buy frozen feeders and pre-kill them yourself. While this may be cheaper, you have to remember that live prey can injure your snake during its hunt. Pre-killed prey is difficult for snakes to digest, and it may take longer for your pet to adjust to it. If you can’t catch the prey yourself, buy frozen feeders to ease the transition.
Some snakes are finicky and may refuse to eat dead prey. Other animals may never cooperate with you, making it difficult to get them to eat something new. While it is exciting to watch your snake chase its live prey, you may end up hurting your pet. You may also have to train your snake to eat pre-killed food once it’s used to eating live prey.
Frozen/defrosted prey
While most snakes will happily eat frozen or defrosted prey, some will not. These pythons may require special feeding techniques. However, adult pythons are perfectly content with frozen/defrosted mice. Juvenile pythons may require a little time to adjust to the new diet.
For the best results, feed them pre-killed, frozen or defrosted rodents. Rats, mice, and quail are all excellent choices for feeding your pet pythons. If you don’t have time to hunt and kill your own prey, frozen or defrosted rodents are a great alternative for your pet.
Mice and rats are the most common prey for pet snakes. While some snakes don’t like them, others love the taste of meat. While mice and rats are great for most snakes, some snakes prefer frozen/defrosted mice. Before feeding your snake live prey, make sure you thaw the rodents thoroughly in the refrigerator. Some people leave the mice out at room temperature to defrost, but cover them so as not to cross-contaminate the prey.
Reptilinks
If you’ve ever wondered what snakes eat, you should know that Reptilinks are a common choice for snake feed. They’re safe for most species of snakes, and some of them are even suitable for lizards and amphibians. However, if you don’t want to feed your snakes rodents, you should look elsewhere.
Reptilinks are small sausage-like products made for reptiles. They’re made from a variety of different prey items, including meat, bones, and even hair. They’re typically sold in 100 gram links, and come packaged in vacuum-sealed packs. In the wild, Reptillinks are made from ground-up chicken, rabbit, quail, and plant meat.
Besides rodents, some snakes don’t eat rodents. If that’s the case, you should consider replacing rodents with Reptilinks. Reptilinks are whole prey ground up into sausage-like casings. These substitutes provide more calories and nutrients, and can save you money. So, what do pet pythons eat?
Whole animals
Did you know that pet pythons can eat whole animals? They do! These snakes can eat chickens, rabbits, pigs, and even humans. The only limitation to their diet is the human shoulder blades, but they do occasionally eat reptiles, crocodiles, and even fish. In addition to the fact that they eat whole animals, they are also capable of eating small pets, such as rats and mice.
The first thing you should know is the size of the prey you can feed your snake. Generally, snakes will eat anything that is about one to one and a half times the size of their bodies. This means that a snake weighing one-inch can eat a mouse of a quarter-inch. But some snakes prefer smaller prey, so it is best to avoid larger mice and rats.