Unusual feeding problem?

My ball pythons been having a weird problem lately with eating rats, shes always been great at feeding since I've known her but the last two time I fed her some large rats she killed them easy, but took a while to figure out how to eat it.

Its like she couldn't find its head or maybe couldn't swallow? I don't think the rats are too big persay, shes a full size ball about 4'4". I'm wondering if sometimes this is normal for them to take 10-20 minutes to figure out how to swallow some things?

Could it be the color pattern throwing her off? Both these last rats were white bodies with black heads? Shes been at this one now for coming up on 25 minutes. She really seems like she wants to eat it, but can't figure out how to start.

I think I'm gonna get smaller ones from now on just to prevent this from happening.

That last little tidbit you included is where I would start. Every now and then, the snake will start from the arm if it's sticking out, and give up... After I re-offer, they strike, constrict, and swallow successfully that time... Weird..

Is she eating the rats? Or does she give up and leave them there? All your theories are possible. Takes some experimentation.

For some reason, I imagined your BP as a child with a bowl of food in front of them that they have not yet tried before, and she is deciding whether or not to eat it XD.. Probably because I know that ball pythons are notoriously picky feeders :D.

If she's actually able to eat it, I don't see why the amount of time it takes for her to figure it out would be a problem...

Shes still trying.

Honestly I'm thinking I got one a bit too big for her. This is the biggest one yet, I didn't intend to get it this big either, but the guy at the shop boxed up the biggest one.

Will update if she eats or if she gives up. I'll give her a while, if she hasn't eaten in a couple hours and gives up ill take it out.

Its body was maybe 7", but he wasn't too fat around so I thought she could handle it.

Update: Good girl! She ate em. Okay, gonna make sure to feed smaller from now on, don't like to worry bout this stuff. Hehe.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mrs Brisby

Shes still trying.

Honestly I'm thinking I got one a bit too big for her. This is the biggest one yet, I didn't intend to get it this big either, but the guy at the shop boxed up the biggest one.

Will update if she eats or if she gives up. I'll give her a while, if she hasn't eaten in a couple hours and gives up ill take it out.

Its body was maybe 7", but he wasn't too fat around so I thought she could handle it.

---

I have some big girls that normally would eat medium rats take forever with smalls. Sometimes they are just funny. As long as they eat I don't care how long it takes :)

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2