Shayna, our Albino Spider ball python just went off her first fast.

She refused food for 4 weeks. I know, that is hardly a big deal, but it is the first time she has gone off food (except for refusing one here and there).

I wanted to post because a lot of people seem to freak out after one or two missed meals. Shayna is healthy and 1 1/2 years old. She was about 910G when the fast started and about 890G before she ate a nice big rat (F/T) last week.

The other thing I wanted to mention is that a lot of people who feed F/T also think about switching to live quickly after a snake starts a fast. Shayna happily accepted her F/T meal after refusing 3 meals in a row.

I think many people don't spend the time or have the patience to work with a ball python and frozen thawed. Live has serious drawbacks in my mind and we want to keep her on F/T. I am very patient with her, and being our only ball, I work with her. She rarely strikes when I first put in the rat. Either striking a minute or two later when she is sure she wants it, or often, I put it down and leave her alone for 20-30 minutes and she eats.

The point I am trying to make is that fasting seems to be more an owner issue than snake issue. We get upset they are not eating. Shayna seemed to act normally otherwise and lost little weight. I imagine if it had been 4 months, versus 4 weeks, I would have been more upset, but the same principles would have applied.

Additionally, if you want to feed F/T, be patient and work with your snake. I had a conversation with Brian at BHB (where we got our beautiful Hypo Lavender Corn) and asked about him feeding live to some of his adult balls. He pointed out that he doesn't have the time to work with them with F/T and if they don't take F/T and he wants to breed the animal, will go right to live. He pointed out that it is rarely an issue when you can work with the animal.

As long as the snake is healthy and you want to feed F/T, get to know the animal, it's feeding responses, and try different things. I think patience is the real key.

I hope this helps some people out there.

David