(TW: written gore) Difficult BP + Horrifying Nightmares: What next?

[Bogertophis]

all good. He hasn't had any scans, but the vet has put a flashlight up to him and looked inside. Because he's an albino, it's pretty easy to see inside of him in the dark with a light. she didn't feel anything abnormal and didn't see anything abnormal when she did that. I don't know exactly how many grams he has fluctuated. All I know is that he gained some weight when he was weighed at his last appointment. I think I will start weighing him at home weekly, so I can keep track of any significant weight loss. I probably should have been doing that already.

I'd agree with keeping a weight chart on him, but don't do that weekly- nothing changes that much in a week, & you'll only stress him too much, & if he's going to eat on his own for you, it's imperative that you minimize his handling & stress. I'd weigh him once a month, & do remember that retained wastes can make it appear to be a difference in the weight, as Beans already mentioned, so you might want to note when he eliminates also.

[smakemom]

Okay, will do. Monthly it is. Thank you.

[BeansTheDerp]

of course! <3

[Caitlin]

I only just caught up on your struggles with Smake, so feel free to ignore me as a latecomer to the conversation.

For the sake of transparency: I've kept snakes all my life and worked my way through undergrad and grad school as a vet tech in exotics and laboratory settings but I am NOT a veterinarian.

From reading your story so far - first I am so, so sorry you've gotten so stressed over this that you are having traumatic nightmares. Even after decades of keeping and a current crew of happy, healthy snakes I sometimes have a bad dream that reflects my fears and concerns for them, and I know how awful it feels to wake up after a dream like that.

Based on his behaviors, your snake has very clearly communicated a lot of things to you. The most important, I think, is that he is a shy snake who reacts strongly to change and to things he perceives as stress. This is not unusual for Ball pythons in general - they tend to be on the shy end of the temperament spectrum. But as with any animal there's a range, with some individuals being more bold and outgoing, and some being very shy and sensitive. I think your guy is in that very shy category, so that is likely a large part of his feeding refusal.

His body condition looks good in the photos, and he does eat now and then. So you need to try to stop worrying about his not eating. Just know this is going to sound crazy to you, but hear me out - leave him alone. Like totally leave him alone other than essential care, and think in terms of weeks and months for this. No handling. Spot cleaning the enclosure only when really needed. Try to spot clean or change water when he is tucked into his hide; you could even drape a little piece of cloth over the hide entrance when you are doing enclosure maintenance to block his view. If you really need to change the substrate, do it in half the enclosure at a time while he is in a hide. If needed, give him a hide with a top plus bottom so that when you are cleaning you can just lift him out while he is in his hide and put snake plus hide in a safe container till you're done. But you don't need to clean as often as you may think, at least not while you are trying to get him into regular eating patterns. Always make sure his water is fresh and clean; remove urates and feces and replace a handful or two of substrate right around where you removed urates and feces, but keep enclosure disruption and major substrate changes to an absolute minimum.

Offer him a nice warm meal about once every ten days, and since he has already shown you he doesn't like company when he eats, feed him after dark, in a dimly lit room, and leave the room once you have placed the rodent in his enclosure. I've never had impressive results by messing around with soiled rodent bedding, but that's up to you. Do whatever you need to do to reduce your anxiety over him and be prepared to go through weeks and months of this routine.

He ate at the breeder's. What sort of enclosure was he in at the breeders, and to what extent can you duplicate those conditions?

Stop force-feeding him. Like full on, dead stop, don't do it. Force feeding is for snakes in a life-and-death situation and it typically should never be done if a snake has EVER taken a meal normally, unless the snake develops a serious illness or injury that warrants force feeding.

Correct me if I am wrong here - but did I read correctly that your veterinarian recommended force feeding your snake dog food?

If this is the case, find another veterinarian. We can help you with that. If I misunderstood, my apologies!

It sounds like your heat and humidity may be inconsistent or a bit unstable. You are using ceramic heat emitters, yes? You might consider switching to deep heat projectors, which are set up the same way as a CHE but which are less prone to trash humidity levels. For now I would focus on leaving him alone as much as possible, ensuring that his temperature and humidity parameters are stable, and ensuring that his feels his enclosure is safe and secure.

Hang in there. He's gonna be fine. Really.

[smakemom]

first of all, thank you very much for such a detailed response.

when he ate at the breeder's, it was about two years ago, and he was kept in a rack and fed a live rat. I don't know the details beyond that, unfortunately.

And yes, the vet did have me force feed him recovery dog food; she said it was densely packed with nutrition and would help him regain weight. i no longer do this, and i stopped a few weeks ago. this is also my third exotic veterinarian. if there is some list of names out there of reputable veterinarians by area, that would be great, but at this point, I don't know if it's even worth it. At the very least, I would like to know where to take him in the event of a life or death situation. Hopefully she would know what to do, but honestly, I don't know that she would. if it helps with recs, i'm smack dab between the cincinnati and columbus areas of ohio.

I have stopped force feeding him completely. I have not been handling him, with the sole exception being that I moved him out of his hide today so that I could check all of his hides for feces, and it looked clean, so I put him right back and closed the tank back up.

I actually made a mistake before when I listed his heating elements as ceramic heat emitters. that's what I used when I was a new keeper. He has three deep heat projectors. The temperatures have stabilized now, it was just unstable when I had just freshly changed everything (and forgot to plug a light back in, oops). It does get a little cooler at night, but not dramatically so. His tank is in front of a window, so the heaters work a lot less hard in the daytime, but do all they can at night.

fortunately, the nightmares have stopped, and I feel calmer about him, but this has definitely hurt my love for ball pythons specifically. I would like to get other snakes in the future, but I think this will be my first and last ball python. i don't want to go through this more than once- not to this degree, at least. That being said, I'm very grateful for everyone's help. I know not every ball python is like this, and maybe he won't be this way forever. Who knows.

I hope I covered everything in your message. Thank you very much for your advice, and I'll do my best to adhere to it.

[Homebody]

... if there is some list of names out there of reputable veterinarians by area, that would be great...

Here's a link to the Association of Reptile and Amphibian Veterinarians's vet finder: https://arav.site-ym.com/search/custom.asp?id=3661.

[BeansTheDerp]

I'm glad the nightmares have stopped though I am sorry about your love for ball pythons being hurt, I hope you feel better about that but if you don't that's alright if you don't want another bp. I assure you that not every bp is like this, though pretty much all of them go on feeding strikes at some point. Is your bp showing any feeding responses at all or does it seem like he has completely lost his appetite? Also once you find a good vet I would redo giving a stool sample and I would have a scan done if he hasn't eaten by then and any advice from the new vet hasn't worked. Don't give up! You've got this and you have got help and support from multiple sides!

[BeansTheDerp]

ALSO, when you feed your snake, if you are feeding with tongs then are you holding it above your snake? That can scare them and sometimes even if it didn't before it can start to. My bp used to eat with tongs perfectly fine but now he only eats with tongs once in a while. Try holding the rat by the scruff with the tongs, don't be worried about holding it too tightly because depending on the weight of the rat it could be more difficult to hold it up. Basically try to mimic the motions of a rat while holding it's upper half up with the tongs a small distance away from your snake. Have you tried offering your snake a small live mouse pup to see if he takes it? Just to hold him over? Live feeding isn't very good but this is a suggestion for if it starts getting really bad, like almost life or death. Trying live should be the decision before the last minute decision to force feed in my opinion. I say mouse pup because there is less risk of a bad injury with a little tiny mouse than with a big mouse/rat.

[smakemom]

Smake has demonstrated great fear when exposed to tongs. I don't use them at all with him. I place the rat on a little "rock" dish that is on the hot side so it's not too cold. I've always placed the rat on something flat for him to take at his own pace. Mimicking life has also scared him in the past. I tried feeding him a live mouse in years past but he didn't take it and instead hid from it. He has always had little to no response to food. He has never struck at food and never coiled around food, only slowly taken meals inch by inch down his throat until he's done. It is an extraordinarily slow process for him. He used to stick his head out of his cave or roam around the tank, but that's never been a reliable indicator for me if he was ready to eat or not. I say "used to" because, since moving here, we no longer sleep in the same room, so I don't catch glimpses of him at 2-4am anymore when I wake up at night. I may go downstairs before bed tonight to see if he's up and out, but he generally gets active in the wee hours of morning when us diurnal folk are most quiet.

[smakemom]

Here are some photos of Smake from over the years.

2023: (not much here. I moved twice, so it's been a bit hectic.)

(he's being a very good hat)

2022:


2020:


Looking back, I forgot how much he used to climb on that old rod. When he eats regularly for me again, I'll have to install a new climbing rod.
The pic where he's around my hand was taken when he was a month-ish old, so he's very orange there. It's also my pfp.
As seen in the eating photo, he's known to take meals from halfway inside his caves, not even crawling all the way out. He also finishes swallowing in his caves if he can manage it. He sheds and poops inside his caves, too. Like an emo teen who refuses to leave his room. I hope that's because he just prefers it that way and not because he's stressed/scared.

Thanks for everyone's help to keep this little man alive. He's just being his lil snakey self, but I want to do better for him. I hope you all enjoy these.