Hard time switching to frozen, strange day time behavior

[Godzilla78]

By the way, I only take out and handle my snakes, once or twice per week, as they are content to be left alone most of the time. They are really not “fun” pets, as people might wish. They are extremely boring in many ways, lol. But I love them, and its enough for me to just take care of their needs, and occasionally take one out to interact with.


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[Danya]

Thanks for everyone's feedback. I really do appreciate it even though it's not the nicest, but that's the only real way for me to learn right now. I now know how improperly I am doing a lot of important stuff in my husbandry. I will do as people told me(have minimum contact with the snake for a week, and then try and feed it). But, my original thread and some posts had some questions that I didn't get an answer for. One of the questions I asked was "Where I could get one or a few live hoppers?". I do have a pet shop not too far away that I know sells live mice, but I don't know if they will sell me just one. Let's say they did sell me one hopper on the day I would try to feed my snake(After a full week of basically bare minimum human contact) and he wouldn't eat the hopper. Where would I keep it? Would I have to get a cage for mice and make them live and grow with me for another whole week? I also asked what the strange day time behavior could mean. Someone also told me that I did need a second hide after I stated that I will be getting another one soon, which made me think that my thread wasn't read completely through(No hard feelings at all, just made me feel a little bit frustrated). I hope this doesn't make me sound like an ungrateful person. Thank you all for your feedback, No hard feelings.

[Sgt7212]

Thanks for everyone's feedback. I really do appreciate it even though it's not the nicest, but that's the only real way for me to learn right now. I now know how improperly I am doing a lot of important stuff in my husbandry. I will do as people told me(have minimum contact with the snake for a week, and then try and feed it). But, my original thread and some posts had some questions that I didn't get an answer for. One of the questions I asked was "Where I could get one or a few live hoppers?". I do have a pet shop not too far away that I know sells live mice, but I don't know if they will sell me just one. Let's say they did sell me one hopper on the day I would try to feed my snake(After a full week of basically bare minimum human contact) and he wouldn't eat the hopper. Where would I keep it? Would I have to get a cage for mice and make them live and grow with me for another whole week? I also asked what the strange day time behavior could mean. Someone also told me that I did need a second hide after I stated that I will be getting another one soon, which made me think that my thread wasn't read completely through(No hard feelings at all, just made me feel a little bit frustrated). I hope this doesn't make me sound like an ungrateful person. Thank you all for your feedback, No hard feelings.

Dont get frustrated. Everyone starts somewhere. The important thing is that you are receptive to the advice.

I am not an expert, but reading through and interpreting others’ responses and also thinking through how I would attempt to resolve the issues you are facing right now, these are my thoughts.

As to your question regarding him roaming and exploring after having him out and handling him for about 20 minutes, your question was indirectly, although not explicitly answered. If a ball python is stressed and scared, it will not behave the way it would when it is not stressed or afraid. When you put him back into his enclosure, which is a space that he has not had time to sufficiently adjust to in the first place due to over handling and repeated efforts to feed him when he wasn’t ready, what you interpreted to be exploring, may have actually been him searching for a place in the enclosure that he felt safe and secure in.That’s why people have recommended to leave him be, no handling, etc... Let him have the time to settle and de-stress.

As for the live hopper, once you get him eating regularly, it won’t be a concern. In the meantime, my personal opinion is that a live hopper mouse does not present a danger to your snake. I would NOT recommend this with a larger mouse or rat, but you could put the hopper mouse in and leave in in the enclosure. My guess is that at some point overnight, when things are quiet and dark, he will eat it and it will be gone by morning. Worst case scenario, a hopper mouse is not very expensive, so if it goes to waste and you buy one the following week, I don’t think it’s that big of a loss. Maybe $2? You’ll be spending that anyway once he is eating regularly. Once you get him eating on a consistent basis (at least 3 weeks in a row), you could switch him over to f/t.

Someone with more more experience can jump in here if I am off base on any of this.

[Danya]

Thanks for the great feedback! I won't be having any contact with him for a week from today, so let's see how that goes. He's currently just lying on his warm spot. As for the mouse, I guess I'll pick one up this Friday(that was the day he was fed before) and see how that goes. I really hope he eats it because I don't know what I'll do with it if he won't. Thanks again.

[CALM Pythons]

Thanks for the great feedback! I won't be having any contact with him for a week from today, so let's see how that goes. He's currently just lying on his warm spot. As for the mouse, I guess I'll pick one up this Friday(that was the day he was fed before) and see how that goes. I really hope he eats it because I don't know what I'll do with it if he won't. Thanks again.

If he doesnt eat the mouse you can keep the mouse in a Plastic tote or small $7 critter cage or old 10 gallon tank. Dont try cardboard as they will chew threw. You can throw any food in there for them for a week. Dry dog/cat food if you have some or some scraps from your dinner. A little shallow bowl or something that holds some water. Make sure there are a couple air holes for the mouse too.


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[redshepherd]

I really hope he eats it because I don't know what I'll do with it if he won't. Thanks again.

If he doesn't eat, seriously just buy a 6qt tub and the correct hides, and follow Deborah's guide here to a T. It will not go wrong, it's much cheaper to set up than a tank, and your snake will eat and grow while you figure out the rest of the "main tank's" husbandry!

https://ball-pythons.net/forums/show...-hatchling-101

[Danya]

I don't know how my parents would react to the mice, lol. The problem is, I would grow really attached to the animal in a week and I wouldn't have the heart to feed it to the snake, even though I know my snake needs its food. Yeah, if in a week or two he won't eat, I'll do the tub setup.

[Craiga 01453]

I'm happy to see you're open to learning and receptive to advice. Since you're concerned with your parents being unhappy about a mouse in the house I'm guessing you're young? So good on you for taking the constructive criticism maturely. We've seen MANY adults get all hurt and act like children if they were given any advice that wasn't sugar coated.

As for your original questions, the activity in the enclosure is due to stress. The animal is STRESSED to the max. Granted people and snakes are entirely different, try to put yourself into a similar human related situation. You'd be stressed, anxious, nervous, etc...
Also, snake brains are very simple and at this point all that snake is thinking is "don't get eaten". And since it hasn't had a chance to feel safe and secure yet, it is SCARED.
So, the behavior is directly due to stress and fear, things YOU can fix easily.

Don't get overwhelmed, we were ALL new once. Learn from mistakes and grow. We've ALL made mistakes with our animals and in life. It's how we learn and grow that matters...

Onto the mouse concern... first off hoppers are too small. BPs eat hoppers for the first 3-5 meals out of the egg and quickly are ready for bigger prey.

That being said, if the snake doesn't eat you have a few options:
1) keep the mouse in a tote, tank, etc... that it can't chew out of. Feed it, make sure it has water and offer again in a week.
2) throw it outside for a neighborhood cat, snake, etc...
3) ask the store if they'll take it back
4) humanely euthanize the mouse and freeze it for later


As for the part about you being frustrated that not all your questions were answered, sorry bout that.
Sometimes it's hard to remember everything from the thread, sometimes we forget.
There are lots of threads, lots of members, lots of questions.
We are all here willingly sharing our experience and knowledge, giving our time and doing it simply because we want to help people enjoy the hobby we love.

Anyway, I hope I helped you out. Feel free to ask any questions you may have. Keep learning from the right people and applying what you learn. You'll be a great snake keeper in no time!!

[Danya]

Yeah, I'm only 15 right now, thanks for the compliment! He's now acting more or less normal, at night hes active, in the daytime he either sits on his hot or cool spot. Only one problem, I think he thinks that if he goes under the cool hide, he'll be taken out because he stopped going into it, instead he sits on it. Do you think he'll start getting back into it soon? I'll get a live hopper this Friday(feeding day) and give it to him at night. Another member said that a hopper isn't a threat to a young ball python so you could leave it in the tank overnight(In their opinion). Any thoughts? I really hope he'll take it, because I'd grow attached to it really fast, haha. No hard feelings about my questions, I totally understand there's a lot of help to be given out. Thanks for reading! I hope to get a response soon! :-)

[Danya]

Going to make a quick edit on how things are going right now. Monty did decide to come back into his cave, so that's good. I had a lot of plans yesterday so I couldn't get a hopper, will be getting one in an hour or so. I bought a special hanging vine for him(which he absolutely loves), he sits on it like an Emerald Tree Boa or a Green Tree Python would, haha. He explores and climbs during the night and sleeps during the day(Behavior seems to be normal again). I've had bare minimum contact with him, just giving his enclosure a quick spray once a day and changing his water every other day. I did put a thin "blanket" over his cage which keeps it somewhat dark, and surprisingly keeps his humidity very well. Anyways that's it for now, will update after I offer him the hopper. Bye.