first time refusing to eat

[SatInpw]

My girl is approximately 4 years old and she has normally been very food motivated, never hesitating to eat unless she's about to shed. However today she refused her usual meal, although while my partner was taking the rat to the trash she struck at me. She isn't in her hide like usual when she's about to go into shed.

One possibility is that her temp and humidity gradients have been sort of wacky recently. For a few days a few weeks ago I couldn't get the enclosure above 40% even with constant misting and even directing the nozzle of a humidifier into her tank. It's been slightly better but I'm still having a lot of trouble getting the humidity to a level above 40%. Also today her cool side got to be about 85, but has since gone down. I'm going to check tomorrow to see if she has any signs of illness, but other than humidity problems she's been perfectly fine, she even passed a healthy turd a week ago.

How long should I wait till I offer her food again? I don't want to offer it too soon and stress her out.

[Hugsplox]

My girl is approximately 4 years old and she has normally been very food motivated, never hesitating to eat unless she's about to shed. However today she refused her usual meal, although while my partner was taking the rat to the trash she struck at me. She isn't in her hide like usual when she's about to go into shed.

One possibility is that her temp and humidity gradients have been sort of wacky recently. For a few days a few weeks ago I couldn't get the enclosure above 40% even with constant misting and even directing the nozzle of a humidifier into her tank. It's been slightly better but I'm still having a lot of trouble getting the humidity to a level above 40%. Also today her cool side got to be about 85, but has since gone down. I'm going to check tomorrow to see if she has any signs of illness, but other than humidity problems she's been perfectly fine, she even passed a healthy turd a week ago.

How long should I wait till I offer her food again? I don't want to offer it too soon and stress her out.

If you’re feeding weekly I would just wait until next feed day and try again, if she skips that wait 2 weeks and try again. In my experience the hunger always wins out eventually if husbandry is correct.

Remember these guys can go months without eating so one refusal isn’t something to get stressed over.


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[SatInpw]

Thanks. I can get kind of panicky if something goes wrong. I generally try to feed her every 10 days, but I'll wait a week and try again to see if she takes it.

[Charles8088]

I do the same thing Hugsplox does. My girl usually fasts during this time of the year (the colder months). Last she ate was October 20th. If she refuses a meal, I try again during her scheduled feeding the following week. If she refuses again, I then wait 2 weeks. If she refuses again, I then move to monthly. The only exception is, if during the fast she sheds, I try feeding like 2-3 days after the shed. And also try feeding if I notice she suddenly becomes very active at night, like she's "hunting".

[Bogertophis]

If her "cool" side actually got to 85*, what did her hot side get up to? I'm concerned about that- she may felt pretty stressed if she was overheated. I'd be way more concerned about actual temperatures than about the humidity, to be honest. Humidity fluctuates in the real world. But a snake that's confined to temperatures that are uncomfortable or even harmful, that's a problem.

Be sure you're taking the temperatures accurately, & inside the enclosure where the snake is. Don't take a thermostat's "word" for it. (I hope you're using a thermostat???)

A 4 year old BP is an adult, & may just feel like fasting a bit- it's not unheard of. They can also feel a shed coming on before we can see any evidence, & may refuse food for that too.

Your snake may also be over-fed- it's easy to do, because our pets aren't as active as they'd be in the wild. There's a chart floating around in other posts here that can help you assess this.

How often are you feeding her? I'd wait at least a week or 2 before offering another meal. Might help to post a pic here too, if you're not sure of her weight -whether she's thin or not?

[SatInpw]

If her "cool" side actually got to 85*, what did her hot side get up to? I'm concerned about that- she may felt pretty stressed if she was overheated. I'd be way more concerned about actual temperatures than about the humidity, to be honest. Humidity fluctuates in the real world. But a snake that's confined to temperatures that are uncomfortable or even harmful, that's a problem.

Be sure you're taking the temperatures accurately, & inside the enclosure where the snake is. Don't take a thermostat's "word" for it. (I hope you're using a thermostat???)

A 4 year old BP is an adult, & may just feel like fasting a bit- it's not unheard of. They can also feel a shed coming on before we can see any evidence, & may refuse food for that too.

Your snake may also be over-fed- it's easy to do, because our pets aren't as active as they'd be in the wild. There's a chart floating around in other posts here that can help you assess this.

How often are you feeding her? I'd wait at least a week or 2 before offering another meal. Might help to post a pic here too, if you're not sure of her weight -whether she's thin or not?

She's gone back into her hide, but she's definitely not thin, I've been feeding her every 14 days at the longest. And yes, I'm using a thermostat. What -probably happened was there was probably too much sunlight--I closed the blinds as soon as I saw that and it pretty quickly went back to normal. It wasn't going directly into her enclosure or anything, she's not up against a window, but she's close enough that sometimes sunlight can come in. She's back in her warm hide now so I think she's okay.

I figured it might be something like that now that she's an adult. She's just always been very food motivated, so it was weird. I'll also probably keep an eye on for signs of shedding the next few days.

[Bogertophis]

Here it is: Maybe this will help you gauge her weight-

[SatInpw]

Here it is: Maybe this will help you gauge her weight-

That's actually good reference, thank you! she might be a tad overweight in that case actually...I'll have to space out her feedings more.

[Bogertophis]

It happens...so easy to overfeed a little, & so hard to gauge, as most of us worry more about a BP not eating than about eating too much.

What size are you feeding? If you're feeding medium rats, maybe just downsize to smalls, or do that every other meal? Nothing extreme or sudden.

And do be careful not to allow sunlight streaming in on a snake enclosure- snakes can overheat & they're trapped inside. Overheated snakes can suffer neurological damage, even if they don't die from the incident. The sun changes angles at different times of the year, so what is safe most of the time can become unsafe.

[JacksReptiles]

I would offer her food once every week. I would get the ambient temp/cool side down to 80 degrees and nothing higher. I would get yourself one of those heat detecting guns and shoot the bottom of the enclusure with and without substrate to see if your temps are good. Cool side no hotter than 80 degrees and hot spot 89-92 degrees. Place a humidity temperature guage in your tank and make sure the humidity is in between 55-60%. If you can't get your humidity to that I would try to get your snake enclosure moved to a smaller room where you can control the humidity better. If you cannot move to a smaller room than try putting a bed sheet over the enclosure to retain the humidity better and if you do that make sure that you monitor the temps because the bed sheet will retain heat more too. Hope that helps. Feel free to post a picture of what your snakes enclosure looks like as well as the room you have her in.