timid striker?

well, for the past two weeks, i'v been having a little bit of a problem getting lennie to feed. after presenting, he seems to be very interested in striking, but never really hunts for the rat and waits in ambush. while i know this is perfectly normal and expected, it gets odd when he never springs the trap. the slightest shadow moving in the room causes him to withdraw for a short time. this is a departure from a few months ago where the rat coming anywhere near the entrance to his hide yielded a swift death. it seems that even the rat exploring the tank in enough to startle him on occasion. could this be a behavior i should address further, or do i just have a picky snake?

I put a mouse in a plastic container with holes in it on top of the enclosure for about ten minutes then I just dangle the mouse by his tail a few inches away from my snake's face and he snatches him right up. Maybe you could give that a whirl instead waiting for the rat/mouse to get close to your snake?

I remove hides, wood and usually the water bowl so the snake has an open field and prescent with the rat/mouse in a small container and when the snake starts stalking the rodent in the container I free it and the snake strikes in a few minutes.

unfortunately, those are both things i have tried. i started taking all of the extra stuff in the tank out so the rat only has one place to go for shelter- the hide with a hungry snake. dangling the rat caused too much noise and had the rat fighting to get free. it worked once but every other time i have tried it, nothing happens. Canecorso, the presenting method you describe is basically what i have always done and worked well, but to no avail recently.

has he been bitten or scratched by one of the live prey u are feeding him? if so it could possibly have him kind of scared to constrict it.

not that i know of. he has one scar (from before i bought him) that looks like it may be a rat bite, but he has feed fine in the past under my watch.

It could be that he is going into a non-feeding mode. I have one male and one female that do this throughout the breeding season. Roughly from October to March. It is not uncommon for ball pythons to fast during this time. Not all snakes will fast, but some do, even if you are not cycling them. I would suggest that you offer food every two weeks or so. You also may want to try live, if you are currently feeding F/T (I had one female last year that switched to live for the breeding season)

I hope this helps.

John

i have heard that they do this, i guess i just thought they would wait for a greater climatic change than we have had so far. the only reason that i don't think it is the seasonal off feed is that this trend has been going on for some time now, although i won't rule out the possibility. just to clarify, i have been offering live.