I am making no progress taming/training woma python.

She is over a year old now and still cant be handled with my hands without a hook to keep her head away from any part of my skin. Im at a loss as to what to do.I feed her plenty and try to handle her a few days after feeding hoping the food response will be curbed but nope.
So is she too old now to change?

One trick I learned with the hook and my male SD retic (who is so stupidly foody he will strike and hold the RHP) is to rub it with a bit of lemon-scent hand sanitizer or white vinegar. The sharp smell can throw them out of being foody once they encounter it. You can try rubbing a bit on your own exposed skin also.

After about a year with our three I will tell you what I have tried, read and what I accidentally stumbled upon that worked.
First off, understand the ridiculous feeding response you are working with. In the wild womas eat cold blooded low fat food. They have to eat a lot. As a result they are programmed to always be hungry and taste first, ask questions later. This feeding response is even stronger in their first couple years. Once their growth slows down, it sounds like this calms down with it. This info is what I have read and beet told by others with womas. The information seems to coincide with what I have experienced with ours. I have never been bitten out of aggression, they are not defensive. Quite the contrary they are very inquisitive. Knowing this is not an aggression issue helps some but getting bit and wrapped still sucks.
What we tried;
Frequent small meals- Frequent small meals as opposed to weekly larger ones are supposed to help with the constant hunger. I have not seen that benefit however I stick to this for the health benefits. Obesity is a real issue with womas, keeping the proper food amount while letting them eat often is a good idea.
Frequent handling- With our male this worked. With our females it takes about 10 minutes of dodging before they switch from fedding mode to exploring mode. Of the 3 he has the mellowest feeding response. I still use a hook to get him out of his cage but once out he is pretty chill. I had him out yesterday and the wife took some pics. I will try to post them.
"Tap training - the concept is that the snake learns the difference between play time and dinner time is defined by a tap on the head with the snake hook. Ours bite and wrap the hook so you can guess what I think about that.
What we inadvertently discovered that worked- while cleaning I put them in separate Tupperware bins. I noticed that after this time in the bins they are not in feeding mode when I go to get them out. This has worked with all 3. The only thing I can guess is the new environment with no chance of food gets them in exploration mode.

Hope this helps.
https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...0730_24215.jpg

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...0730_33512.jpg

Thanks to both of you bcr I had forgotton about the lemon/vinegar trick I will try this one first.
Enginee I tried training with a hook, last time she grabbed the end of the hook and started swallowing. Scared the bjs out of me, but she was smart enough to spit it out after a minute.luckily the hook is rubberized at the end.
I tried waiting her out, even taking her outside in the grass to see if that would take her mind off food, but after picking her up she was back to smelling me and opening her mouth to take a bite(lol, she does this slowly so I have time to move her head away).
I will give the small more frequent meals a go and see how that does, Im willing to try all the methods to which will work.

Make sure you don't have the scent of any other snake on your hands, and in your case, you might want to make sure that's your whole body and get a snake hook that's used only for her. My woma is usually an absolute sweetheart, but if there's other-snake smell on your hands/arms he will get agitated.


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Definitely make sure there's no other snake smell and prepare to be curiously bitten many times when working with Aspidites. Still imo the best species there is but definitely bitey with their strong food response. They seem to go through calm phases and angsty phases.


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I didnt think about other snake smells. I mean I always smell like something, dogs, parrot, snakes, possibly human too.
I know she even went after my leg with pants and everything. I am hoping we get through this and she tames down like all the others.

I'm sorry to hear that you're having such a difficult time with her. Especially since I will be picking up my first pair of Womas this Sunday... lol I've never worked with Womas, but it has been my understanding that they're typically calm and docile as can be once you get them out of their enclosures and rarely ever bite once they're out. Is that not necessarily true?

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Originally Posted by Aedryan Methyus

I'm sorry to hear that you're having such a difficult time with her. Especially since I will be picking up my first pair of Womas this Sunday... lol I've never worked with Womas, but it has been my understanding that they're typically calm and docile as can be once you get them out of their enclosures and rarely ever bite once they're out. Is that not necessarily true?

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By nature they are non defensive, calm and inquisitive however as juveniles they have an insane feeding response. Once they realize you are not food you are good to go.

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Originally Posted by Aedryan Methyus

I'm sorry to hear that you're having such a difficult time with her. Especially since I will be picking up my first pair of Womas this Sunday... lol I've never worked with Womas, but it has been my understanding that they're typically calm and docile as can be once you get them out of their enclosures and rarely ever bite once they're out. Is that not necessarily true?

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It's inquisitive. They burrow a lot and they're hilarious to watch. If they start burrowing hard in your fingers though assume they will latch on and womas don't bite and release like a ball for instance. It's a 100% feed response. I have some pictures and even after 10 years on this forum I'm not sure if Deb would want me to share them or not? BUT babies will posture and headbutt sometimes. Womas being inquisitive take work. They're typically jumpy when they're small and calm when they're adults with the bitey phase being the in between sub adult time.


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Originally Posted by enginee837

By nature they are non defensive, calm and inquisitive however as juveniles they have an insane feeding response. Once they realize you are not food you are good to go.

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They have insane feed response their whole lives! I argue there the best snake to start with in the medium range because they're hard to not feed [emoji12]


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Originally Posted by BMorrison

Definitely make sure there's no other snake smell

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Originally Posted by Prognathodon

Make sure you don't have the scent of any other snake on your hands

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I'm considering the addition of a woma to my collection so reading all of the threads about them and getting some great information. Thank you enginee837 for your input as well.

Should womas should be housed in a separate area of the house if I have other snakes in my collection?

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Originally Posted by BR8080

I'm considering the addition of a woma to my collection so reading all of the threads about them and getting some great information. Thank you enginee837 for your input as well.

Should womas should be housed in a separate area of the house if I have other snakes in my collection?

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My balls and womas are all in the same room. In fact I have 3 sub 400g balls in the same hatchling rack as a couple month old woma.


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My woma is in half of a T8 with a sand boa "next door" in a stack with other snakes. It doesn't seem to bother him, but on colubrid/boa feeding day he's usually at the door hoping for food. [emoji57] My guess is that they get used to general other-snake smell in the air, but the strong recent smell of another snake that's on the part of thing handling them gets their attention. I'm careful about cleaning my hands/arms before handling my boy, but he doesn't seem to care if, say, the shoulders of my shirt smell like the BP that was cruising around there a few minutes ago.


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Just to add, my woma is still a youngster, he'll be needing to move up to a whole T8 or a T10 soonish.


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