Won't baby BP get stress?

Hi master, sorry for asking for some silly question here... I'm just want to make sure they don't get stress...
My question is how we gonna know wat the baby BP sex right after the baby hatching? By probe? It won't stress them?
Another question is when will their very 1st meal on? How they know the pinky is their food? By force feed / they will automatically whack the pinky? :confused: Thanks.

Please don't apologize for asking questions, and don't worry about them being silly.

Hatchlings are best sexed by popping. As the animal grows, they develop more musculature and it become harder to pop, and easier to probe. The popping process is so quick and easy in a hatchling that I doubt it adds much more stress to the process of hatching, being washed, and weighed.

Most babies take their first meal, usually a small furred rat pup or hopper mouse, within a week or two of their first shed. They seem to know what to do. There are always outliers that eat super early or really late. Sometimes, if the baby takes really long to start eating, assist feeding may be necessary, and in those cases you need to weigh the stress of not eating vs. the stress of assist feeding. I imagine that assist feeding must not be too bad, since most of them start eating on their own shortly after that.

Hope that helps, and good luck!

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Originally Posted by MakiMaki

Please don't apologize for asking questions, and don't worry about them being silly.

Hatchlings are best sexed by popping. As the animal grows, they develop more musculature and it become harder to pop, and easier to probe. The popping process is so quick and easy in a hatchling that I doubt it adds much more stress to the process of hatching, being washed, and weighed.

Most babies take their first meal, usually a small furred rat pup or hopper mouse, within a week or two of their first shed. They seem to know what to do. There are always outliers that eat super early or really late. Sometimes, if the baby takes really long to start eating, assist feeding may be necessary, and in those cases you need to weigh the stress of not eating vs. the stress of assist feeding. I imagine that assist feeding must not be too bad, since most of them start eating on their own shortly after that.

Hope that helps, and good luck!

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Thanks MakiMaki, tat mean there is no problem to know their sex by popping them right. Coz there are a batch of 30pcs normal BP just hatch pass 2 week. n I plan to choose 1st few nicer female to add into my list.
The only problem is feeding problem... I scare they don't take meal by themself.

Don't worry, they usually know what to do with their prey! I hatched my first clutch last year, 6 baby BPs, and 5/6 took their first meal without hesitation... I just threw in a live hopper mouse, and within a few minutes they were striking/coiling & swallowing. :gj:

I did have one who refused, and he was the runt of the clutch - born with un-absorbed yolk, a small neck kink, and 10-15g smaller than the other babies. He ended up refusing for almost 8 weeks, despite numerous attempts with different prey types & two failed assist feeds. His weight held pretty steady, though, and as soon as it started to drop he decided to eat. Guess he just wasn't hungry until then! Btw, I still have that snake, and he hasn't refused a meal since. ;)

P.S. General rule is to wait until their first shed (about 1 week post-hatching), then wait another week before offering the first meal... they usually aren't hungry until then, as their yolk provides enough nutrition for a while. Mother Nature is pretty clever, eh?