Frozen Thawed question

my BP has never even looked at me funny let alone snapped at me.

the feeding association with aggressiveness is a myth as far as im concerned. they either fear you and snap at you or they dont. and if your lucky that dissipates with age.

Yeah, if your snake eats fine in a separate tub then I guess it's no issue, but it's not necessary at all. I worked at zoos and nature centers for 7 years and we never fed anything in a separate container. Look at how difficult it is to get some snakes switched to eating a F/T rodent that clearly looks and smells like food. They are not going to confuse your hand for one unless you were handling rodents without washing.

It is fun waiting for them to come out of their hide to strike a F/T. My babies will hit so fast that you don't even see the head, you just realize that suddenly the pup is gone! Sometimes they will drag it into their hide to swallow, but other times they will actually come out to eat it. I almost always am startled by the strike though, haha.

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I don't feed my snakes while in shed. Well, if the eyes are blue anyway. They wouldn't be out looking for food at that time if they were in the wild. It won't hurt them to miss a meal.

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Originally Posted by Kaorte

People do it just because they have heard that it helps with "aggressiveness". But it really doesn't. At all.

Yes, wait 5 days and try again. How long did you leave the mouse in last time?

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You can't be so definite in your statement. A BP is generally more docile, but other more aggressive snakes with stronger feeding habits may need to be taught that eating[striking], is only for this tub, and not while in the enclosure.

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Originally Posted by Enser54

You can't be so definite in your statement. A BP is generally more docile, but other more aggressive snakes with stronger feeding habits may need to be taught that eating[striking], is only for this tub, and not while in the enclosure.

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your snake should never associate a hand with food unless your husbandry practices are bad, even if that. a strike would be 95% fear driven. they use thermal, sight and smell to define a food item a hand will be thermally imaged way to big for its meal even if it does smell like food. it does not look like food attached to a human either.

people say if you dont wash your hands after handling the food the snake may strike you. i do not wash my hands after handling the food immediate and have went to handling my BP and putting him back in his enclosure and never even had him flick his tong at me.

I'm just saying, a type snake that is more aggressive by nature may be more necessary to do it with, I don't know as none of my snakes are aggressive so I don't do this, but for others it may be the case.

I use aspen substrate, so I use a separate tub. All my snakes are in their own custom-built wood enclosures, so it's easier for me and they do just fine. In fact, they seem to know that when I put them into the tub ,it's go time. They never ball up or act scared. They usually look right at me as if to say, "ok, now where's the food". I put a f/t in, and bam! usually right out of my fingers. Except for my big female. She's srill on live, and I can't seem to break yer yet. But that will come in time. Just like the others.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Enser54

You can't be so definite in your statement. A BP is generally more docile, but other more aggressive snakes with stronger feeding habits may need to be taught that eating[striking], is only for this tub, and not while in the enclosure.

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I don't think ball pythons can be taught anything. That is my personal opinion. There is no reason for a bp to associate the opening of it's tank with Being fed. I don't mess with my snakes on feeding day though.

YouTube - Hook Training with Reticulated Pythons

I am sure this guy knows more than either of us, and he says that the hook "lets her know", thus she has been taught/conditions to associate certain things with feeding, and certain things to say this is not time for feeding.