Striking at food and missing

I’ve noticed lately that when I go to feed my bp, she will strike and miss multiple times. This past time was 3x that she struck and missed before actually getting the rodent right in front of her. Im worried shes gonna hurt herself knocking into the glass of her tank. Should I try heating her food up slightly? Should that improve her aim?

I noticed that babies usually tend to do this on occasion. They need to learn how to strike and coil so it’s a learning process. But if yours is a adult then I’ll let a mod chime in cause they could go more in depth if it’s a possible issue.

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No shes still juvenile, idk her birth month but shes only 161g.

Well how long have you had her? If she has done this the past few meals she should grow pit of it. Just put the food closer to her and you shouldn’t have a problem

Have had her since Jan13, she always strikes and misses at least once. I think I might just try heating her rodents up and see if that helps

Just dont overdue it when you heat it up. They wont eat a cooked rat

Heating definitely helps. They have pits to detect hot prey that they aim with instead of their eyes.

That being said I’ve had more than a few (and, just for the record, they were not spiders, champagnes, etc) that miss on the first go. Most outgrow it and eventually sort it out. I do have a pied male that will strike like a weird boomerang. It’s very strange but it’s just him :woman_shrugging:

It’s probably not something to worry about as long as you’re sure there isn’t any obvious injury or other reason why they’d be missing.

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@tahllia89 it isn’t uncommon for young BPs to miss every-so-often but consistently/repeatedly missing can be an issue. Some morphs are more prone to it because of known neurological issues (spider complex). Do you know if your python is a morph?

She’s an enchi het ghost.

If you feed frozen/thawed prey, we will put ours in a plastic bag into warm water after they have thawed to warm up the temps without cooking them. I have also used a hair dryer. This has helped our GHI get his meal on the first hit. He used to miss a lot.