baby wont eat, help!

About two weeks ago i bought a 10 day old baby ball, and it wont it eat! It seems uninterested in the live pinkies, maybe even scared of them. What are your suggestions to help the process along?


I have her in a 10gallon aquarium with a hide on both sides, a water dish, an under side heater, and paper towels as substrate.

edit: after a quick search through the forums, it is said that a pinky is too small of a meal. Everybody I've talked to in person has told me the first meal needs to be a pinky so there aren't any big issues... what's up?

Dead hopper to small adult mouse no bigger than the widest point on the snake, Get a brown paper bag place mouse and snake in bag close and leave it be for awhile, this trick has worked for me every time I have a tough eater. Also until you snake its limit handling to the bare min. Good luck.

First off, welcome to the site. Glad to have you here. :)

Next thing, I don't know who you have been talking to, but a pinky mouse is much too small for the first meal of a baby ball. Usually live small adult mice or rat pups are the preferred meal.

Since you got the snake 2 weeks ago, have you handled it at all? How are you measuring your temperatures(94-95 warm side, 83-84 cool side) and humidity(50-60%)? How many hides do you have(should be at least 2, one on each side) and what type are they? A good hide can be made out of a ceramic pot bottom, the ones that sit under the ceramic planters and catch water. You can knock a small hole in one side with a hammer, and *voila* Snake hide. A good solution for accurately measuring your temps and humidity would be a digital thermometer/hygrometer combo unit. These can be found in the outdoor thermometer/air conditioning section at WalMart for $15. They are a must when keeping these snakes as they are very particular about temperature fluctuations and tend to go off feed if they feel as if they won't have enough warmth to digest a meal. Our care sheet and our DIY info sheets will help sort some things out.

Another thing, how many times have you offered food to the snake? Has it had its first shed yet? If it is only 10-days old, the pet store probably sold it to you non-eating, and it is going to be a tough time trying to get the little booger to eat. If you are handling the snake, please don't. This only exacerbates the "not eating" problem and stresses the snake out more. Try leaving the snake completely alone for a week to a week and a half, in a quiet, dark place with very little to no foot traffic. Make sure the temps and humidity are correct, and fill the water bowl when needed. After the 1.5 weeks, try offering the snake a live small adult mouse. Don't try to move the snake to a separate feeding container. Just feed in the cage and leave the hides where they are, so the snake will feel secure when it goes to eat.

Hope these suggestions help you out a little. Just remember, get the temps and humidity where they need to be, and leave the snake alone. Hopefully we can help you get him/her to eat for you. :)

Ditto what Becky said .... and since this is the time of year that CH babies pour in from Africa (10 bucks says this one ain't CB) I'd also suggest finding a good local reptile vet and introducing yourself :D

-adam

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by SatanicIntention

First off, welcome to the site. Glad to have you here. :)

Next thing, I don't know who you have been talking to, but a pinky mouse is much too small for the first meal of a baby ball. Usually live small adult mice or rat pups are the preferred meal.

Since you got the snake 2 weeks ago, have you handled it at all? How are you measuring your temperatures(94-95 warm side, 83-84 cool side) and humidity(50-60%)? How many hides do you have(should be at least 2, one on each side) and what type are they? A good hide can be made out of a ceramic pot bottom, the ones that sit under the ceramic planters and catch water. You can knock a small hole in one side with a hammer, and *voila* Snake hide. A good solution for accurately measuring your temps and humidity would be a digital thermometer/hygrometer combo unit. These can be found in the outdoor thermometer/air conditioning section at WalMart for $15. They are a must when keeping these snakes as they are very particular about temperature fluctuations and tend to go off feed if they feel as if they won't have enough warmth to digest a meal. Our care sheet and our DIY info sheets will help sort some things out.

Another thing, how many times have you offered food to the snake? Has it had its first shed yet? If it is only 10-days old, the pet store probably sold it to you non-eating, and it is going to be a tough time trying to get the little booger to eat. If you are handling the snake, please don't. This only exacerbates the "not eating" problem and stresses the snake out more. Try leaving the snake completely alone for a week to a week and a half, in a quiet, dark place with very little to no foot traffic. Make sure the temps and humidity are correct, and fill the water bowl when needed. After the 1.5 weeks, try offering the snake a live small adult mouse. Don't try to move the snake to a separate feeding container. Just feed in the cage and leave the hides where they are, so the snake will feel secure when it goes to eat.

Hope these suggestions help you out a little. Just remember, get the temps and humidity where they need to be, and leave the snake alone. Hopefully we can help you get him/her to eat for you. :)

---

I use a little thermometer from tempgun.com to monitor the temps, the high side being around 90*F at the moment, and the low around 77*F. When I bought it, it had already shed, that was about 2 weeks ago, and at that time it was about 10 days old. I have little plastic plant hides right now, but am getting ceramic ones tomorrow. The room is dark, but not pitch black, and it gets practically no traffic. I bought her at a recent Tampa show, from John Berry Reptiles (johnberryreptiles.com) I called and talked to him earlier this week, and he said not to get too worried for another week or so about this situation, but I wanted more opinions.

With the thermometer/hygrometer combo unit, do you place this inside the cage? I also heard it was better to put the hole in the ceramic pot piece on the top? Her plastic hides she has now seem to light, and she pushes them around while exploring. I guess tomorrow I could also pick up a small live adult mouse. How do you suggest feeding the mouse, with the least amount of danger to the snake?

Sorry for all these questions, but my corn snake was never this much trouble!

edit: I don't handle it. Only have handled it to move it into the cage.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jdapython

I bought her at a recent Tampa show, from John Berry Reptiles (johnberryreptiles.com) I called and talked to him earlier this week, and he said not to get too worried for another week or so about this situation, but I wanted more opinions.

---

How funny! That is EXACTLY where I went to get mine... and yep... I bought mine from John Berry as well (and my neighbor got one too... gave us a deal; 2 for $80). Oh the irony...

I got my neighbors to eat her first pinky with no problems last tuesday, however I wasn't so lucky with mine. I had to umm... persuade her to eat last night and she finally did take down a pinky. She's looking much better now and is out roaming the cage again.

If you're local and need some help with anything let me know. Two heads are better than one. :P

P.S. Check out my thread... "Say Cheese!" in the pictures section. :)

I live two hours away from tampa... anyways, I'll get new hides tomorrow, and I guess a hopper/small adult. Thanks for the kind thought though, Isshinharu. The baby I got was the only one that had shed already, glad to hear yours is doing alright.

Edit: How did you "persuade" your snake?

Edit2: I was also thinking about putting a 75watt lamp on at timer also, but I've gotta figure out how to get it all together with the small 10gallon.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jdapython

I live two hours away from tampa... anyways, I'll get new hides tomorrow, and I guess a hopper/small adult. Thanks for the kind thought though, Isshinharu. The baby I got was the only one that had shed already, glad to hear yours is doing alright.

Edit: How did you "persuade" your snake?

---

Ahh... I think I know which one you got. If you're who I think you are, I was standing next to you. You got the one with the nice bright yellow pattern on it... and said 'I'll get that one if he's not going to'. Haha. I was tossing it up between that one and the one I was holding. Anyway...:)

I tried several things to persuade her; left the pinky in the cage for a while; confined her with it in one of those gallon ice cream tubs... neither worked though. Finally I ended up holding her and grabbed the pinky with some forceps, held it in front of her and she finally opened her mouth long enough for me to put it in... and when I did... ooooo boy... she was good to go; did all the rest on her own.

yea that was me :) I hope I don't have to resort to doing that with her though...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jdapython

Edit2: I was also thinking about putting a 75watt lamp on at timer also, but I've gotta figure out how to get it all together with the small 10gallon.

---

What I did is I got an infrared heat lamp (75 watt) and bought a lamp dimmer from home depot for $10. I put that on the dimmer switch and used that to set my ambient temp. Then I got one of those under tank heaters from petco and put that on a seperate dimmer on the warm side of the tank. I set the dimmer to wherever I get about 85-90 ambient temp on the warm side, and the dimmer for the UTH I set so that it'll give her a belly heat of about 90-92. This probably isn't the best setup, but it works until I get a proportional thermostat. Just waiting for the right kind. Until then... I'll monitor the temp's and humidity with the acurite thermo/hygrometer and the temp gun.