Frozen Rodents?

[Gregavi]

Hi, I'm a newbie to this forum and have a quick question about my garter snake. I have read that one of the preferred foods is frozen/thawed baby mice. I wasn't aware that there was a frozen section in the wild. Why would they prefer frozen/thawed when captive but obviously don't have that choice in the wild? When we were kids, we had many, many snakes (King, Gopher, Racer, Garter) and fed them live rats, mice, lizards, fish, frogs etc. That seemed logical then and still does today. Everything they ate was alive. In fact, I seem to remember them refusing eating something when it was dead. I know the freezing probably kills parasites and such, but it seems like a better diet would be the diet they would get in nature. Just curious.

Thanks in advance.

PS
I will be posting photos of my snake to see if someone can help me sex my pet as to help my 9YO daughter name him/her.

[infernalis]

[infernalis]

To answer your question, keeping pinkies in the freezer is very convenient, you don't have to feed them, they don't make any noise, and whenever you need one, just thaw and serve.

I have also bred and raised mice, and it's a mess, it's hard work, and my snakes don't seem to really prefer a live mouse over a thawed mouse.

final thought, Garter snakes swallow them alive, they do not kill their food like constrictors or venomous do, they just gulp it down alive.

[Invisible Snake]

Hi and welcome to the forum. The main thing about frozen baby mice is that it is extremely convenient for us and it is from what I've read a balanced nutritious meal. In my experience most garters aren't particularly fond of pinkies so I have to scent them with a little fish filet juice.

[Gregavi]

Thanks to all for the replies. I would rather use live food because part of reason to have a snake is to watch what happens in nature. Isn't that why we watch "Animal Planet"?

Could you explain in detail ReptileGeek the scenting with 'fish filet juice'. Like where you get it and how much you use.

Thanks

[chris-uk]

Welcome to the forum.

Frozen/thawed mice have no chance of injuring your snake. As they don't care whether the pinkies are alive or thawed it seems like the safer and therefore best approach.

[katach]

Welcome to the forum family! We use pinkies frozen because of convenience and reduced risk of injury. We have many snakes and buy in bulk.

[infernalis]

Thanks to all for the replies. I would rather use live food because part of reason to have a snake is to watch what happens in nature. Isn't that why we watch "Animal Planet"?

If that's the case, you better dump in some parasites, add a few predators that eat snakes and give yourself that well rounded "natural" experience.

There is nothing "natural" about keeping a wild animal in a cage.

[Invisible Snake]

Hey Gregavi, basically what i do is cut off a small piece of any type of frozen fish filet, place it in a small ziplock bag, let it thaw and once it has thawed completely I just squeeze the fish filet while still in the ziplock bag until it becomes mushy and then I take a thawed pinky and rub its head on the mushy fish filet. Hope this post helped, if you have anymore questions feel free to ask.

Check out the sites caresheet for which fishes are safe to feed garter snakes and I know what you mean by wanting to feed your snakes live food and watching them hunt, I like that too so a few times a month I feed my garters guppies in a water bowl.

[chris-uk]

If you need more convincing that live feeding isn't a good thing take a look at the first post in this thread over on RFUK :
And this is why feeding live is oft frowned upon. - Reptile Forums

There's nothing natural about a snake in a tank, and unless it's a huge tank you aren't going to see any natural hunting behaviour, so why would anyone risk injuring their snake? I'd be gutted if anything happened to any of my snakes, and don't know anyone over here that would consider feeding a live rodent - maybe that has something to do with us Europeans having to pay good money for our garters rather than picking one up in the garden?