A note concerning pre-packaged frozen fish

[infernalis]

With all of the questionable keepers out there that will buy the cheapest stuff they can find, I think you'd see a LOT more issues with this if it WAS what was killing off snakes in batches. I personally still think it's got a lot to do with fish simply being contaminated with stuff as they are grown... seeing as our planet's shot to hell, I don't really buy into the whole "organic" movement as there realistically are no places untouched by human scum anymore. I've moved away from feeding fish filets because a whole prey diet is certainly a lot more ideal than filets with artificial supplements and it's not cost prohibitive anyways.

How many of those "questionable" keepers pay attention.

We have had plenty of those "oh my snake just died" threads, "I don't know why"...

I agree with the human scum statement, but I'm quite sure there are MANY unreported deaths, and many "I don't know what happened" deaths.

Further, if the preservatives are prayed on with nozzles at the packaging plant, a dribble, a sputter or a clogged up spray nozzle suddenly clearing could (and will) deposit higher concentrations of the chemical on the fish being packaged.

One calibration at the plant goes out of spec, and suddenly a whole batch or just a few inches of a batch of fish gets a larger dose of detergent than the rest of the line.

Heck, after reading the material safety data sheets Stefan posted up, I'm not sure I would want to eat that fish myself.

When many of us feed babies, we tend to chop up fish, how many of those "failure to thrive" babies actually fell victim to the chemical preservatives in the fish??

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

Failure to thrive happens regardless of what kinds of food items offered... No matter what kind of keeper you are, you are going to notice if a couple of your snakes die overnight after eating some fish. And you are right, if I were you I wouldn't eat the fish either... In fact avoid any meat at a grocery store! Meats don't belong on a conveyor belt under a series of sprayers. Like I said, if one is really worried about it, I would just avoid feeding filets... Kind of like thiaminase! There are plenty of feeding options that are out there.

[kerensa]

How many of those "questionable" keepers pay attention.

We have had plenty of those "oh my snake just died" threads, "I don't know why"...

I agree with the human scum statement, but I'm quite sure there are MANY unreported deaths, and many "I don't know what happened" deaths.

Further, if the preservatives are prayed on with nozzles at the packaging plant, a dribble, a sputter or a clogged up spray nozzle suddenly clearing could (and will) deposit higher concentrations of the chemical on the fish being packaged.

One calibration at the plant goes out of spec, and suddenly a whole batch or just a few inches of a batch of fish gets a larger dose of detergent than the rest of the line.

Heck, after reading the material safety data sheets Stefan posted up, I'm not sure I would want to eat that fish myself.

When many of us feed babies, we tend to chop up fish, how many of those "failure to thrive" babies actually fell victim to the chemical preservatives in the fish??

I used to manage a pet store and I obviously got in plenty of reptiles in the beginning. After all I adore them, why wouldn't I carry them? I switched to stocking large quantities of gold fish and hamsters and pushing them. the reason they are easy, and most people will come in saying "my son wants an iguana? isn't that a lizard?" and leave with the hamster and be fine, the son may not be thrilled, but he isn't likely to be the one buying the food and not caring if its healthy. I had tons of people who came in to replace reptiles. (we were the closest place for a 4 hour drive to buy reptiles at the time) and tell me that their iguana (they were the rage at the time) had died, they didn't know why. "It had been doing so well and lived a really long time. oh at least a year." I quickly decided that since for every owner that cared and actually did even minimal research, I saw over a hundred who didn't, that the average person shouldn't be trusted with anything more then a feeder goldfish- and then that only because its gonna die within a couple years anyway (they've horrible genetics)

so yeah I can easily believe there are a lot people feeding their snakes whatever comes to hand, even if that looks like obvious poison to us.

anyone here is much more likely to avoid something that *might* hurt their precious pets, then say the budget conscious mother of three buying cheap food for a snake she never really wanted in the house anyway...

I try to see the point of view of the parents etc. but really I still feel in the end that a gold fish is the most they should be trusted with, and that a hamster (horrible little monsters) is an acceptable substitute if it looks like the kid in question will give a crap and wants something to handle. (although a hamster might cure that fast enough)

[Sonya610]

I only buy fish at the counter but virtually all of it is frozen and then thawed and sold as fresh. Does anyone know if the "fresh pre-frozen" counter fish also contains this? Or only fish that was packaged for long term freezing in the frozen foods section? I backed off fish a while ago and stuck with pinkies, just reintroduced a bit of tilapia the other night.