from mice to rats

[ninjarider777]

Ok so my snake is no where near big enough to start feeding on rats yet, but I was wondering wahts the best way to transfer from mice to rats. I prefer live feeding too so keep that in mind. "responsible" live feeding that is.

[rabernet]

When you're ready to make the switch, "tough love" worked best for me. If my snakes had good weight on them, I only offered small rats to them, week after week, until they decided that they were hungry enough to take them. If you give in and go to mice, you have to start over.

[frankykeno]

I'd did the same as Robin's described above. I made sure I had a good stock of rat pups/weans that were just a tad bigger than the adult mice they were used to, that the snakes were healthy and had good weight on them and just never brought another mouse in the house. I purposefully skipped their next scheduled feed to get them really geared up to eat then the next week it was all about rats.

The longest hold out mouse eater was I think 3 weeks of refusals before she decided that rat was pretty good eating after all. The others went 1 or 2 weeks then ate.

[frankykeno]

I'd did the same as Robin's described above. I made sure I had a good stock of rat pups/weans that were just a tad bigger than the adult mice they were used to, that the snakes were healthy and had good weight on them and just never brought another mouse in the house. I purposefully skipped their next scheduled feed to get them really geared up to eat then the next week is was all about rats.

The longest hold out mouse eater was I think 3 weeks of refusals before she decided that rat was pretty good eating after all. The others went 1 or 2 weeks then ate. A few ate rat the first time it was offered.

[naba2002]

i fed live large adult mice, then offered a small rat n mitch jus looked at me as if to say ok thats for u now wheres my mouse? he wouldnt even strike at it. so i fed him a mouse that was slightly smaller than he was used to the next day. once he was sched to eat again i offered the rat and BAM! he seemed real angry at it like he knew that was the reason he got a tiny mouse instead of a nice fat one hehehehe. good luck!

[beardieguy]

what i did was have the guy put some bedding from the mouse cage and put it in with my live rat.it worked like a charm the only thing is my bp never refused food exept for the thawed ones i tried so i dont know if its just that mine didnt care if it was a rat but its worth a try.i did that for 4 feedings then stopped getting mouse bedding.