Hey everyone,
I have purchased a female ball python from a local chain store. She has settled nicely in her new environment. According to the associate she is feed on Wednesdays and is eating frozen/thawed fuzzies. She is healthy, very social, curious and overall very docile. However, she is has refused to eat. She was brought excatly a week ago. She’s not going through a shed or anything. I have noticed she likes to stare at her reflection in her tank A LOT which is something that has gotten my attention more. I remember that the associate mentioned they house their ball python together. They had three hatching in the tank but feed them separately of course. She was the last one left and was extremely shy until she was handled. Once she’s back in her tank, she goes back to staring at herself for literally hours. I have never had this issues before with my other ball pythons. Would introducing a new hatching help since she is accustomed to cohabitation? Thoughts? Please no negative comments.
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Not eating after just a week isn’t uncommon. Sometimes it can take 2 weeks. But that said…
Has she tried striking at anything when you get near the tank?
What are her temps and tank size? Photos of the enclosure can help sometimes
Staring at the glass like that to me is a sign of stress. If there’s not enough clutter or a hide she feels comfy enough to curl up in, she could be staying in a defense mode. And eating is something that makes them vulnerable.
I don’t cohab any of my hatchlings once they start eating. I don’t take them out of the enclosure to feed them. And possibly the most important part is I try not to handle them until they’ve eaten at least a couple meals.
I think once we know a little more about how she’s set up we can maybe offer more advice
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Sounds like she’s simply not fully acclimated yet. I would give her another week to adjust more then try to feed. Try not to handle her much, let her get used to her home and feeding first. Cohabitation is general causes stress with BPs; these are not social animals.
Tell us as much as you can about your setup. Enclosure type and size, heating type, temps, humidity, hides, etc. BPs are very sensitive, one off setting could be enough to cause stress throw her off feed. The move she recently experienced is definitely enough to stress her out and throw her off feed. That’s why I said give her more time to adjust. But we need to make sure your other settings are within tolerance.
The number one concern of BPs is security. They value it above food, water and correct temps. She needs a TIGHT hide on the warm side and on the cool side, preferably the same exact type of hide. You can try putting extra clutter in there too; fake plastic plant scraps from a dollar store work well. I would black out three sides of your aquarium with cardboard from the outside. That’ll make her feel more secure.
I would guess she’s not yet fully acclaimed and/or doesn’t feel secure.
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Setup info would help to make sure you are on the right track. Temp around 86, humidity around 50-60%, a hide and water dish.
One week is not unheard of. It could go up to 3 weeks if everything is correct. If you can weight it regularly it will hepl to make sure no to much weight is being lost to quickly.
Dont worry about keeping it a Wednesday feeding, as long as you keep it a set day that works for you. As it has already missed a feeding so the day does not matter to much.
Dont try to feed daily, this can stress it out. If it refuses, then tey again in a week.
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No, she hasn’t struck at anything and she’s not sitting curled up when she stares. She’s got all her essentials. Her temp is sitting at 87 with a humidity at 57%. She’s in a 20 gallon aquarium with plenty of plants. I’ll have to get photos of her habit when I get back to my place Saturday morning. I’ve been thinking they might have feed her the wrong size as she’s about 88 grams. A friend of mine has a slightly bigger female who is still eating pinkie and his weights 103 grams. Something never sounded right about her eating fuzzies since she’s tiny.
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Unless your hatchling is very small (like under 35 grams) After the first 3-5 meals out of an egg, hatchling ball pythons should not be eating rat pinkies. They should be eating fuzzy rats.
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Something with hair is better. If rats are not working, try mice.
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I apologize for the extremely late response. I’ve recently have had a lot of family issues taken place but I do have an update. It’s been about a month and she still hasn’t eaten. She has lost the slightest bit of lost weight but I’ve tried feeding her a couple of times since this post and got nothing. I’ve tried different weeks of not handling, decrease size mice, dipping the mouse into chicken broth and letting it dry in the sun, feeding in a dim environment, and the list goes on. She’s still active and has no aggressive behavior, yet lots of sign of hunger and has been patrolling her enclosure so I waited a week and tried again this past Friday yet same response.
HOWEVER, I did take a beautiful and extremely sweet female pastel highway stripe off a friend last week and she has been very interested in her. When I was spot cleaning her enclosure she managed to find her way out and into my highway stripe’s enclosure and has been doing so for the past couple of days. The enclosures are next to each and under very close supervision, the two have been almost inseparable so to speak ( sounds weird but it appears my highway stripe will search for my normal if she’s not near her or in the enclosure). Since my highway stripe has eaten this week, I decided to commit to full on cohabitation. They are currently sharing an enclosure and everything has been going extremely well so far. I will give them time to fully adjust to full cohabitation and try to feed the normal again either later this week or Monday.
Aside from the the new addition, the slightest bit of weight lost and cohabitation nothing has really changed. I will update again if anything changes or if I still have no progress with my normal.
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You absolutely should not be cohabbing these animals, period. You purchased the first one barely a month ago from a chain store and she still hasn’t fed for you yet. She should still be in quarantine as should your new acquisition. You need to ideally be quarantining each new animal for a bare minimum of 60-90 days (some folks even quarantine longer periods). By not only having them in the same room but now the same enclosure, if either was carrying mites or a contagious illness, they’ve now both been exposed.
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Hello @thegolfingsnake and welcome to the forums!
Can you please post a photo of the snake that is refusing to eat, or give me an accurate weight in grams? Chain stores have to feed f/t because they have a no “torture” policy. Depending on the size of the animal the fuzzy may not be the correct size. I also saw that you tried to feed her a week after getting her, which is normal for most, but changing into a completely new environment may take the adjustment period longer. Depending on their tank size vs the new one you have, she may feel like it’s too open, not cluttered enough, not enough hides, lights could be wrong, etc etc. I’d recommend waiting 2 - 2.5 weeks before trying to refed her, and when you do attempt to offer a meal (if you’re doing f/t) make sure the animal is of the correct size and temperature when offered.
As for cohabitation, ball pythons are independent creatures. They should never be housed together, and the only way chain stores are able to continue that practice without one another eating each other is because of how small they are, and because they will sell one or two within the week, and then just replace them. In the wild you will not find multiple ball pythons together (unless mating) and even then that would be a rare sight to find indeed!
edit: I actually scrolled down and saw you mention the snake was 88 grams. You’ll want to offer a meal that’s between 10-15% of her body weight (so 8.8 - 13 grams), which would be a fuzzy. That is the correct size for this animal. Your friend feeding pinkys to his 100 gram snake needs correcting too.
Please post a photo of your setup when you get a chance.
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