Aggressive New ball python

[Fenderplayer104]

I was at the St. Louis reptile show Sunday and I got my self my first ball python male (168 Grams).
I got him home and tried to let him settle down a bit today I tried to get him out to handle him. So first I pulled him out of his hide and he was in a defensive position, but I picked him up any ways and he tried to tag me.
Is this normal with baby balls having this unsettledness and slightly aggressive ever happen to you?
I believe he might be starting to shed his skin is a bluish tint but his eyes seem alright to me...
Thanks for all the info.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Give him time to settle and adjust to his new environment.

I would recommend to leave him alone for a week with no handling than once a week has passed try to offer food, if you are successful you will be able to handle your BP within 48 hours of feeding.

In the meantime

Make sure that your temperature are 80-84 on the cool side, 90-94 on the warm side, of course this mean you need to have an accurate reading provided by a digital thermometer/hygrometer.

Check your humidity and make sure it is between 50%-60%

Make sure the enclosure is in a low traffic area.

Make sure your enclosure is the appropriated size, an enclosure that is too big can be overwhelming, and can cause stress overtime.

Make sure your hides are tight enough so your BP can snug in, all sides must be touching your BP's body (Avoid log hides as they do not really provide enough security for a BP).

Also keep in mind that during shedding you should abstain from handling your BP.

[Sparky1]

Oh yeah some of them can be rather grumpy, smaller ones usually are. First you need to leave him alone for a week, no handling nothing to let him adjust. After that you can start handling him a lil more and more. If he is going into shed make sure your humidity is higher than normal and it will make it all go much smoother. I have one that is 6 months old and he is still agressive, a lil better once i have him out but in his tub he likes to strike.

[Chuck]

yep perfectly normal, I would try to not handle him for a week or so let him get acclimated to his new environment.

Chuck

[Dragndoor]

i have been having the same problem with all 5 of my resently purchased BPs. They are all pretty aggressive to me in and out of there tub/rack. Each of the 5 have tried to strike me more then once. I'm actually starting to wonder about them. I have them in a nice rack set-up i built with 31qt. tubs,flexwatt on the warm side,with 24ft of rope light lining the back of the rack on 12 12 light cycle. They each have hides and water dishes. There temps at day are 92-94 and night from 80-84. I am having a problem with the humidity being a little to high,but i plan to add a few more airflow holes this weekend to help this. They all range in size from 2 normals being 875-790 grams and the 3 pastels are from 200-110 grams in size. I try to handle them once a day if it's for a few minutes, buts kinda hard when they are always striking at me. 3 of them have been with me for over a month and the other 2 i purchased last week. Can anyone give me some advice on what to do. I'm actually a little nervous around the BPs and i have a breeding pair of albino burmese that don't ever even bat an eye at me unless i have food around or if i have been handeling my breeding rats before hand and forget to wash my hands... Any help would be appriecated. Thanks in advance and sorry for the long write up . And if i am hijackin a thread...


o and they all eat fine every 5 days

[Sparky1]

All i can say is the same i was told about my grumpy one, it is what it is. Some snakes are just grumpy, your keeping can be perfect and they just have bad attitudes. I believe it has to do with how they were kept before you got them.

[Lexcorn]

Yup,

All good info.

Every snake is an individual, as previously mentioned, & will behave accordingly.

Although the species has a well deserved reputation for being calm, there's always going to be the exception to the rule!

Two examples:

1.0 Pied hatchling - decided everything that moved was 'food' including a hand going into his box to clean out.

Left him to his own devices as he was eating well & that's more important, in my mind, than disturbing & stressing unnecessarily. Fast forward 6 months & the guy is A-o.k. now.

0.1 het. Albino hatchling - a voracious feeder who would strike at anything warm. She's 2 years old now & can be handled very well.......she remains an excellent feeder too.

Just don't hurry the process, we all need time to adjust.

Lex

[frankykeno]

Excellent post, Lex, I couldn't agree more. While BP's are naturally pretty laid back anything with teeth can and will nip, snakes, dogs, whatever. Snakes just present a new set of challenges because they don't bond to us like a new dog might and they can be harder to "read" for us humans.

Personally, Mike and I don't even worry about handling new snakes much. Settling them in, making sure they are healthy, getting them on a good regular feeding schedule and just observing them are our first priorities. Handling comes with time and generally goes quite well since by that point we have a bit of a handle on how each specific snake deals with things.

Fender, I would try and think of this more as a defensive behaviour than a really aggressive one. This snake hasn't a clue that you care about it, or want the best for it. You are simply at this point likely viewed as a unknown large heat emitting thing that may be a predator. The snake is just reacting, attempting in it's way to survive and protect itself from an unknown entity in an unfamilar environment. Time and patience are your best friends right now.

[slartibartfast]

In my experience, and I've only got a couple dozen snakes so it's not a huge sample size...

The nippier babies seem to make calmer adults than the really skittish babies who freak out and ball up at anything.

The three kids I have who are really timid have remained nervous and still ball up, whereas the nippy defensive babies, given a chance to acclimate (l don't handle them until they've had a couple good feedings) seem to be much less fearful and are now easy to handle.

I may be overgeneralizing, so if anyone has had a different experience, please do jump in.

[frankykeno]

Funny you should say that Jess because overall I'd say our ball pythons are about the same. The really shy babies are still quite shy juveniles/sub-adults whereas the nippier, in your face type babies have developed into a more confident I guess you could call it snake....easy to handle and hit the prey so fast it barely gets time to hit the floor of their tubs.

Like you we only have a smaller collection so it's not a broad base to form an opinion on but I'd say we've seen about the same sort of pattern.