This girl's condition...opinions wanted

[Pals BP]

Hello,

I pride myself on taking good care of my snakes and have always fed them sparingly. I have an albino ball python I got from Vin Russo back in 2012. During the summer months, I feed her a medium rat every 2-3 weeks. I also drop the temps down during the winter and only do a couple feedings from December through March. I recently joined a discussion forum with an area to post pictures of pet snakes. When I posted a pic of this girl from today many people said that she was too fat and one person actually said she looked morbidly obese!! The pictures do make her look a little chunky, but she is all muscle and has been conditioned for years!! I'll post the links to the pics here and would appreciate input from a crowd who knows what they're looking at. She's currently weighs about 1290 grams.

https://i.imgur.com/gNoyGfw.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/cUvn5t0.jpg

Thanks

[John1982]

Looks fine to me. Not sure what the "morbidly obese" person was seeing but I'm missing it.

[Zincubus]

Looks perfect in this shot




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[303_enfield]

Not fat at all. I look at the top of the tail area.

She's lovely !

[Bogertophis]

... I recently joined a discussion forum with an area to post pictures of pet snakes. When I posted a pic of this girl from today many people said that she was too fat and one person actually said she looked morbidly obese!! ...

Was that a discussion group for just (or mostly) ball pythons? Or snakes of ALL kinds? I can imagine that people who only ever see corn snakes (for example) might think
this is an overweight snake, either that or some of those folks have anorexia themselves? -Have you ever noticed that people tend to feed their pets similarly to how they
feed themselves? (And I agree, your BP looks just fine!)

[Stewart_Reptiles]

She looks fine based on the proportions however 1290 grams at 7 years old for a female is bit small even if they all grow at different rates, how big is she length wise she appeared to be quite short based on proportions? and most importantly are you sure it's a female?

[Craiga 01453]

She looks fine based on the proportions however 1290 grams at 7 years old for a female is bit small even if they all grow at different rates, how big is she length wise she appeared to be quite short based on proportions? and most importantly are you sure it's a female?

You took the words right out of my mouth. I was thinking exactly the same thing.

Is it possible there was an error in communication? Or maybe Vin Russo was mistaken? Obviously his reputation leads me to think not, but hey, nobody's perfect.

[Pals BP]

Looks perfect in this shot




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Can I ask how you got the picture within the post? I'm new to using Imgur. Thanks for your input.

Was that a discussion group for just (or mostly) ball pythons? Or snakes of ALL kinds? I can imagine that people who only ever see corn snakes (for example) might think
this is an overweight snake, either that or some of those folks have anorexia themselves? -Have you ever noticed that people tend to feed their pets similarly to how they
feed themselves? (And I agree, your BP looks just fine!)

All kinds of snakes. It's actually Reddit...I joined because there are separate groups for all my interests, but this is my very first post and it leads me to believe it may not be a great spot for ball python owners. Many of the posts on there are culobrids or hatchling ball pythons.
https://www.reddit.com/r/snakes/comm...m_source=share

She looks fine based on the proportions however 1290 grams at 7 years old for a female is bit small even if they all grow at different rates, how big is she length wise she appeared to be quite short based on proportions? and most importantly are you sure it's a female?

Pretty sure she's a female because all my females of the same age are approximately the same size. I feed sparingly and wanted to emphasize building a healthy muscular snake instead of a big fat girl. She's about 3.5 feet right now.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Pretty sure she's a female because all my females of the same age are approximately the same size. I feed sparingly and wanted to emphasize building a healthy muscular snake instead of a big fat girl. She's about 3.5 feet right now.

Even slow feeder, poor feeder are generally bigger by that age not to mention 3.5 feet is really short for a 7 years old female.

I am one of those people that grow their animals slowly and yet I still achieve at least 1200/1500 grams in 3 years as an average.

Poor feeder might take 4 years to get to 1200 grams.

So that gives you an idea, growing slowly is one things but again 1250 grams at 7 years that is more than slow growing even if they grow at different rate, now the proportion looks good based on weight/length but I would likely re-sex her.

[Zincubus]

.

I only use the free version of TapaTalk ... it’s an app that encompasses all the main forums plus its side benefit is the free , one click photo upload option




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