New to BP's and I have some questions...

[BitterCowgal]

I picked up a 'Normal' Female Ball Python at the Reptile show in Columbus, Ohio on Saturday. I've named her Elvira and am calling her Ellie for short. She is approx. 17" in length. She wouldn't stretch out all the way for me when I was trying to measure so I had to measure in two parts. She was hatched out May 2007. She was purchased from Bruckman Reptiles. Anyone heard of them?

She looks to be a bit skinny to me but I'm afraid I don't know how to gauge body condition in snakes yet as I am a complete newbie to snakes. She isn't perfectly round. I've found on some sites that they should be well rounded. I can feel her spine rather easily and she is slightly triangular in shape. Can someone tell me, or show me somehow, how to gauge body condition? I don't have a way to weigh her at all at the moment.

I was told she has been being fed a F/T Mouse Hopper once per week. Her last feeding was Friday, October 26. I went to my local pet store yesterday to get some Frozen Hoppers to keep on hand for her and found that they do not have any. They stock Pinkies, Peach Fuzzies, Fuzzies and Adult Mice but no Hoppers nor Weanlings. I measured her girth with a piece of string and found that she is approx. 3 inches around. Do you think she'd be able to step up to a small adult mouse? Also how many mice should she be getting at each feeding and how often is optimal? Different sites say different things here. I was intending on feeding one F/T mouse twice weekly for a month or two and then drop her to one F/T mouse once weekly. My thinking there was because I thought she appeared a bit skinny.

She is getting ready to shed as well. I know to try and get the humidity up to about 70%. Is that relative humidity? Am I okay to go ahead and handle her while she is preparing for a shed or should I just leave her alone until she's done? Seeing as how I just got her maybe I'd be wise to leave her alone for a week or so anyway to let her settle in? I've had her out twice since bringing her home and she's seemed relaxed both times.

Last question..
I have her housed in a 20 gallon glass aquarium with secured screen lid. I'm using Aspen as substrate. I've got a medium dog bowl for water, a small chunk of driftwood in case she gets the whim to climb, and a hide on her warm side. I haven't got a hide on her cool side as of yet as she seems to hang on on the warm side most of the time and had no interest what-so-ever in it while I had it on the cool side. I have a Exo-Terra Rainforest small UTH on the warm side. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be doing much good at all. It's the 8" x 8" one. Box says it's only 4 watts. Temperature on the substrate above it gets to only about 80F. Is that normal for this particular UTH? Should I have gotten the Desert variation or is this one defective? I don't have the funds to get another UTH right yet. It'll be about two weeks before I can. For right now I have a red spotlamp over the warm side. It hovers the temperature at substrate level between 92F and 94F. Will this do for her for now? What do you recommend for the UTH? Eventually I'd like to be just relying on the UTH for heating as I think belly temps are more important than ambient, correct?

As you can tell I'm a bit clueless despite the four days I've spent surfing around reading up as much as I can on Ball Pythons. I'm thankful for any advice or suggestions ya'll can provide.

-Heather

[dr del]

Hi,

In case you haven't seen it here is a link to our glass tank setup sticky and caresheet - hopefully they will help a little.

I could only find one thread on the sellers on the B.O.I and it was short but positive.

The size of prey to offer is hard for someone else to judge really without being able to see the size of the snake but a small adult shouldn't be too large of a meal for a 17" ball python I think.

It's better to feed once and feed multiples (if the prey is too small to satisfy) rather than feeding twice from what I've heard so I would probably just feed a suitable meal every 5 days if you feel she is underweight and move on to every 7 days once that's corrected. But other people will have other opinions so take a sounding and go for the one that seems best.

Since you just got her then leaving her to settle in would be the best choice ( we normally say a week with no handling) and since she's shedding I would make sure the relative humidity is around 60% - 70% and leave her be till she has finished the shedding process.

What stage of shedding is she at? Has she gone blue and then cleared up?

I can't give any advice on the UTH however as we have different ones over here but I'm sure someone will chime in soon to answer that. I would add a second (identicle, snug, dark) hide on the cool end though just so she has the choice to use it if she wants.

I take it there is something making sure she cannot come into contact with the hot bulb? Just making sure.

Oh and feel free to deluge us with pictures - we liiike pictures.


dr del

[BitterCowgal]

Yep, I've seen both of those links. This site is one of the many I stumbled upon while looking up info.

Would it be best to take a piece of string to the pet store with me and get a measurement of the girth of adult mouse first? I assume if she is approx. 3 inches around, if the mouse is also approx. 3 inches around that'd be just fine. Everything I've read thus far points to it but I worry alot...lol.


She is 'in blue' right now. Her eyes are fully blue, pink belly, dull dark coloring everywhere else. When I got her at the show, her eyes were just starting to get some blue to them so she seems to be moving right along.

No, she cannot get access to the hot bulb at all. I have it up on a pair of 2x4 boards on top of her screen lid so she's got the lid in between her and it.

I sure will get some pictures of her. I think I'll wait until after she's finished her shed though..heh. She'll be looking prettier then.

[dr del]

Hi,

I'd just try and judge it by eye.

I'm not sure pet shop mice would apprecite a stranger trying to put a belt on them.

Try and pick a small to medium sized one if you have the choice and it shouldn't really be too much bigger than what she was getting before.

As you've probably already read then some won't eat while they are shedding ( none of mine do for some reason ) but plenty of our members have snakes who eat as normal so it's a case of suck it and see really.


dr del

[BitterCowgal]

*giggles* I was thinking more about using the string to measure around one of the frozen mice not one of the live ones. I'm good friends with the manager and 3/4 of the employees of this pet store so I don't imagine I'd have much a problem requesting a specific size.

I got a picture of her tank. She's curled up in the hide on the warm side. I really hate that red light but I guess it'll have to do for right now. I'm going to run back out to the pet store once they open up later today to get another hide identical to the one she's already got. You can see my Digital thermometers probe in the picture.

[BitterCowgal]

Anyone else have anything to add advice-wise. I most definantly could use anything you've got.

[bigballs]

you were saying that you wanted to get rid of the spot light sooner or later. thats ok but you will still need to provide proper ambient temps. a UTH providing belly heat is good but will not raise ambient temperatures to where they have to be.
no type of temperature is more important then the other but if i were to say which one you could live without then it would have to be belly heat over ambient.
if you had an ambient temperature of 90-94 on the hot side and 80-82 on the cool side the snake would live a healthy life where as using only a UTH would only create lets say a 92 degree hot spot with air temperature being determined by whatever the room temperature is.
that can be compared to holding the snake in the palm of your hand in open air. your body temp is 96 point something degrees so holding the bp in the palm of you hand in open air is just like him sitting on a 96 degree UTH on the warm side of the tank.
so a UTH hot spot with room ambient temperature will not be enough to properly support you ball python's thermoregulating needs.
unless the UTH was thermostatically controlled at 90-94 and the room temperature at 82.

[bigballs]

oh and the best way to find out exactly how warm your UTH is, is to take the digital thermometer probe and tape it directly over top of the UTH on the bottom of the inside glass in your tank.
this way you can see exactly what the temperature is that your bp is resting on.

[BitterCowgal]

The temperature of the UTH on the top of the glass is 80F. Thats it. My snake is in a room in my house that is heated just for them. It's always at least 80F in there with at least 50% relative humidity.

[dr del]

Hi,

Well if the room is heated to 80f and the surface of the uth is 80F are you sure it's actually working? - does it get hotter if you plug it directly into a socket with no regulation? ( don't do this with it attatched to the tank if that's a possibility - and if it isn't I'd probably move the snake out for the hour or so it would take to see a difference).

Although if the snake has just eaten then wait a couple of days so as not to disturb his digestion.


dr del