Hi there!
My little Julia isn’t very little any more. She’s now 8 months old and loves to go out and exercise (choice based handling exclusively) and eats like a monster.
But the last months temperatures have gone down (and there’s no indoor heating in Portugal) so she’s been deciding to stay in her terrarium.
This means, all those rats and quails she’s been eating are turning into rolls. She’s weighing 415g as of today that she asked out.
Should I limit her portions (f/t rat/quail 10-15% of her weight every 10 or so days) while the cold months pass and she’s ready to go out again? Or am I exaggerating and she’s not fat, she’s just thicc.
Unless they are severely underweight, rolls are gonna appear when they bend like that, especially in the upper part of their body. Rolls are only an issue if they happen when they are only slightly bending, and usually in the lower part body. Your girl doesn’t really have any rolls in the lower part, so she’s most likely fine. I find that it’s easier to tell whether they’re too chunky by looking at their spine. Their body should be shaped more or less like an equilateral triangle. If the spine is too sharp, they’re underweight, and if the spine is barely showing they’re overweight. Also, their lower body should taper into the tail, there shouldn’t be any noticable chunk around the cloaca area if that makes sense
Once she turns a year, you can start feeding her every 14 days, and then every three weeks once she’s two, and once a month once she reaches three, and her growth starts slowing down a lot
Ohh ok that’s great to know! I checked her spine and she looks kinda like a round-ish triangle and her tail tapers, so I can assume she’s in good weight.
I’ll stick to every 10 days until she’s 1, and then continue with the suggested meal plan
Anyways, once winter softens she’ll be working out those muscles again
Thank you so much for the advice!
Yeah, if your snake re-evolves hips, you’re feeding it too much.
Julia looks to be in healthy condition. As mentioned, healthy snakes will have some “rolls” or skin folds when they sharply bend their body. Think of how you have “rolls” when you bend your elbow, or when you bend at the waist. Everyone is going to have some soft tissue folds there, even if they’re in amazing shape.