Fat Spider ?

Well for sure that snake has not laid recently. No snake can put that much weight back on that fast. If she had laid in the last few months, she'd still look a little deflated and not completely round.

I hesitate to say she's overweight, I think she's just bigger than you are used to. Ball pythons are heavy bodied snakes remember, and some are heavier than others. If she's on small rats, feeding a girl that size every 7 - 10 days should be about right.

Slugging out is when a female lays a clutch of completely or mostly infertile eggs.

Your girl looks pretty well proportioned. If she is a bit heavy, it is only a little bit. Maybe you should find out when exactly she is supposed to have laid. That might give you a clue.

Gale

Okay Thank you Gale (:

"She laid a clutch of eight good eggs in March of this year." Is what the breeder said.

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Slugging out is when a female lays a clutch of completely or mostly infertile eggs.

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Slugs are not infertile eggs and infertile eggs are not slugs, they are very different things altogether.

The worst I have seen with a female being over weight is not going at all, slugs are much more common for a female that didn't eat well enough before developing eggs.

That snake is far from obese, just a healthy weight imo.

Well...slugs are infertile eggs, they're ones that the snake didn't bother to shell. It makes no sense to put in calcium resources for an egg that has no embryo. I think shelled infertile eggs are slightly less common than slugs.

Am I the only one who finds it unlikely that the snake laid a clutch in March? Maybe if she was fed large rats every 5 days, since then? lol...

She is at what I would personally consider to be optimal weight for going into breeding, and I would take care to regulate her food from here to ensure she doesn't really gain any more. She doesn't look overweight, but could become so if she adds much more weight.

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Well...slugs are infertile eggs

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well yes a slug won't be fertilized, but an infertile egg and a slug are two very different things.

Our big girls put weight back on fast, in 3 months they don't look like they ever laid, so yes it's possible this female laid in March.

Cool these responses are making me stress less lol. So is a slug just an unshelled baby ball that is still born?

Okay, technically speaking a slug is not exactly an infertile egg. I was more or less trying to keep it simple.

An infertile egg is just that, a calcified egg that was never fertilized. When laid it looks completely normal, except that it candles clear and never develops a baby snake.

A slug is also not fertilized, but it is not properly calcified, and when laid it looks very different, usually yellowish.

So no there is not a stillborn baby in either kind, they were never fertilized and never developed a baby.

Gale