Sona is an Orange Glow Golden Child. She is very stunning especially her eyes
. Don’t let her regal looks fool you, she absolutely destroys her rack every time by tearing apart the paper towels for no reason
. If there actually is a reason to that please tell me! She also is very food driven. One time my mother made the mistake of putting her hand in the rack to pick her up while there were rats in her other hand and Sona struck her hand and didn’t let go. It was a pretty bad bite and my mom still hasn’t gotten feeling back in her thumb but her hand is ok now! We also have not had any incidents since then.
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Sounds like she’s very antsy, and I see signs of past pushing between her eyes as well. She’s on the slimmer side, could perhaps use some bigger meals, as well as a larger enclosure. Perhaps those changes could help settle her down. At that size I was feeding meals that left a big lump with scale separation, or anything 15-30% of body weight. Retics are one of the few snakes I don’t hesitate to feed more, they really seem to need it. Oh and double check her temps, she could be hot.
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Ok thanks! I’ll make sure to check in her! The only problem with feeding sometimes is that we buy frozen rats from reptile expos and those can get expensive..
And yea she love pushing on everything she sees for some reason. Might be that she’s hungry like you said
If this is an issue where an animal is underfed that is where you need to consider rehoming. Especially if this is a mainland and will be eating large rabbits at adult sizes.
Even my 8ft retics are eating baby pigs right now and my female gets rodent snacks in between. And the pigs are cheaper to feed than rabbits and rats where I am.
And I don’t want to sound rude… this is a young snake. If your mother was already bitten badly enough to loose feeling while doing something ridiculous as trying to pick her up with food on her? How will you deal with her larger size? These are not easy to work with snakes like a ball python or cornsnake. They have killed owners before. A keeper died in 2024 after trying to medicate her sick 13ft retic while home alone.
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Omg, I hadn’t heard of that!!! Where did you see that? I definitely would have expected some damage at that size, but a death is honestly shocking to me. 
Really goes to show how careful you should be…having a big docile girl really spoils me.
It’s an unfortunate reality of keeping. If things are tight on so many fronts as I’ve seen across multiple of your posts, perhaps you all should consider down sizing until you can appropriately provide for everyone. I get there are hard times, I’ve been through them. I have had some rough moves, had to rehome animals and have less than stellar set ups, but if snakes are pushing and aren’t getting needs met you risk having sick snakes which can only make the burden worse.
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It’s not that we can’t take care of them it’s that once we move we will then have the space to get them the large enclosures we were looking at.
You can look up Amanda Ruth Black. I thought there was a more recent one with an influencer or tiktoker, but I can’t find that one.
If she continues pushing like that after you try feeding her a little more, I would recommend trying to find her space sooner than later. She could really do some damage to herself. It’s easy for them to impact a tooth and they can swell up and cause infections and feeding issues
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I just want to make sure everyone knows. My mother and I have spent quite some time researching these snakes before we buy them. We have done everything we can to make sure that they are fed and comfortable. One of things is that I’m still learning from my mother how to properly feed them. As for the housing we are waiting to move to another place soon and when we do we are going to get Dream and Sona 6-5 foot wide enclosures for them.
I am making sure to read your comments so I can help them best as possible. Thank you for your help.
I don’t keep retics, but it is pretty apparent that enclosure size and setup is the first thing to consider.
I’m not sure if you’re aware that minimum (minimum) enclosure size is ‘length of snake = perimeter / 2’ – so a six foot snake needs an enclosure with a minimum of a 12’ perimeter (for example, a 4’ x 2’ footprint). That’s bare minimum dimensions – people who advocate for more are not wrong – and doesn’t take into account species that need more room than the norm.
The sooner they can all be upgraded the better. If the feeder situation isn’t money related, I would go ahead and plan needed changes for the next pick up. Maybe consider feeding her two of her normal meals, even if they’re bigger than the weight range I gave. You can always go longer between feedings, and she’ll likely stay calmer a bit longer.
That’s so unfortunate! Such an avoidable tragedy.
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[quote=“armiyana, post:5, topic:64142”]
If this is an issue where an animal is underfed that is where you need to consider rehoming. Especially if this is a mainland and will be eating large rabbits at adult sizes.
[/quote]
I am offering constructive criticism to you and to others reading this post. If you cannot afford to feed an animal the appropriate amount of food it needs to maintain optimal health you are ethically responsible for finding a suitable home that can. Pure and simple. Same goes for a suitable enclosure for said animal that meets the needs for its optimal health, The animal should not have to wait until funds are available