! Hatchling feeding tips and proper temps and enclosure / feeding methods

[royalserpentsss]

Note: Add two images here. Change ‘data-direction-horizontal’ to ‘data-direction-vertical’ for a vertical slider.
C

**Hi all, so I just hatched my first clutch of 4 healthy babies. They came out on day 52.

I beleive I ID them correctly please let me know if you see something different.

Pairing was pastel banana clown male o a leopard pastel yellowbelly female**

3 males no banana !???

1. Pastel leopard het clown male
2. Pastel leopard yb hey clown
3. Super pastel leopard possible yb hey clown female. (Holdback(
4. 4. Yellowbelly ? Het clown.

So they were born on August 10 they shed their skin around August 18. I have tried to feed them once Frozen thaw hopper mice absolutely none of them were interested. I tried offering it to them directly in the tub and I’ve also tried putting them in a small dark box separate for a half hour and then offering the food from the top tongues. None of them even showed any interest.

So everyone please don’t yell at me, but I have all four babies and an FB 70 adult size tub. It is absolutely loaded with hides at least three on each side and a few in the middle basking spot is about 5 to 7 inches wide and as wide as the tub, so the back part of each tub surface temperature usually ranges from 88 to 92 the air temperature usually stays around 83 to 86 and all the way in the front of each tub. The cool side always remains 78 to 82.

is it better to feed outside tub for now. Put them in a dark small box with some paper towels and then give them half hour to settle down then offer the prey?

I will be putting them all into their own small tubs on a shelf by next week, in the mean time I was just trying to get them started.

The one that went to my friend, who yes is a breeder , has eaten the night I gave it to him. Live fizzy rat. And has eaten again for us. So things are good there. I would never give a baby up without it having several meals.

Apologizes I’m getting used to MM interface and controls and looks like I typed to fast and was clicking things k should have and it really
Messed with my words and the format of my writing. That’s where the confusion came from.

I was really mostly just looking for help identifying the babies as well as curious about how large of a basking spot needs to be 88-92 in a fb70 tub. Because I have 2 3” heat panels built in specially. One inch apart each of them. So basically 7” of the back of my tubs d the width of the tub is always 88-92.

Depending when and where you measure from.

So I was making sure that I wasn’t overheating my tubs. The surface temp of the rest of the tub is 82-85 everywhere else. And in the front of each tub and in cool hides 78-82. Warmer in middle racks.

It’s been only almost 3 weeks but starting to get worried. How long can hatchling go with no food ?

I can place a Tub on top on top of the rack which I have a heat pad set to 88-93 as well and this way her ambient and cool side temps
Will be in mid to high 70s instead of 83-85. Since it’s going to take on my ambient room temp instead of the temp inside the rack.
to have done all this for years to loose them.

One pastel leopard went to his new
Home
Last night because the person is a close friend and breeder and already got him eating , before he even picked him up. He’s not ate 2x about to be 3x tonight.

So I have 3 to get feeding.

My axanthic Lemonblast female 2 years old , male pastel banana clown 2 years and the mom 3 years old all in the same rack on different shelves and eat great. Well the male only eats live.

But that at least means my
Temps are good right ? Never had health issues.

Sometimes I worry my warm side is either too cold or too hot. Unless digesting or shedding they lay around the hide which is about 84 instead of inside where it’s 88-92.

But the tubs 33” long 16” wide. The back10” is covered with basking spot so 1/3 the tub. Then the rest is water dish then small area of cool side. Surface temps stay 76-82 cool side. Air temps around 77-80. I have a side panel set to 81 to keep cool side warm when it’s cold in my rooom.

I’m hoping I am not providing too much heat. Usually their body temp is 84 when in warm side , 80-83 in cool hide. And 88-91 when they are in the warm hide. Shooting the temp gun directly at their bodies.

Does it sound like they all have a good gradient ? So air temp in first 1/3 of
Tub 77-82. Middle before heat panels is 82-85. Then back air temps 83-86 with surface basking
Temp inside warm hides is 88-92
I don’t do a night drop. Should I turn the basking spot off at night ? Or at
Least lower it? Or could just drop the whole room temp.

Please any input on feeding advice. Hatchling enclosures and feeding tricks. Input
On my ambient and surface temperatures and the area of the tubs they take
Up.

Most of
My older snakes pretty often move back
And forth between each side so that’s a good sign. Just
Never catch them in warm
hide too long. I put gove thermometer in there. From 6 am - 6 am 24 hours.

It ranged as low as 86 in warm hide up to 90. Air temp. Surface temps are always fluctuating depends on thermostat and room temp. My thermostat is set to 93. Which gives me the correct temps in the tub.

Although very top tub doesn’t get as warm since there’s no shelf
On top of it with a heat pad. So I put a heat pad on cool side above the rack to help keep his cool side warm and not get affected by room temps.

My room in summer ranges from 74-80 through the day.

Winter stays around 74-75 cuz I have a thermostat on my space heater. So in the winter, I have much more steady temperatures since I can keep the room at a steady temperature, but in the summer because of the air conditioner, it kind of goes up and down, but only a few degrees but it tends to give me a lot of anxiety and I’m always switching things up I saw that switching to Coco apparently can help I use aspen because my humidity is naturally so high 75 to 90% without doing anything I’ve never had a single bad shed so I’m afraid if I did, I would not let them at all

Thanks in advance ! Please help me out.

[armiyana]

There is… a lot to unpack here. I may not be able to get to all of it but I’m going to try before heading off for bed. And blast off a couple of bullet points for now.

• Please do not accidently cook you female in a shoebox in the bigger tub. These babies should all be individually housed in a smaller appropriately sized rack or shoeboxes on a shelf with 3" heat tape. BPs are shy and reclusive ambush hunters, so moving them to other tubs to try feeding can stress them out more even as babies. A small tub or shoebox is a great size to have them feed safe and secure without having to fight for the hides or move to where they are comfortable.

• Is there a specific reason for the communal keeping? If space is a concern, breeding may need to be off the table for a bit until the proper enclosures are available.

• personally I feel 92 is too warm. I try to keep mine to 90 at most and hover around 88-89. 92 is hot enough to leave no leeway for accidents.

• I don’t feed my hatchlings until at least 4 days after they shed. They are housed together in a tub until they shed then moved into individual tubs. That 4-5 days is time to settle in and then I offer a live hopper mouse or a live rat fuzzy. Once they’ve taken 2 live meals they can usually be coaxed into trying a frozen thaw, but every hatchling is different.

• It’s generally a poor breeding practice to send non-feeding hatchlings off unless you are very close friends with another breeder and that’s who’s getting them. I don’t know how much experience the baby’s new owner has, but generally 3 meals is my lowest bar for sales. Hatchlings that haven’t eaten are very risky since you don’t know if there’s an issue with them digesting and such.

• as far as IDs go, was there possibly a 2nd sire? 4 eggs is a low number to say for sure but do you have a photo of dad as well just in case? Oddly I just hit 3:3 bananas on a pewter het pied x banana het pied, so 4 non-bananas isn’t too far of a stretch either.

Can you post photos of the babys post shed? Just so it’s easier to see colors and possibly belly photos? It could be me, But I’m hesitant to say leopard on the super pastel. I’ve seen some wonky Super pastels and the chaining I expect the leopard to bring just doesn’t look visible in the photos here. I could be wrong because I’m a little too bleary atm.

Hopefully someone else will be by with some more advice.

[chesterhf]

I’m a little concerned that you jumped into breeding without having a good setup/plan for hatchlings and how to care for them.

Some thoughts:

Take the female out of the small tub and put her in the FB70 adult size bin. That’s the size she needs at minimum and you’ll want her to be comfortable and back on food, because she’s probably very hungry

Separate out the babies and put them each in their own individual small bin, ideally with a small baby hide and a small water bowl. Feed them in there, do not move them somewhere else to feed.

As for temps this whole long paragraph is confusing to read and broken up into weird half sentences, but I keep my hot side at 88 for both hatchlings and adults and have never had an issue. It doesn’t need to be complicated

@royalserpentsss

I don’t have a way to get live hoppers. Only live adult mice.

I’ve never tried to get hatchlings started on frozen thawed, so hopefully someone else can give you advice on that, but I’d try thawing a mouse fuzzy or hopper to body temp and offering it with tongs or leaving it in the bin in front of the hide for them and see if either works. Although if the little summary on your storefront that you linked is correct and you live in Philadephia, you should have no problem finding live feeders nearby. The whole area has plenty of reptile people.

Letting hatchlings go before they’ve taken a meal isn’t really a good practice and I’d avoid it in the future, athough in this case it might be best to try and reach out to a local breeder who knows what they’re doing and to see if they can help you and be a source of feeders.

[akmorphs]

If you haven’t had issues with temperatures and your snakes have been acting like snakes with no issues - then don’t overthink it and worry about it now.

Move the mom back to her big tub.
Move the babies to individual smaller tubs (Walmart sells a 10pack for $6)
Heat the f/t hopper to about 118 - 120 (based on head) and offer
Feed individually, not together, and do not move them from their tub

If you have about $200 laying around I highly suggest you buy this moving forward if you plan to continue on breeding, and only breed when you can properly maintain adequate care for babies and adult snakes

[t_h_wyman]

There is a lot to unpack here but Christina, Hilary, and Anna have tackled the lion’s share so I am not going to rehash it. I do very strongly advocate that you heed their collective wisdom and experience

The only place where I, personally, deviate from anything they have said is that I will keep hatchlings together communally until after their first shed and I begin feeding. I do not due this due to space limitations (I have four to five empty racks sitting around at any given time) but because there is enough evidence in the primary literature that the babies of many denning species remain congregated for a period of time after hatching/birth and there are some indications that that communal behaviour can contribute to a better start at feeding. But again, that is just what I do personally and I am not saying it is the only or best way to do it, it is just what works for me

[royalserpentsss]

Thanks everyone for the replies. I apologize about my post and the way it was written. Thanks a lot Siri lol.

I see now that it’s hard to understand. To clarify things : Mom is is a FB 70 tub. Same tub she incubated in , except
Cleaned out and fresh bedding and her hides are back. Mom ate a medium f/t rat 2 days after being soaked and separated from babies.
She also just shed last week and ate again a couple nights ago. She’s already gained over 100 grams back. She’s doing great.

I was not planning on breeding the leopard pastel yellowbelly mom this year again. She’s getting at least a year off before I start highway projects using her.

I have a female Axanthic Lemonblast , she’s 1100g. She probably could breed by
November - January but I think I’m skipping this year entirely.

The reason I have the hatchlings together in a fb 70 tub is because I have no room.

That last of my 4 shelf AP rack is for the super pastel leopard female I’m keeping. Which now I really hope she is that morph. Since someone in here mentioned she may not have leopard. That was the goal here.

Here is a pic of mom and dad. And more pics of the babies.

The baby I gave to his new home at the night he was picked up so that worked out great. Yes the person is a close friend and I wouldn’t have given one up before they have had a few meals otherwise.

The other 3 will be put into their own bins on a shelf with heat tape , I just worry about their ambient cool side temp being too low 75-77 maybe.

For now they are still in their FB 70 tub. They seem fine. No
Feeding response yet. They all shed fully without any problems 7 days after they were
Born. Feeding attempt number 2 will be tomorrow night. F/t hoppers again. This time scented with live mice bedding.

By this time next week they will all be in their small tubs separated.

Once I sell the yelllowbelly and the pastel leopard YB the super pastel leopard het clown stays with me. And I always put babies. By themselves ! In large tubs. Just
Many many hides. I have never personally had a problem with it.

So I have listed them , but will not be letting them go until they have had a few meals each. This is my
First time really selling through MorphMarket and creating profiles and talking with other breeders.

I have been breeding reptiles as a hobby over 20 years. Just never got into it in a business sense until now.

And this is my
First time
Doing maternal incubation too. Which went amazing.

Thanks everyone for the help. Hopefully I have some good luck with feeding this week.

[royalserpentsss]

Sorry for the confusion. Having a hard time typing and talk to text using my
Phone through MorphMarket.

I know what I’m doing. Hatchlings will be separated within a couple days. Mom is already eating again. Everyone is in their own tubs. That was a mistype.

Here’s some more pics of dad and babies.

Really just need help ID babies and mostly went into such depth with my temps because I get crazy when it comes to temperatures and how exactly they should be and how much area they should take up. You always hear about temps. Well how much space should be the basking temp? How about the ambient ? Cool side ? Things like that is what I’m wondering. Trying to really study in depth what a captive ball Python needs to thrive in its lifetime.

Now I just bred, did maternal incubation for first time , and got 4 beautiful healthy babies without really doing a thing. Except giving them the right environment.

So that is all I’m concerned in doing now. Just really studying and using data I have collected to perfect their temps and lighting as well as feeding and frequency and enclosure size.

Thanks for the help. Here’s some more pics of babies and dad and mom. Also my other female , axanthic Lemonblast.

[royalserpentsss]

      

[royalserpentsss]

[armiyana]

Lol, your momma snake shouldn’t be able to fit in a shoebox well, so I understood you meant the hatchling female. It just seemed odd because she doesn’t look like her brothers so if anything she should have had free roam with them.

I keep my snakes at around 85 degrees max on the warm side. The hot spot is 88-89. Cool side usually hovers around 76 for me.

@royalserpentsss

the super pastel leopard female I’m keeping. Which now I really hope she is that morph. Since someone in here mentioned she may not have leopard. That was the goal here.

That was me. Without seeing the bellys of the pastel leopard boys I would be a little bad at IDing YB.
The 3 boy is a YB
The female looks like a super pastel YB. Her pattern doesn’t have the stripes or chaining pattern I associate with pastel leopards.

@akmorphs do you think s. Pastel YB Leo?

[caron]

@royalserpentsss Do you have access to live? As long as the babies are in separate bins you could try instead of ft. A little movement by the warm rodent might start the feeding response……

[noodlehaus]

I don’t have anything to add here in regards to IDs or husbandry, but I am going to suggest you give MorphMarket’s Rules, Policies, and Beliefs as well as Selling sections an in-depth read. In your case I’d specifically take a look at the “Not Ready” Animal Sales section, because at your membership level, unless MM staff have told you otherwise, this is a rules violation:

@royalserpentsss

So I have listed them , but will not be letting them go until they have had a few meals each.

In order to sell an animal that isn’t feeding yet, you must have at least a basic level membership, and they must have their maturity level set to “Not ready”.

[royalserpentsss]

Thank you. I was not aware of this. Now I know. Appreciate the advice.