Appropriate size/health determination

[Blitzjg]

I know for cornsnakes the spine is used as a reference to determine if a snake is underfed (pronounced spine) or fat (muffin shape). Is this applicable to BPs? If so what are the features, if not, how can I assess my BP? There seems to be so much inter-individual variability that weight would not be sufficient.

[JodanOrNoDan]

Spine showing on a BP is bad. Begin able to easily feel ribs is bad. A gushy body tone is bad. Now that I think about it I am having a hard time describing in words what a healthy BP looks like. After awhile you get the correct proportions in your head and you can just tell.

Maybe someone has already done it, but it should be possible to do a length to widest part of the body ratio. If no one else chimes in, i think I may start measuring some of my animals. If enough of us do it we should come back with some sort of range. It is a bad time of year though for this because many animals are just coming off of fasts and many have laid eggs.

There would have to be two ratios though, one for boys and another for girls. They are put together differently.

[Craiga 01453]

Like Jodan said, it can be a bit difficult to put into words.

But BPs should have a slightly triangular shape, without the spine being too pronounced. There shouldn't be any "baggy", loose skin hanging down, and the animal should be fairly firm to the touch.

On the other side of that, the animal shouldn't be too round. If the spine is kinda indented with the snake's mass growing up around the spine the snake us overweight.

If you'd like to share a few pics of your BP we can help assess the snake's size. If you can get a few different angles that'll help, but one from directly above the snake will work best.

[Blitzjg]

What do you mean by gushy body tone?

When googling ball python images, it seems like half of the first images that come up have a visible spine, am I assessing that correctly?

[JodanOrNoDan]

Craig is explaining this better than me. Protruding spine would be a better definition. Gushy body tone means either hanging skin or you can feel something other than solid muscle(too fat).

This is a baby right after its first shed and different rules apply but outside of a hatchling you would not want to see this body shape. This particular animal is a fat pig at a year old.



Here is a month old female, the way I like to see them. A boy should be thinner with more defined musculature along the back.

[Blitzjg]

Very helpful guys thank you.

In that pic of the baby you are saying that's how an underfed/skinny adult would look?

[JodanOrNoDan]

Very helpful guys thank you.

In that pic of the baby you are saying that's how an underfed/skinny adult would look?

If that was an adult with that body shape in would be near death. It is an extreme. The female below, if she was an adult, would be close to diet time. Everything has variation though. The bottom female comes from one of my large lines. They plump then grow. She is 1500 grams at a year on the same feeding schedule as everyone else. That line just grows quicker so they move up prey sizes quicker.

[Starscream]

This is my girl, and I'd like to think she's pretty healthy. She's a little over a year old. I've seen good body condition described as looking like a "melting hershey's kiss", as their fat distribution is down towards the bottom of their sides.

[tttaylorrr]

here's a beep that's a bit fat lol (she's slimmed down now)