Out of curiosity - for those who mention how long your snakes have fasted, how often do you feed when the snake isn’t fasting?
I often suspect that many of the famous BP “hunger strikes” are actually the snakes’ own way to regulate their food intake. In other words, if a snake eats every two weeks for six months and then fasts for six months, it’s the same number of feeds per year as a snake that eats once a month all year. Given that they are highly adapted to storing and using energy extremely efficiently in between huge meals, this isn’t unreasonable. Not to mention that many members of the same family of snakes naturally experience long annual fasts during breeding season or during times when prey is scarce; or alternatively, they are able to take advantage of brief periods of abundance by eating a lot all at once and living off of those reserves for long periods in between.
Plus, huge numbers of captive snakes are overfed and under-exercised, including ball pythons. Devoted owners want to do right by their pets, and it’s not intuitive to us to feed an animal once a month or less. Plus we base recommended feeding schedules off of what respected breeders do, and then apply them to animals that are not experiencing the huge metabolic cost of breeding. It’s like a human who isn’t pregnant basing their caloric needs on those of a human who is. Or we take the recommendations for feeding babies and apply them to adults that are not growing anymore. I know I don’t have the appetite I had when I was 16, do you?
Anyway, that’s not to say that husbandry issues, disease, and stress don’t cause fasts. But I do suspect that a lot of the fasts in *adult snakes* (not growing babies) that worry concerned keepers basically boil down to the snake just being legit not hungry for a few months because it’s had enough food for awhile.
Maybe that at least makes the fast less frustrating and worrisome. :)