I’m a new reptile owner and have had this sweet girl for five weeks now. She seems well adjusted - stays in her hide during the day, explores at night, etc.
From what I can tell, she’s got pretty much everything she needs. Temperatures are from 78 on the cold side to 90 on the warm, humidity stays above 65% at all times (is usually around 70%), her water is changed out every two days, and in general her life here is about as stable and predictable as it gets.
… But she won’t eat. She’s coming up on 2 years of age and was fed live before I got her. I had heard that changing over to f/t can be a bit of a pain but I feel like I’m getting absolutely nowhere here. I’ve tried everything from trying to feed her while she’s exploring to trying while she’s in her hide, making the rat dance a little bit, increasing the temps temporarily in her enclosure, blow drying the rat to heat up the head, leaving the rat in the enclosure for a few hours, heating it under the DHP in the hide, the list goes on, but the closest I get is her moving her head towards the rat, then ultimately backing away into her hide. I’ve also not yet handled her, and am intending to wait until after at least two successful feeds.
I understand this is a big change from live prey, but I really, really do not want to feed live unless I absolutely have to. If I can mitigate a safety concern with the teeth and claws and all, I’d like to.
On the other hand, I’m worried that her lack of sustenance is going to become a safety issue as well.
First question - any tips on how to get her to switch over? I have searched and Googled this nonstop, but maybe one of you have something I haven’t seen yet.
Second - at what point do I give in and get a live rat so she can (hopefully) get some food in her? It’s now been 5 weeks since a successful feed. I can get her out to weigh if needed, but I’m not looking to stress her out anymore than I have to. How many weeks can we play the “who is more stubborn” game?
You’re going to need to be a LOT more patient to switch that snake over if it doesn’t want to switch. In its current body condition it doesn’t need food for 10-12 months. It will eventually take a frozen rodent, but your patience and its metabolism have no common ground. In the early days of ball python’s it was fairly common for a ball python to not eat for 8-12-18 months. They have heroically efficient metabolisms. Personally, I wouldn’t even offer it food for another few weeks or a month if you’re intent on switching it over. Something that will further complicate your journey is the snake appears obese right now so it has a lot of calories to burn.
I understand your concerns too, but like Don said they can go months without eating and be fine (depending on body condition and pre-existing health), your BP for the most part looks to be a good weight though a full body photo would give us a better idea of whats going on.
It would be good to weigh her as well in grams to see where she’s at weight wise and see what she should be eating, a general rule of thumb is to feed her 10% body weight every 10-14 days. Weighing her is also important to establish where she’s at in case she suddenly starts losing a lot of weight which is a health concern for a non-feeding snake. Weighing around every 2-4 weeks is reccomended.
Definitely going to need to be patient, and you may have to give in and feed a few live meals while you work with your snake to switch, as some methods work with feeding a small live meal and then offering a f/t meal while the snake is still in feeding mode.
I personally try to feed all of my non-hatchling BPs f/t meals as much as I can. I have 1 adult female who was fed live her whole life before I owned her and to this day she has never reguarded f/t prey as food, and I have another female that ate f/t as a baby before I got her and ate f/t prey for me for over a year and suddenly cut it cold turkey and wont take anything but live now (she’s 4 years old now), and then I have some Ball Pythons who eat both f/t and live prey (rare occasions) intermittently without a problem. So some BPs are fickle in that reguard… but its definitely not impossible to switch them, it just takes a lot of time meaning months to possibly years of work.
If 90°F is the ambient temp and not a basking spot temp that is way too high. You’ll want to bump that ambient temperature down to 85-86°F, but the cool end temp is suitable.
If this is ambient humidity it is too high, you’ll want to aim for 40-50% ambient humidity and offer humid hides only in a few places that are around 65% humidity.
If you have to inevitably feed live, monitor the feeding- As in do not leave the snake unattended with live prey whatsoever. Have some kind of barrier ready to keep the rat from biting/scratching your snake, I use a small snake hook for example for my live prey feedings to keep away bites.
Be patient, give a month or so in between feedings, feed in a calm dark environment (at night is even more preferable since they are nocturnal). If, for example, your snake is eating small-med rats- try to feed them a live rat pup and then go in and offer a second f/t prey item while the snake is still in feeding mode and see if she’ll take. Leave the f/t prey item infront of her hide overnight. Do not touch her or rearrange her enclosure at all excluding water changes and spot cleaning. Do not try to feed her in a seperate container- this may work with other species but Ball Pythons are more prone to stress this way.
Considering she is 2 y/o and has eaten live her whole life supposedly, it may take months for her to even begin to make any progress. My girl who cut f/t cold turkey took 7 months to get to eat anything at all and my other female as said before has never made any progress with f/t in the 2 yeara I’ve had her.
Patience is key.
If at any time she starts rapidly dropping weight out of nowhere, she will need a vet visit to rule out health issues.
I hope you can eventually make some progress with your girl.
That image might not have been fair to her body , here’s another one just in case. Again, new owner, so if you still think she’s a bit chunky that would definitely make sense given her (lack of) eating habits.
Thank you for the advice - actually really encouraging knowing that I potentially have a lot more time to make this switch happen. I’ve been trying every week - probably going to just let her chill out for a few weeks now and try again then, give her some time to relax a bit more.
Thank you so much for the huge reply and wealth of information!
A full body photo is extremely challenging to achieve. She’s very shy, but here’s the best I can give you. This was what she looked like a month ago - her weight hasn’t changed any noticeable amount since.
I am perfectly willing to weigh her, but I’ve also heard to not handle ball pythons until a successful feed or two because of additional stress. So you’re thinking maybe override that advice and get a good weight on her for now, then track it every 2-4 weeks or so until she eats?
I’m up for that. I can be as patient as I need to be, I just want to make sure my own patience isn’t going to become a health issue for her. If we’re not making any headway at all and I start getting some alarming weight loss (which I guess “alarming” depends on her weight now), I’ll probably chuck in a live one and supervise while I keep offering f/t.
So this is where it gets confusing for me. 90 degrees F is the ambient temps on the warm side, but she spends her entire day inside the warm hide. She only comes out at night to explore, and occasionally spends a few minutes in the cool hide before switching back. I’m using PVC hides from Blackbox, which seem to be extremely insulating.
I have two probes to measure temperature in there. One is suspended about 6-8 inches below (offset a bit) under the RHP and the other is suspended about 4-5 inches below (again, offset a bit) under the DHP. The RHP is the “warm” side, the DHP is the “cool” side. These aren’t set in stone; I’m perfectly willing to switch what side is warm and cool, but I went with the RHP being “warm” because I was worried the RHP would just nuke the top of the hide in an effort to make that side “warm”.
RHP probe: 90 F
DHP probe: 82 F
Here’s some temp readings I’ve got at this exact moment using an Etekcity IR thermometer.
Under warm hide: 84 F
Top of warm hide: 93 F
Substrate in front of warm hide: 83 F
Under cool hide: 75 F
Top of cool hide: 81 F
Substrate in front of cool hide: 80 F
Substrate in middle: anywhere from 84-89 F
Humidity is 68%
Completely open to changing this to reflect something you think may be better for her! It seems like many breeders just keep entire rooms at an ambient of what you said - 83-86 or so - and they manage just fine. My concern is that if I drop the temps any at all on the cool side, I’ll end up having a cool hide around 72 degrees. For the warm side, same concern - if I drop the temps, it’ll end up being about 78-80 degrees in that hide. With her spending huge swaths of the day in those hides, I was trying to prioritize the temperatures in there - but again, I’m extremely willing to make changes on this.
This is something I’ve heard so many different things about. Some folks say go for 70+, some say 60+, some others (generally here on MM) say the ranges you gave are fine, and others say to just echo their native habitat humidity, which is often around 65+, so that’s what I went with on my end. I’m guessing as long as they have somewhere to go with that level of humidity (a humid hide in the center or so?), that’s fine, but is there any harm in having humidity higher than 40-50%? It’s not a “wet” environment in there by any stretch, for what it’s worth, Inside her warm/cool hides, the substrate is completely dry as well.
I’ve always tried at night, but something I want to know is when is the best time to try at night? Do I wait until she is completely out of her hides and exploring, or do I wait until she’s poking her head out of her hide a bit? I’ve heard different things on this. Some people say them being completely out of their hides is “hunting behavior” and that’s the time to feed. Other say that them being in their hides with their head out is actually “hunting behavior” because they are ambush predators.
As for this, all I’ve tried so far are f/t small rats. I can certainly give this a go and see what happens! For the last two times I tried f/t small rats, I did leave them in front of her hide overnight. She didn’t seem to care for it, as it was pretty obvious she’d slithered right past the thing to go explore later in the night . I have not touched her (although I may need to now to get weight?) and all I’ve done with her enclosure is exactly what you said. I cleaned out some poop in her cool hide in the first week and change water every 2-3 days, but that’s it. I do try to feed her in her enclosure.
This is actually really encouraging . My main worry through all of this is that I’m starving the poor girl, which is the last thing I want to do, and I’d switch back to live to prevent that if I have to. If this is a lengthy process, I’m in it for the long haul and can be as patient as possible, as long as her health is good with it.
Yeah the warm hide is the temperature the air should be on the warm side. You want an air temp gradient of 75-85 to keep it simple. Air temps at 90 can cause dehydration and potentially neurological issues is maintained for a long period.
The basking temp should only be around 88-90. Anything over 90 can increase the risks of a bit .
The warm hide is a comfortable middle temp and most likely why they spend most time there and is possibly just a soothing shape she feel comfortable cozying up inside
I’d try a thawed adult mouse to try and break her fast and get her metabolism going again, and then offer a rat the next meal. Or you could try rubbing a mouse on a rat first and then move to an unscented tat.
If you have to feed live, I’d go a mouse over a small rat to reduce the risk.
She’s highly suspicious of the thermometers whenever I put them in .
How is this though? It’s hanging around 86.5 F on top of her warm hide, which is under the RHP. In front of the hide at substrate level, it’s about 82. Still too warm?
In the middle, it’s sitting at 84-85, but moves down to 78 on the cool side.
Not at all rushing to breed. I guess this means she has plenty of time to be picky then huh?
Any advantage in going with something substantially smaller than a small rat? Something like a rat pup, or even a fuzzy? Thinking maybe that’s a bit less intimidating of a meal if she’s being picky about it.
So that I’m not just curmudgeonly telling you that your snake is chunky I’ll explain a bit.
Snakes like birds do not store fat intramuscularly. They store it subcutaneously in the form of lipid pads. Because of this method of storage, they are more prone to obesity and it’s related issues. Excess lipid storage puts pressure on internal organs, and eventually also leads to lipid storage in the liver. Hepatic lipidosis (fatty liver disease) is one of the most common causes of death among ‘well cared for’ reptiles.
In the photo the subcutaneous fat is circled in blue.
, here’s another one just in case. Again, new owner, so if you still think she’s a bit chunky that would definitely make sense given her (lack of) eating habits.
. My main worry through all of this is that I’m starving the poor girl, which is the last thing I want to do, and I’d switch back to live to prevent that if I have to. If this is a lengthy process, I’m in it for the long haul and can be as patient as possible, as long as her health is good with it.
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