I feed my youngster once a week, and wish he had been on rats when I got him! I have time though, and he takes his mice nicely every week without problems. I really think the aggresive reputation is over exagerated, mine was skittish for about a week, and has to date never struck or bitten. Even the 4.5ft one I bought the other week, which was sold as aggresive seems to be nice enough.
They do like to be up high, so I prefer to give a vertical thermal gradient to the setup. Works for me.
This one seems happy in a 60hx60wx45d exo at the moment. They are very slender bodied as young (I have seen some massive older specimens) so seem happy in this.