Amongst snake owners and professional animal keeping\ninstitutions, there has been controversy regarding the feeding live prey\ndebate. Officially, it is not illegal, under the 1911 Act, to feed live\nvertebrate to reptiles unless you cause it unnecessary suffering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just because snakes are used to feeding on live prey in the\nwild, it should not be assumed that they need to be fed live prey in captivity;\nfeeding live prey should only be a last resort. Frozen food is much more\nbeneficial for snakes anyway and here are a few reasons why:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Live prey can pose a serious threat to your snake, as well\nas yourself. Some are willing to defend themselves and will put up a fight,\nlike bite or scratch and leave defensive wounds that can take time to heal.\nAlso, if the live prey is not eaten immediately, there is a risk of attack\nlater on or a chance of the live prey escaping into your home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Due to being kept in a confined space, your snake will not\nfeel relaxed with another animal in their space. Sudden movements may startle\nor alarm your snake and if they start to feel threatened, they will be\nextremely hesitant to eat their food.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One of the main advantages of feeding your snake frozen prey\nis that you won\u2019t have to see the live prey suffer. Frozen prey has been\nhumanely euthanised so it will not have to endure unnecessary pain and anguish.\nAlthough this is present in the wild, that is an essential part of life, it is\nnot essential when snakes are kept in captivity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Freezing kills many parasites that can be present in prey,\nso there is no risk of your snake being exposed to any illness or disease. As\nwell as this, as live prey is more susceptible to injuring your snake, even if\nit\u2019s just a minor scratch, this leaves them vulnerable to infections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Out of convenience, frozen prey is easier to store than live\nprey. Live prey requires a large amount of space as well as maintenance and\ncare. Frozen prey only requires a freezer for storage and can be removed as and\nwhen is needed. Also, with frozen prey, a large supply can be maintained with\nminimal effort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As mentioned before, snakes are used to being predators but,\nwhen kept in captivity, they will easily transition to frozen prey. In the\nwild, it is not uncommon for them to scavenge or eat prey that has already been\nkilled, so frozen prey is not so different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Kiezebrink, we supply frozen reptile food<\/a> like mice<\/a>, day old chicks<\/a>, rats<\/a> and other rodents<\/a>. If you have any further questions or queries about feeding your snake, don\u2019t hesitate to contact us<\/a> or look around our shop, <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Amongst snake owners and professional animal keeping institutions, there has been controversy regarding the feeding live prey debate. Officially, it is not illegal, under the 1911 Act, to feed live vertebrate to reptiles unless you cause it unnecessary suffering. Just because snakes are used to feeding on live prey in the wild, it should not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":236,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":237,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235\/revisions\/237"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kbanimalfoods.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}