# Urgent: improper thawing of mouse for snake. what do i do??



## reptilereptilereptile (6 mo ago)

i fed my ball python today and realized hours later i do not think it was fully thawed. it saw in a plastic bag in hot water for only about 30min. my python is about 6 years old and at least three feet. the rodent was a medium to large mouse. he usually gets medium rats but the store didn’t have any. the mouse is considerably smaller and was definitely at least partially thawed. i put warm water in his bowl and have made sure his temperatures are a bit warmer than usual. how serious do we think this situation is?


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## Malc (Oct 27, 2009)

If it doesn't agree with him he'll throw it back up.

Just be more focussed. It's better to defrost the rodents at room temperature rather than rapid defrosting in hot water. Take the rodents out of the freezer in the morning and place them in a plastic tub and cover to prevent flies getting to them. leave them for a good 8 hours to defrost and then warm them with a hairdryer for a few minutes before offering. This does two things, wafts the scent around so the snake gets switched on for feeding, and secondly gives the python a nice warm target to home in on.


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## ian14 (Jan 2, 2008)

I think this could be a bit of "summer holiday trolling". Bizarrely the OP sent me a PM asking the same question


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