I rarely have to leave them in for long either. Usually they have eaten with a half hour to an hour.
I feed my Arizona mountain kingsnake boi in a box away from his cage. I have since I got him 9 years ago and it seems to have basically trained him that box=food. He goes into food mode and rattles his tail whenever I put him in the box and it is the cutest thing to see him so excited. 
Box/cup feeding seems to work a lot of the time with colubrids, but it doesn’t work too well with BPs and the like. Maybe it is because BPs wait around for their food in the wild, and king snakes/other colubrids hunt for their prey?
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I think colubrids like corns and kings (might as well include rats as well) are simply less picky about how they eat. They are all called garbage disposals for a reason. Always ready to eat. Just gotta shove it in their faces first lol
I use cup feeding extensively when raising baby boas. It works great.
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Ok, so I’ve bumped her warm spot down to 90, I’ve tried cup feeding, I’ve tried scenting with tuna, I’ve tried both warmed up and live pinkies and this girl just doesn’t want any of it. I know she initially had to be kept on lizards, and while I’ve tried scenting feeders with one of my own live pet lizards, it didn’t seem to do much for her.
I’m wondering if I should bite the bullet and try a whole lizard as a feeder, or alternatively, if anyone knew offhand if MBKs go for reptilinks? I see they have both frog and iguana ones on their website. Failing that, is an anole a suitable feeder lizard? I want to avoid them because of the parasite load but if I have to I will.
I cannot speak for MBKs but I have a number of snakes that take links pretty readily. Where are you located? If you are anywhere near me I can probably provide you with a couple
As for the anole… Rather that feed the anole maybe try this: Euthanize the anole and then freeze it. After a couple days, take it out of the freezer and break/cut it into pieces. Take one of these pieces and dice it into a fine paste. Add about an equal volume of water to the paste and freeze it again. Take the lizard slurry out of the freezer and thaw it out enough to dunk a pinkie in it. Try feeding with that pink,
This is how I have converted GBKs in the past.
And if you do not want to euthanize the anole you can just break its tail off and use the tail to make the slurry
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Haha, sounds almost like cooking! I could definitely try that. I’d probably do that first before feeding whole anoles (I really don’t want to feed anoles, I find them very annoying little lizards haha) And you’re very kind to offer, I’m all the way in North Dakota so I’m fairly far-flung from most others in the reptile hobby.
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Yeah… That is a bit of a drive from VA LOL
Let us know how it goes and we will keep trying to come up with ideas to help 
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I know with my MBK she had refused food a couple times. Turns out, the only reason why she didnt eat was due to me not “playing” with the mouse more. Once I started moving the mouse more and making it seem like a live prey item, she takes every time without a problem. Ive noticed that most colubrids are pretty much garbage disposals like you said, my brooks king seems to only like live (i do freshly killed so there’s not a chance of him getting injured) I had tried f/t with him at first but he just refused it flat out.
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Ok, so far none of my tricks have got her feeding again yet, not even live anoles. Before I cave and bring her to the vet, I wanted an opinion on whether or not that reptaboost stuff or other appetite stimulants are worth a try. The bottle says it works for corn snakes, but the bottle says a lot of things. I’m not eager to force a syringe into her tiny little baby mouth willy nilly, especially not if it won’t help. But a $15 thing of vitamins is more affordable than a $100 exam fee for the exotic vet.
Can you post a pic of the animal? As long as it is not losing weight and looking bad you might just be best off waiting it out.
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I think she LOOKS ok, she almost looks like she’s got a wide spot in her. I’m worried she’s stopped up.
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She looks about like what mine looks who’s a freaking chow Hound. She could probably be a little bigger but she’s not like… Starving.
Yeah, that animal does not look like she is anywhere close to being in the force-feed area. I would just let her be for now. Keep her supplied with an easily accessible water source and maybe try feeding again in a month.
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UPDATE: I added a bit of repta-boost vitamins to her water dish, and she’s started going to the bathroom again finally (though her ‘leavings’ are much smaller and less frequent than her usual) so I think her system is finally “moving” again. Haven’t tried feeding her but I’ll have some fresh pinky mice to try as soon as my mice drop their litters in a week or so.
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Sad update, but maybe a medically interesting one.
The animal never did feed for me again. She had an unusual wide spot in her body that progressed to a large pair of ugly lumps that kept getting bigger. The veterinarian recommended against surgical intervention on a snake so small so we opted for a humane euthanasia and a necropsy.
The necropsy revealed the slightly wide spot that became a very ugly set of lumps was actually an intussusception, a condition in which the digestive tract folds up into itself like a telescope. She had some bacteria present in her stomach but we cannot say for sure whether this was an infection that caused the issue, or an infection that occurred because of the issue. There was some potential for parasitic causes as well, which may have been more likely because she had to be fed anoles as a hatchling when she wouldn’t take mice.
An animal has to have phenominally bad luck for this to happen (the sphinchters in the stomach have to grab part of the stomach and pull it through basically) and once it occurred she was basically doomed as she wasn’t a very good surgery candidate. So no amount of corrected husbandry or different prey items could have fixed it. I’m very sad I couldn’t have helped her, but the autopsy at least made me feel more at ease that euthanasia was the kindest option for her and that it wasn’t something that was anybody’s fault. I hope I have better luck with other colubrid friends in the future.
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Omg I’m so sorry for your loss! I couldn’t imagine the frustration and heartache. Thanks for the bit of interesting info. though. That’s gotta be a long shot of a happenstance. At least you gave her a good life and happy home for as long as she was healthy.
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Very disappointing for you, sorry to hear it! It is interesting to see the information, sounds like a pretty bizarre set of circumstances.
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Terribly sorry to hear this was the outcome but, as you said, at least you have the peace of mind knowing that it was nothing that you did wrong.
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