BP's Attitude Problem

[Deadringer21]

Hey All! I recently (mid-March) took in my first ball python and I thoroughly enjoyed my first month or two with him, but he has become fairly hostile and is becoming more of a stress than a comfort. Some brief background info: I got him on March 23rd at approximately 12 months of age, and he seemed to be very malnourished at the pet store from which I got him. He weighed an even 80.0 grams the day I got him at one year old, and he'd only eaten at 16 of his 40 weekly offerings at the store (they fed him single f/t mouse fuzzies until the last week they had him when he ate two, which was still likely to be shy of 8.0 grams of mouse). Anyway, I started handling him a few days after I got him and he seemed to be totally cool with that; he never seemed shy, and was always seemingly at ease in my hands. I initially got into a 7-day feeding cycle for him since this was what they had been doing at the pet store, but after seeing him eagerly take his meals (live mouse hoppers) time and time again, I figured that it wouldn't hurt to try offering even more often than once a week to maintain a rapid/healthy growth rate. As of the 3rd of May (at which point he had recently tipped the scale into triple-digits), I have adopted a feeding schedule of every five days; he has yet to decline a meal and as of today is weighing in at 260.5 grams.

Now, I have been very pleased to see how rapidly he is gaining mass since it suggests to me that he is healthy and thriving in his new environment. However, as of about 3-4 weeks ago he seems to be always on edge and potentially stressed out. I never have an issue with reaching in and removing him from his terrarium, but once out of his tank he is constantly coiled up in a striking position and violently flinches away from any movement within several feet of him. Here's an image of a scenario that just took me 20 minutes to defuse:


Prior to placing him in his external feeding area (a big cardboard box), I popped him onto the scale to get a pre-meal weight as I always do. However, once I'd taken his weight down, I was unable to comfortably move him into his box because he sat here in striking position and struck at me any time I got my hand close enough to the bowl for twenty minutes. (In the past I have successfully dealt with similar situations by slowly approaching him with a closed fist which he would not mistake for a mouse, but today he struck at my fist each of the three times I got close enough for him to do so.) I finally resolved the situation by covering the bowl with a plate and moving the whole container into the feeding box.

The reason I decided to get a ball python is because I've known a few friends who owned them and I've always been blown away by how relaxed and docile/friendly they are. However, my little guy seems to be getting less and less friendly each day, despite my best efforts to keep him well feed and in optimal living conditions. It's pretty upsetting to me that taking him out to show off to my guests is a definite no-no since I fear that he'd strike at anyone who might reach in to touch him, but at this point I can't even comfortably handle him myself without having this same concern that he'll strike at me and just get stressed out over it. I hate to say it, but unless his behavior improves I think I'll have to eventually get rid of him (I know this isn't something I can expect to happen over the course of a few weeks, so I'm definitely planning to give him at least several months and reassess the situation maybe around January-March).

Pardon my verbosity in the above, but my main question is this: what can I do to get him to mellow out? Are there things that I'm doing wrong that I should change? Are there other details that I may be overlooking regarding his change in attitude? To conclude, I'll include a shot of his housing arrangement which provides the following environment:
- Under-tank heater for a surface temp of ~90-92F (hot side), cool side surface temp ~78-80F.
- Infrared heat lamp (24/7) to maintain air temp around 84F
- UV white lamp (daytime only) to simulate daytime in his otherwise-dark room
- Modified screen-top to maintain humidity at a constant 55% (can be easily increased with a humidifier during shed)
- Similar hides on the hot side and cool side (he switches between the two regularly) with a water bowl in between the two
- Kritter Crumble Coconut Husk bedding and an artificial plastic limb with leaves for added privacy


Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

~Dan

[JodanOrNoDan]

Sounds to me he may have learned, "I'm out of my tank, its time to eat". Try feeding him in his tank for awhile. Could be many other things, but that is my first guess. I would say 90% of the ball pythons are super mellow. There is another 10% that can be a pain. Whatever you do, if he acts like that don't put up with it. Pick him up. He may try to bite but if you pick him up right it won't happen. Once you are holding him do not put him back until he relaxes. Once he does immediately put him back in his cage. He will most likely learn. That said, i have one animal that nothing has ever worked on. She bites, she hisses. I love her anyway. She keeps me on my toes.

[redshepherd]

Kind of off-topic, but do you have a temp gun? If not, it would be a good idea to invest in one for accurate temperature readings. I see the dial thermometer in the back wall of the tank, and those could be inaccurate to up to 10 degrees or even more, which basically makes them useless.

Ball pythons don't actually need a bright lamp to stimulate daylight- they're nocturnal animals to begin with, and bright light could possible stress some out? They prefer being in mostly dark, even during the day. So I'd remove the lamp altogether, in case that's affecting him.

What rodent size is he on/how much is he eating? It's preferable for a ball python to just have one properly sized rodent for a meal every week, for his size, rather than a few hoppers every 5 days or something. Bumping food quantity should be bumping the rodent up in size, but having more days apart between each feeding. The one rodent should be slightly wider than the thickest width of his body.

Also... it is rare, but there really are just ball pythons that are extra on edge and snappy. If everything in his setup is fixed and he's been eating a properly sized meal every week, and he is still snappy and on edge, it may just be his personality.

[chrid16371]

Definitely feed in tank, safer for you and your snake. I agree with the above that analog thermometers are inaccurate, a good reliable temp gun or digital thermometer with probe like the acurite 00891 would be good to buy. I didn't see you mention a thermostat, do you have one for the uth? While bps don't need special day light mine are kept in a dark room but I use dim lights to offer day/night cycle so I would use a lamp dimmer with the day light.

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[cchardwick]

I have 17 snakes so far, about half are ball pythons. I have one in particular that's a pain in the but. When I open up the tub if I don't feed her she strikes out of aggression several times in a row even if I'm several feet away. She strikes at me so hard she rolls herself over LOL. She is going to be a terror when she gets full size, but I love her anyway. She only eats live mice too HA! I'm starting to think that it's a genetic trait, she is a pastel spider, possibly yellowbelly and possibly het pied. Not sure but I think it may be the combo of spider and pastel or yellowbelly. Seems like many aggressive snakes have these genes. It would be interesting to track all of the mean snakes and what genes make them up, I'm betting certain combos bring out the aggression gene LOL. Your snake looks like it may be a pastel or yellowbelly? I agree with feeding in the tank, less stress for sure. Way too much light on that tank too, I'd put an IR heat bulb in there and track temps to make sure it doesn't get too hot, use a heat gun probe. All my snakes hated glass tanks, I switched them to dark tubs and they love them. Keep the glass tanks for raising rat babies.

[locolobito]

I've got a mystic I've had for a couple months now. The 1st 2 days he was cool with me. The 3rd day, all attitude. He strikes at me all the time. At first it was all good, then he started to scare me cause of it, now I just laugh at his goofy butt when he strikes at me. It seems like he jumps, twists and everything else. Love the little guy

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[Stingray74]

Many of the responses above contain good advice on how to approach the situation. I've had both balls and boas that got nasty on me when temps in the tank/tubs were too high. Dropping the temps a few degrees always seemed to resolve the issues for me. I had a Brazilian Rainbow boa that would attack the glass of the tank whenever anyone walked through the room. I dropped the ambient temp to about 80, from 84, and dropped the hot spot to 90 from 92. Cool side hung around 76-77. Within 48 hours she was like a different snake. Never struck the glass since that day. Previous to my temp adjustments, she never showed signs of being too warm as she almost always stayed in the hot side hide.

I'd suggest removing both lamps, especially the daylight bulb, or dropping the temps on whatever you have controlling the remaining bulb (I don't recall reading what you have controlling your UTH or lamps). Good luck, and I hope he mellows out for you. There's always the chance that he just has a nasty disposition and will never chill out.

Also, get yourself a snake hook for those situations where you need to move an aggressive snake. I got one on the big auction site for $5 that works perfectly.

[Ba11er]

Never let an animal get away with bitting you. Especially if they are young they will get use to it and think its ok. Correct the behavior by not giving them what they want which is to be left alone. Be gentle but firm with them ,wear gloves if your scared but spend time with them to show the animal your not a threat, then when they no longer show the behavior put them away. It can take awhile but be consistent, firm, and fearless and they will come around.

[Deadringer21]

Thanks everyone for all the great advice! It's very encouraging to see that many of you seem to be on the same page regarding what I can do to improve his behavior.

I will definitely remove the white-light bulb and just leave the IR heat lamp for now. I'll monitor the temp for a day or so to get an idea for how much this affects the ambient temp, but I don't imagine it will cause a huge difference since it's just a 26W bulb. I am aware that BPs don't need lamps with UVA/UVB since they get all of their necessary nutrients from their meals, but I thought it would be better to at least simulate daytime. Regardless, I have this tank in my basement which does have a small window off in the corner, so the new setup will have at least a little bit of natural light during the day and none at night.

Onto my tank's setup and temp meters: I do have the analog thermometer/hydrometer attached to the back wall, but I don't pay any attention to it; the terrarium has a digital thermometer/hydrometer (hidden by the greenery) which I mainly rely on. I also have two temp guns which I break out every week or so to make sure that the levels in the tank are in fact what the digital thermometer is showing me. Regarding the UTH, I do have a thermostat attached to regulate the temperature. I currently have that set to 95F, and the hot side has a layer of fabric on the glass beneath the inch-or-so of bedding, all of which provides the aforementioned surface temp of about 90F (confirmed by both temp guns, both of which had great review on Amazon regarding their accuracy). I suppose, per your advice, that it can't hurt to bump the UTH down a few degrees to see how that works for him.

Feeding him in the tank is something I hadn't really considered, but I suppose I can give this a shot. Is there any good way to ensure that he doesn't ingest any of the bedding if I do this? I can't exactly simply put the mouse on a piece of newspaper or paper towel since I feed him live (which I feel like he prefers, given his terribly feeding history on f/t at the pet shop). And on that note, I am currently feeding him live adult mice which are generally in the area of 30 grams.

Would a snake hook potentially help to ease his tension at all? I'm honestly not very worried for myself regarding him striking at me: I just figured that him being defensive like this meant he was stressed so I didn't want to make that worse by just going in to grab him anyway. If the hook would help with his stress then I would look into one, but otherwise I will just go in to grab him anyway and "chill" until he relaxes, at which point I will return him to his tank.

Again, thanks for all of the advice. I really love having this little guy around so I have high hopes that these changes will help out. Let me know if any of you have any further advice, thanks!

[JodanOrNoDan]

I have 17 snakes so far, about half are ball pythons. I have one in particular that's a pain in the but. When I open up the tub if I don't feed her she strikes out of aggression several times in a row even if I'm several feet away. She strikes at me so hard she rolls herself over LOL. She is going to be a terror when she gets full size, but I love her anyway. She only eats live mice too HA! I'm starting to think that it's a genetic trait, she is a pastel spider, possibly yellowbelly and possibly het pied. Not sure but I think it may be the combo of spider and pastel or yellowbelly. Seems like many aggressive snakes have these genes. It would be interesting to track all of the mean snakes and what genes make them up, I'm betting certain combos bring out the aggression gene LOL. Your snake looks like it may be a pastel or yellowbelly? I agree with feeding in the tank, less stress for sure. Way too much light on that tank too, I'd put an IR heat bulb in there and track temps to make sure it doesn't get too hot, use a heat gun probe. All my snakes hated glass tanks, I switched them to dark tubs and they love them. Keep the glass tanks for raising rat babies.

By my collection I would guess there is a genetic factor. I have five pastel morphs. None or them are mellow. Two of them are down right nasty. One of the two is a killer bee. She does not exhibit severe spider symptoms but I can only describe her as beautiful but crazy. She it totally predictable though. The rest of my spiders are wonky but really mellow when being handled. I believe there is something up with the pastel morph. Combine that with spider issues and you are in for a party. I hope to be wrong about this, but as of yet I have not seen a mellow pastel. I have a clutch on the way that I bred a pastel to the mellowest snake in my collection. I can't wait to see the outcome.