Very Thin Ball Python

Hello,

HELP!!! I have a Ball Python that was abandoned by my previous tenants. I've never owned a snake before either. My Husband and I fed him Monday 2 fuzzies and he scarfed them down. I don't know how long they neglected him before they left him but he is super ematiated. Is there anything further I can do to plump him up? I can email a pic if that helps.

The more information you can give us on his setup the better. What is the hot side, and cool side temps? What is the humidity? What bedding are you using? How many hides and what size enclosure do you have him in? Sorry about all the questions, but the only way to help is to have more information. Also take a little time to read the care sheet on this site. It will help a lot... Best of luck

Unless he's a baby baby, fuzzies are probably too small. I have my baby on large hoppers. Normally you'd try to get something as big around as his biggest point...though idk how that'll work with an emaciated snake.

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When we found him he was being kept warm with a regular heating pad underneath his 10 gallon glass tank. They also had a clip light attached to a nearby chair that emitted a red light. The setup has a large water dish and one hiding log and a tree for I suppose climbing. His bedding is that light tan colored shredded stuff.

Yesterday I went to Petco and bought a humidity gauge and a small size sticky heat pad and put that underneath on the right side. I am not using the red light or the human style heating pad.

I can email you a pic but I'm new so you'll have to help me with that. Thanks !!

He had a hard time swallowing the fuzzies. He isn't round and plump but kinda tapeworm looking. Poor guy...I'm just so sad

That heat pad is gonna be far too hot for him if it's not being controlled by a dimmer or thermostat...

Hi LGray,

Do you mean the new heat pad I bought him ? I bought the smallest size. How do I keep him warm without having to regulate it ?

There's the problem, you HAVE to regulate it, unless you want him to get burned...a dimmer is $10.00 at Home depot....a tempgun like $25-35, or a thermostat for $40-100. If you can't properly care for him then you probably should find someone who can. That heat pad HAS to be regulated..

You must be a pretty cool land lord if you're taking the time to try to save this animal. Mine was discovered by my landlord under similar circumstances after an eviction and that's how I ended up with her.

There's been a lot of pets being left for dead in apartments & foreclosed homes with this economic mess going on. People have no idea just how big of a problem it's been.

Wow.....ok then LGray. Thanks for the help. I am trying to find someone else to care for him. In the meantime I just was asking for some advice.

Have a fabulous day !!

Try searching for a rescue in your area. I'm in seattle and we have a rather large reptile rescue org. :)

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Good luck, I wasn't trying to be mean about it, just giving my advice. UTHs not monitored by a dimmer or thermostat can seriously burn your snake.

To get a general idea of what the care requirements are for a Ball Python I'd recommend checking out the BP.net care sheet:http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...ius)-Caresheet It has a ton of useful information.

Basically you need that 10 gallon tank to have a cool side and a warm side. The floor of the cool side should have a surface temperature of about 78-83 and the warm side 88-92. I would recommend doing away with the light just using the Under Tank Heater (UTH). UTH's are great for Ball Pythons because Ball python's don't bask, they just need surface heat in order to keep themselves warm and digest food, but when UTH's are plugged into the wall they tend to get too hot (about 130 degrees) You need something to control the heat output of that UTH in order to not burn the belly of you BP. I would recommend a thermostat such as one here:http://www.reptilebasics.com/thermostats

In order to take a accurate measurement of the surface temperature of the floor of his enclosure I you are going to need a thermometer with a probe restring on the surface(found at most pet stores, but generally not very accurate) or the best way to measure the surface temperatures of your BP's enclosure is a IR thermometer, such as this one:www.tempgun.com/

Also you are going to want to provide your Ball Python with an identical hide on both the cool side and on the warm side. Identical because Ball Pythons are very security minded, if they have two different hides they will always choose the one they feel most secure in and stay there, even if the temperature becomes uncomfortable for them.

For a prey item you are going to want to feed him a mouse or rat that is about the same thickness or slightly thicker than the thickest part of your Ball Python.

Let me know if there is anything you don't understand or any part of your question that I missed. Also, yes I a picture of the Ball Python with a object to reference size would help for determining the right size of prey. Do you have any idea how old the BP is? Or, do you have a kitchen scale you could use to see how many grams it is?

Thank you Agent for the help. I will go and buy a thermostat and tempgun. He is about a year old and very thin. Where can I email you a pic? My husband took this with his Iphone before he left and emailed it early this a.m. so there isn't any size reference. Can I give him more fuzzies to fatten him up right away ?

Good for you for taking care of this poor baby and also for making an effort to get the things you need to take care of the snake. I'm sure that this snake will do very well under your care.

I understand that everyone here is trying to help her, but it just kind of bothers me to read the whole "do you have this, that, what are the exact temperatures, blah blah blah" stuff. It's not like she went out and bought this snake without doing any research. She found a snake that someone left behind and was nice enough to try to take care of it. So of course, she isn't going to have the exact perfect, coveted set-up right away. Maybe instead of automatically asking those types of questions to a person who has never owned a snake and is rescuing one from a negligent owner, we should suggest the proper things to do instead of assuming that they're going to have everything correct right away. If they've never had a snake, they're not going to know exactly what to do or that it even needs to have thermometers, thermostats, etc. Hence the reason why she came here.

Nalababi, you came to the right place to ask for advice and everyone here is giving you great advice. I pretty much don't have anything to add other than what everyone else has told you. Feeding him multiple prey items in one feeding isn't recommended. Go with what Agent told you and feed it prey that is no larger than the widest part of his body. Since he's been eating well, I'm sure if you feed him once a week or every 5 days or so, he'll be in good shape in no time. :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nalababi

Thank you Agent for the help. I will go and buy a thermostat and tempgun. He is about a year old and very thin. Where can I email you a pic? My husband took this with his Iphone before he left and emailed it early this a.m. so there isn't any size reference. Can I give him more fuzzies to fatten him up right away ?

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I'd recommend posting a pic in this thread so others can advise you also.

To post the pictures in this thread you just log in, on the bar right under the BP.net logo click the “Gallery” tab, under the gallery tab click on “My Images” and there will be a tab that you can click that says “Upload Image” http://ball-pythons.net/gallery/upload.php
Once you have the image uploaded to your BP.net gallery you can then put them in a forum post by going to the pic in your gallery and right clicking and selecting "copy image location" and entering the image location information in the post using this BBC code:
[ URL="paste you image location here"][IMG]Also post your image location here[/IMG][/URL]
(with no space between [ and URL )

And another way you could do it is to upload the pictures to an online photo hosting site like photobucket and use the IMG BBC code with the image location to post them on the forum.

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Originally Posted by Nalababi

Can I give him more fuzzies to fatten him up right away ?

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If you have already have some fuzzies go you can go ahead and feed them to him if he'll take them. If you are going to go out to get some to his food look for a prey item that is about as thick as (or a little bit thicker) than your BP's thickest part.

BP's can tolerate long periods of not eating, so you shouldn't be too concerned about fattening him up right away. My recommendation is just getting him back on track with a regular weekly feeding schedule that includes appropriately size prey item(s). Before you know it he'll be up to nice healthy weight.

For now for the thermostat you cod go to ace hardware and get a plug in lamp dimmer. You'll need a digital thermometer too. You can get them at any walmart or like store get an indoor outdoor thermometer. You also may be able to find one that reads humidity as well. I use a few of them in my house. The plug in lamp dimmer isn't perfect but at least the uth won't be full strength. You should get it up and running with the dimmer on it and them adjust until the hotside temps are 92.f and holding steady. Then leave the dimmer where it is. It's not expensive It's lime 10$ and will save you a world of trouble from a burn. Good luck with him!

Now, one thing I want to point out here. Please don't stuff that poor thing with food just yet. If it is as severely underfed as you say, it will need time to digest it's food. If you feed it too much too fast you run a very real risk of regurge and/or death from overeating.

As tiny as he is and as hard as it may be, only feed him one or two SMALL meals every 4 or 5 days. NO sooner. And for now don't offer bigger prey. Stick to fuzzies for now. If you overload his system when he's so weak, the shock alone could kill him.

Go ahead and provide him the best enclosure you can, get him nice and warm, make sure he has access to fresh water at all times, feed him slowly until he starts plumping up a bit, then worry about giving him bigger prey. If he can barely swallow a fuzzy, DO NOT offer bigger.

It will take time, so don't rush him. I'd stay with one or two fuzzies every 4 or 5 days for at least a month. Then you can slowly move up prey size.

Please come here if you need help or have questions, this community is a great resource. And lastly: A huge :grouphug: to you for rescuing this poor thing and trying your best to help him out.

Gale

I've skimmed through the posts in this thread, did anyone mention that the snake should not be held for 2 days after eating?

Since you guys fed him recently, you have a couple days to get things situated while he's digesting. When you get a BP dumped on you like that, and you have no experience with BPs, I could imagine it's overwhelming. While BPs are somewhat fragile, some of them can be resilient.

If you keep him (I hope you do, don't let anyone here tell you otherwise if you want to keep him) just keep in mind the first few months of owning a BP are unpredictable, stressful, and so rewarding in the end. Most everyone goes through the "OMG MY SNAKE IS GOING TO DIE!" phase... We quickly realize we're over reacting ;)

If you can't figure out how to post a pic on here you can email it to me and i will post it on this thread for you. my e-mail is aomarine67@gmail.com. Just let me know its you so I don't toss it thinking its junkmail. good luck with the snake. ask any questions you may have. From the sounds of it you may want to keep an eye out on craigslist for a larger tank. a 20 gal or 20 gal long should serve well for the time being but no rush fatten him up a big before putting the stress of a completely new enclosure on him.

X3 on the not rushing and stuffing food into him. Go slow and he'll come through this. Be as hands off as possible until he is better. I know it's hard but handling at this point would jut stress this poor baby out. I also think that on his fist defecation you should get a fecal test done. Most vets can do them, and it would give you a good starting base. Just as a precaution. Parasites isn't common but it's not an impossibility either.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Bones

I understand that everyone here is trying to help her, but it just kind of bothers me to read the whole "do you have this, that, what are the exact temperatures, blah blah blah" stuff. It's not like she went out and bought this snake without doing any research. She found a snake that someone left behind and was nice enough to try to take care of it. So of course, she isn't going to have the exact perfect, coveted set-up right away. Maybe instead of automatically asking those types of questions to a person who has never owned a snake and is rescuing one from a negligent owner, we should suggest the proper things to do instead of assuming that they're going to have everything correct right away. If they've never had a snake, they're not going to know exactly what to do or that it even needs to have thermometers, thermostats, etc. Hence the reason why she came here.

Nalababi, you came to the right place to ask for advice and everyone here is giving you great advice. I pretty much don't have anything to add other than what everyone else has told you. Feeding him multiple prey items in one feeding isn't recommended. Go with what Agent told you and feed it prey that is no larger than the widest part of his body. Since he's been eating well, I'm sure if you feed him once a week or every 5 days or so, he'll be in good shape in no time. :)

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I agree! Thank you for asking and trying to take care of him-that's what's important :gj:

My advice is to make an account on an online photo album site like photoucket or flicker. They are free and you can insert the pictures directly into the post. If you do that, hover over the picture and copy the "IMG Code" and paste it here.
http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t...otobucket1.jpg

Good luck with this snake. You have some good advice so far. BPs can be pretty finicky so consider yourself lucky that he ate for you. I couldn't help you will size of prey till I see a picture of him, and like I said, I advise that you join one of the sites I mentioned and post the picture directly into the post.

I also suggest never putting your email in any thread on any forum. Spammers have a hay day with forums these days.

Feed him feed him feed him. You can just keep feeding him fuzzies and hoppers for a few weeks until he seems okay getting them down, but offer him at least two or three per meal, once a week. And leave him alone for a couple days afterwards so he doesn't regurgitate. (Don't mess with his temps right after a meal, either--that's how I ended up with a baby ball python barfing up mice two weeks after I got her.) And in a couple weeks you can start moving him up to small and then large mice.

And find a good reptile vet in your area. You want to make sure he's parasite free. If he's just underfed, you'll be able to sort him out with food and good husbandry--but if he's got mites or intestinal issues, you'll need to diagnose that, and he may need treatment.

First of all, wonderful thing you are doing, kudos :)

The danger with heat pads made for animals is that they can get quite hot. Snakes do not feel the heat as "pain" until it is to late, and easily get a really nasty burn on their belly.

Therefore its important to make sure the "hot side" doesn't get to hot. A temp gun is a great thing, but in the meantime one can monitor the heat by using a cheap digital thermometer from Walmart etc. They have a probe which you can place on the warm side of the tank to make sure the warm side stays around 95 degrees at the most (between 90 and 95) Our body temperature should be around 98 degrees, so unless our hands are cold, the warmspot for the snake should feel barely warm to us, not hot. Or else its to hot.

The cool side should be around 80 degrees.

It helps to cover the top screen with silver foil to keep some humidity in the tank. Another crucial are at least 2 hides. They need to be small enough for the snake to feel "snug" inside. They can be something as simple as cardboard boxes from food items, plastic bowls, or the pre made plastic hides for animals.

In the beginning the correct setup may sound complicated and overwhelming, but when getting right down to it, its not that bad ! The heat needs to be right and controlled and the Ball Python needs a place to hide and feel safe. One can always make it "better" and more elaborate later on, for now, its sort of an emergency and I'm not sure how much time and money you want to invest into this. You might just fall in love with the little guy :)

If so, we are here to help every step of the way !!

Its a good sign he ate at all. If he really is as skinny as you say , small meals are good for now, you don't want to make him sick and regurgitate. Once you see he passes the meals just fine, you can feed small meals, every 4 to 5 days, later on every 7 days for an appropriate sized meal. He should grow quickly now !!!

If he turns dull looking, and his eyes look opaque, he will be getting ready to shed, this is the time when you want to bump up the humidity. It takes about 5 days (more or less) from the "blue opaque" phase until they actually shed. They turn all clear looking again before the skin comes off.

Please keep asking questions and keep taking care of that poor little guy. Pictures would be great, as well :)

Nalababi, hello, and :welcome: to BP.net.
Thank You for taking an interest in the health and survival of this animal. As was said above, if you can't get a thermostat right away, them a basic lamp dimmer can be used. You can get them at places like Home Depot, Lowes or hardware stores in the Lighting section. Here is a link to a thread that shows what they look like and how to use them:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...t-Instructions

While a thermostat is preferred for controlling the Under Tank Heater, they come in a variety of styles, prices and features. If you are interested in a good basic thermostat, here is one that you might look at:

http://www.amazon.com/Hydrofarm-MTPR...1529683&sr=1-7

For measuring temperatures, alot of people use Temp guns, but you can also use digital thermometers. I like the Acu-Rite Indoor/Outdoor thermometer. It has a probe, so you can use it to monitor both the warm side temp and the cool side temp, and it will tell you the humidity as well. Sometimes you can find them in stock at Wal-Mart in the Home Hardware section, or at Home Depot or Lowes in the Outdoors section. Here is a link to where they can be ordered from Amazon, and you can see what they look like:

http://www.amazon.com/Chaney-Instrum...1630682&sr=1-7

It may seem a little overwhelming at first, but these really are fascinating animals and worth the effort.