Female Pastel Progression

[Jtmatsumoto]

I just picked up a baby pastel from a local breeder!! Her name is Adaeze (ah-deh-eh-zeh) or Ada for short. It's a West African name meaning princess, which I thought was fitting seeing as bp's originate from Africa. She was hatched on 6/28/14. I'll be using this thread as a way to track her progress and obtain more information about caring for ball pythons!

[Jtmatsumoto]

When I picked up my little one she was feeding on live rat pinks... Tonight I was successful converting her over to frozen on the first attempt!

Here's my method based on things I've read:

I heated the rat in a ziplock bag using warm water and then placed the bag on top of her viv for about ten minutes. I then placed her in a feeding container and used a light bulb to heat the sides of the rat pinkie's body and head. Using feeding tones, I rubbed the rat against her side and worked it up towards Ada's head and slowly dangled it front of her tell she went for it. I also stood behind her so she couldn't see me.

[oskyle1567]

very nice girl! cant have just one though

[alan12013]

She is awesome. I'm glad she has a nice home too. Does she like to explore her cage at night or does she spend a lot of time hiding? I love the picture of her climbing up into the plant.

[Jtmatsumoto]

She is awesome. I'm glad she has a nice home too. Does she like to explore her cage at night or does she spend a lot of time hiding? I love the picture of her climbing up into the plant.

Thank you! She loves exploring at night!! I always see her in different spots and she's constantly on the move. During the day she spends a lot more time hiding but occasionally she'll poke her head out of the hides.

[Jtmatsumoto]

It's been a couple days since I've given an update on Ada. She has been doing great and has fed on f/t rat pinks on 3/3 times for me. She's defiantly grown since I got her. I'm unsure of her weight as a hatchling but I weighed her yesterday at 104g:

I also got a pretty nice shot of her outside


I also recently purchased an infrared thermometer. The furthest point on the cold side is around 77, warm side around 88-90 and basking spot at 95-98 depending on the time of day and temperature in the house. Humidity levels around 40-60. I've been trying to keep them around 50 but they change as the substrate drys out and I have her in a 10g with screen top (saran wrapped with a towel on top). Any tips or advice would be well appreciated except recommending using tubs. I prefer vivs and only have two other snakes so unless I start breeding I wouldn't want to switch to tubs or a rack system.

[John1982]

Diggin the tongue shot. You can probably bump her prey size up to crawlers or if you have a stock of pinkies feed 2-3 at a time.

[Jtmatsumoto]

Diggin the tongue shot. You can probably bump her prey size up to crawlers or if you have a stock of pinkies feed 2-3 at a time.

Awesome! Thanks for the heads up. I have 2 rat pinks left. One is close to crawler size. Do you know if there's a general guideline on when to switch up to the next sizes based on weight or do you pretty much judge it based on the largest width of the snake? I've been feeding my girl about every 5-6 days and I never really see a lump the next day. She'll usually even come out during the night after I feed her and roam the viv for a little bit.