Feeling Like a Failure (Feeding)

[pretends2bnormal]

She was going every 2 weeks previously, so maybe she’s just switching over to less frequent defecation. Hard to know because she hasn’t had a 2nd meal to help push the first one out lol.

I thaw in a ziploc bag in warm (just warm enough to register as warm to the touch, but not hot) water, then blast with the hair dryer.

When I only had my Cal King, I would just leave the rat on the counter for a few hours and she would literally eat it at room temp. Didn’t have to blast it with heat or anything. That didn’t work for Syd (my BP), though, so I started doing both of their meals at the same time in the baggies in water to simplify feeding process and that seemed to be the ticket. Until now, anyway.




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Could be. As for the thawing, that's roughly what I do. Though most of mine don't mind wet feeders so I usually skip bagging and the hairdryer dries it off enough I guess.

Maybe try longer with the hairdryer? I aim for 30 seconds or so, but generally wait until I see a nose at the hide entrance or they start coming out of the hide. Vega, my yearling, will literally take a room temp rat wet if offered... (only did that once out of curiosity. Figured he wouldn't take it and I could just do the blow dryer, but he snatched it right up.)

Right now getting the nose to come out in interest takes 60-90 seconds for my young female (2nd frozen meal last night! & 3rd with me). I do the whole body once I get the nose for 30 seconds and just alternate to try and get the whole thing extra warm and alive.

If that doesn't get interest, I often swap to the low power heat mode and blow some smell straight into the cage near the hide entrance in case they weren't paying attention. That tends to work unless I missed the start of a shed for my adult male.

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[alittleFREE]

Could be. As for the thawing, that's roughly what I do. Though most of mine don't mind wet feeders so I usually skip bagging and the hairdryer dries it off enough I guess.

Maybe try longer with the hairdryer? I aim for 30 seconds or so, but generally wait until I see a nose at the hide entrance or they start coming out of the hide. Vega, my yearling, will literally take a room temp rat wet if offered... (only did that once out of curiosity. Figured he wouldn't take it and I could just do the blow dryer, but he snatched it right up.)

Right now getting the nose to come out in interest takes 60-90 seconds for my young female (2nd frozen meal last night! & 3rd with me). I do the whole body once I get the nose for 30 seconds and just alternate to try and get the whole thing extra warm and alive.

If that doesn't get interest, I often swap to the low power heat mode and blow some smell straight into the cage near the hide entrance in case they weren't paying attention. That tends to work unless I missed the start of a shed for my adult male.

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Well, the problem is, she already shows interest. Her head is out of her hide every night like she's waiting for food. So when it's time to feed, she's there and ready, and she comes up to it, sniffs it, watches it intently - if I move it around she follows it with her head. She just won't strike. Whereas before, once the rat got in front of her, she IMMEDIATELY struck and wrapped.

And yeah, I've tried everything with the hairdryer. Each week she hasn't taken, I've spent like 30 minutes alternating between blasting it and offering it... trying different things to get it "right" so she'll eat. I've done it on the high setting, on the low setting, for 10 seconds, for 30 seconds, on just the head, on the whole body,... I've dangled it close to her face, far away from her face, with little motion, with a lot of motion... I've left the rat overnight each time in case she decided she wanted it.

Before, she wasn't really picky about it. As long as the rat was warm and in front her face, she was gonna grab it.

[pretends2bnormal]

Well, the problem is, she already shows interest. Her head is out of her hide every night like she's waiting for food. So when it's time to feed, she's there and ready, and she comes up to it, sniffs it, watches it intently - if I move it around she follows it with her head. She just won't strike. Whereas before, once the rat got in front of her, she IMMEDIATELY struck and wrapped.

And yeah, I've tried everything with the hairdryer. Each week she hasn't taken, I've spent like 30 minutes alternating between blasting it and offering it... trying different things to get it "right" so she'll eat. I've done it on the high setting, on the low setting, for 10 seconds, for 30 seconds, on just the head, on the whole body,... I've dangled it close to her face, far away from her face, with little motion, with a lot of motion... I've left the rat overnight each time in case she decided she wanted it.

Before, she wasn't really picky about it. As long as the rat was warm and in front her face, she was gonna grab it.

Yeah, that sounds like she's just doing some sort of fast. When I got my adult male, he fasted for 5 months, even eating live, and showed similar sort of lack of interest. He'd look at the food and ignore it.

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[Cheesenugget]

Try a smaller size. If she was eating rat fuzzies, go rat pinkies. Sometimes going a size smaller helps. I watched one of the help YT vids from Chad at Snakes N Adders who talked about why snakes fast. I would check his vid out. One of the reasons he mentioned was that your snake's last meal may have irritated its throat, which can cause a refusal next time, so going smaller can help.

[dr del]

This may sound silly given all the steps you have taken but is there any chance she is going into a shed cycle?

the alternative idea is looking for anything ( including ambient temps ) that may have changed from the time she last ate? new hides, temps, I mention this as even beneficial changes can throw them off occasionally.

[Zincubus]

I have a hairdryer in the snake room so I have the viv glass open , heat with hairdryer then offer INSTANTLY with minimal heat loss .

Make sure the Royal is well settled under a hide then heat and dangle the warm rat in front of the hide entrance ,,


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[zina10]

Whenever I see anything about a hair dryer I have to think of Zincubus

[Bogertophis]

Well, the problem is, she already shows interest. Her head is out of her hide every night like she's waiting for food. So when it's time to feed, she's there and ready, and she comes up to it, sniffs it, watches it intently - if I move it around she follows it with her head. She just won't strike. Whereas before, once the rat got in front of her, she IMMEDIATELY struck and wrapped.

And yeah, I've tried everything with the hairdryer. Each week she hasn't taken, I've spent like 30 minutes alternating between blasting it and offering it... trying different things to get it "right" so she'll eat. I've done it on the high setting, on the low setting, for 10 seconds, for 30 seconds, on just the head, on the whole body,... I've dangled it close to her face, far away from her face, with little motion, with a lot of motion... I've left the rat overnight each time in case she decided she wanted it.

Before, she wasn't really picky about it. As long as the rat was warm and in front her face, she was gonna grab it.

See, the way I read this is that she is internally at war with her instincts: she knows what food is, and she still wants it but her instincts are saying "winter's coming,
don't get caught with food rotting in your stomach, fool..." I think her whole "problem" is seasonal...shorter days (even if her cage temps haven't changed) and her
instincts are telling her "don't eat, you'll survive!" I go thru the same thing in winter with my c/b rosy boa, for what it's worth...great eater all year, never brumated,
but she won't eat, or she eats very little, in winter months. Life goes on...try not to worry too much or wonder what you're doing wrong, because you're not, as far as
I can tell.

[Jus1More]

Yep!!! I am in the same boat with one of my Bp's. He has not ate for 5 weeks now and the last 2 weeks he has not bothered coming out of his hide. I check on him regularly and he gets pissy when I look to see he is ok!!

This is one of ball pythons famous trait. I wish they didnt do this, but if they ate all the time when come feeding day, then we would have nothing to stress over about! Gotta love them though...

[alittleFREE]

This may sound silly given all the steps you have taken but is there any chance she is going into a shed cycle?

the alternative idea is looking for anything ( including ambient temps ) that may have changed from the time she last ate? new hides, temps, I mention this as even beneficial changes can throw them off occasionally.

No obvious signs of shed, and she just shed the day before she last ate. So I would THINK not... but also, you never know, haha.

RE: any changes... I've been thinking about this as well today, trying to pinpoint anything that might have triggered it. All I can think of is that around mid-September (the 12th maybe?), I set up a CHE to help keep ambients up because the UTH wasn't cutting it alone. So her ambients went from 74-75* to 79-81.* She ate twice after the change (once on the 16th, then she skipped on the 23 during a shed, then she ate on the 30th).

Earlier today, I realized the introduction of the CHE is also about the time that she started only going on the cool side. So I decided to do some extra investigation to get a really good read on the temps and spent a little extra time scanning over the whole area of the glass under the hot hide. I found while most of it was 88-89, there were some spots I was hitting that were 92-93. That's higher than what I would prefer so I knocked her thermostat down a degree. Next thing I know, she magically went back over to her hot hide, and has been sitting in it ever since for several hours. First time I've witnessed her using that side of the cage in weeks.

Coincidence?