Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

[MichiganLady]

I bought my first Red Tail Boa a week ago.  I was told she was approx. 7 wks old and not had her first shed (she's aprox 22" long).  They said not to feed her until she had her first shed, is this true?  I've searched around and found no reference to this thus far.  She has been circling the cage and 'rubbing' her nose on the glass and stretching her mouth about every 2 days but no evidence of her eyes becoming opaque yet.  I monitor her humidity and temps constantly.  

This is my first snake so I've been reading everything I can about RTB's.  I have a few frozen pinkie mice on hand (store was out of fuzzy rats and I wanted to have something on hand when it was time to feed).  Should I wait til she shed's until I feed her?  

[tatdaddy]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

Hello,
I just got my second snake from clay last week and, he sent me the records that he had keep on my snake. In the feeding part Clay didn't feed untill my snake had shed for the first time. After the first shed he ate like a champ. Nice looking little guy you have there. Good luck.

Joshua

[ClayEnglish]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

While it is true that I don't generally offer food until after the first shed, that is because the first shed happens 9 or 10 days after they are born.

9 to 10 days. First shed. Just like clockwork.

It is not feasable that the boa could be 7 weeks old, and has not shed, or has not eaten anything, unless there are serious problems involved.

Either the age prediction is way off or someone has not kept any records of the actual events.

We certainly would not wait 7 weeks before attempting to feed a baby boa.

[MichiganLady]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

Based on her length, is there any way to tell approximately how old she is? I had wondered if they truly knew her actual age, could it be they meant 7 days? I have been very nervous and worried about *not* feeding her. Could she be possibly 7 days at 22"?? I have wanted to feed her but from what I was told I had been hesitant. The next RTB I get I will definately come here to purchase. I have read such great things about the snakes offered here. Should I try offering her a pinkie mouse now?

[ClayEnglish]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

22 inches is certainly within the average length of newborn boa constrictors. From the pictures it doesn't appear that she is in a pre-shed state, so I would offer her the pinkie and see if she responds. By the way, if a baby newborn boa were to eat on day 2 of life, there is not a sound from heaven that says "You have broken the boa feeding code by feeding before the 1st shed. We take away all your boa constrictor rights to ownership". This is simply NOT an exact science. What I can tell you from experience is that most babies just don't seem interested until after the first shed. Almost like they are born in the pre-shed state and feel very vunerable, and they are not starving anyway, as they were very well "fed" from the mother in preperation for this time.

Unfortunately without detailed records there is just no way to know. Everything at this point is a guess.

[Doug]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

hi,
what are your temps and what are you using for heat,
your boa looks alittle dry.
   I always try to keep the ambients at least 82 in the cage. No cool spots, does she have a large water dish to soak in, be sure to keep it on the cool side ps the cool side should be at 82 deg. try a little smaller food item if she''s not feeding, she may have only been fed on one type of food and your presenting a new food type.
 Be sure she can hide on the warmer side and the cooler side.
describe you cage in detail.
  never feed in cage with wood bark she may swallow some and get it stuck on her teeth or worse injest  the wood and this can lead to a bowel obstruction.
 and if all else fails you better have her checked by a vet

psps be sure your vet likes and treats herps routinely
here's a post of good herp vets
[ftp]http://www.herpvetconnection.com/[/ftp]
do you know a good herp vet in your area.

  them babies are real easy to upset, once they grow a bit its a lot easier to keep.
  doug
good luck keep us posted.
     

[MichiganLady]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

Hi,

I'm using a 29 gal tank and because of it's height I had a bit of a problem at first getting the heat regulated. I use an UTH that covers aprox. half of the tanks bottom and an 150watt day/nite red heat lamp. The warm side is around 87 1" above the subtrate, the cool side between 80-82 during the day. Night temps drop to 78-80 on the cool side and around 82 on the warm side. Currently we're using the recycled wood pulp paper type subtrate.





I had her for about 2 days when I moved her from a 10gal to the 29 gal (it will take awhile before we get the 40 gal long setup together). Humidity wasn't a problem in the 10 gal, but the 29 gal has been troublesome. I mist her at least 3-4 times a day, and struggled to keep the humidity above 50%. Early this morning I placed a wet hand towel on top of the tank and humidity levels are maintaining around 62percent. Her water dish is slightly closer to the warm side. I have never seen her soak in the dish as of yet, she pretty much just slides over it and is on her way.

She'll migrate to the cooler side for the greater part of the day and warmer part at night. She'll hang from the tree or plant to reach the warmer temps. Because of the height I had to change from the 75 to 150watt bulb to get temps up.

She's located inbetween the kitchen & the living room on a "half-wall". The tank covers 90% of the half wall, but overlaps an inch or so on each side, think that has been a factor in the problems with the 29gal tank as well.

I placed her in a large cardboard box to try & get her to feed last night with a pinkie mouse and she showed no interest in it. She struck at it once when we first offered it, but after that she would have nothing to do with it. (i'm just wondering if she was just startled). I pulled out a 2nd pinkie mouse that was smaller thinking the 1st might be too large, but she still wasn't interested.

Any suggestions on this setup? I'll try and offer her the pinkie again tonight and keep trying. I hate the fact I don't know when she was fed & what she was fed. Perhaps she was fed fuzzy rats instead, thinking of picking one up and giving that a try. Any other suggestions?

Thanks so much for your help!

~karen

[Red]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

Trying thing's different is probley going to be the way that you get the boa to eat... Now when you put the pinky mouse in the box did you stand there and try to watch...? I know both of my boas are different one will only eat if you stand there and watch. and the other will not eat inless you put him in a box and cover it with a towl and walk away... I tryed to cover it and stay there it did not work... so try so different thing's and may-be you will get it right... One suggestion is to try one thing at a time... so you know what worked...
Eric aka...Red

[Doug]

Re: Baby RT Boa Only Feed After 1st Shed??

HI,
I think red's on to something, many snakes are scared of their owners at first. I use a small coleman cooler for feeding drilled a couple 1/4 inch holes in the lid ,it locks the lid on if the handle is down. Put the snake in wait 10 mins and then add the food.



This 1 year old male  guyana is searching for food and I haven't even thawed it yet, he saw the cooler and thought it was time to eat.. hehe he now yanks it out of my hand when I put him in his feeder,, jeeze give me a second to release that rat....
Leave them alone in the cooler for an hour if their feeling picky . Leave the room, I would only do this with pinkies or fuzzie rats or forzen thawed doa rats., we will cover feeding frozen thawed later.Try feeding at dusk thats when a lot of the reptiles iinstinctively feed or hunt.,after feeding in the cooler a couple times your snake may actually become hungry in the cooler before the food item is added, a sort of trained response., I usally gently dump the now full snake back into his cage and leave him alone for a couple days, after which he's a friendly snake again. Note:.They can be grumpier than normal once that feeding response is working, I ve only been bit during them feeding days S.F.M. Stupid feeding mistakes..

     I think you having problems with humidty because your light is creating a chimmney effect and sucking the humidty out of the cage,Due to the fact heat rises and tends to pull the moisture out of the cage. had the same problem with 40 critters.
made some handy heat savers for the cage from cheap wall insulation and a over head heat pad from big apple really cheap


cover the cage with a dry brown towel so its looks acceptable
 I can maintain humidty between 70-90% for days without spraying any water. Your substrate may be insulating the floor from the UTH heat I wouldn't put much more that 1/2 inch in the cage at any one point.

  Ps the uth and the over head heat pad are tied into a thermostat set for ambients of 82 deg 1 inch form the floor the floor is warmer on the warm side, I also put the over head on the warm side. The uth will hit about 110 under the tank and cool down to 98 with this set up, my snakes love to lay on the uth after eating with only 5 or 6 pieces or layers of newspaper between them then the glass and the uth.. this aids that digestion thingy..
 e-mail  me if you want more details on ordering the over head  heat pad I think was only 28.00 at big apple. If the snake is hanging out on top of the hide or the tree he can still bask in the synthetic sunlite.. hehe 8)
doug