BP not feeding

[gazzaboy88]

Hi all,
I have a male pastel ball around 5 or 6 month old. When i first got him he was a fantastic eater every week without hesitation. I have always fed him on defrosted food and without entising him to strike, he has always calmly just taken it.

He has now not eaten for four weeks, each time i have offered him a meal he has ventuted out of his hides and sniffed around the rat but left it alone.

I would be bold to say his viv environment is almost perfect for him with optimal ambiance, adequat hide outs good humidity levels basrd on bp fact sheets.

Also he is not due his shedding cycle as he shedding 5 week ago and then ate the day after, this is becoming very frustrating for me now so any help would be appreciated.

I can upload pictures if required, thanks.

[The Serpent Merchant]

Welcome to the site!

Can you give us some more info on your cage?

1. What type/size cage do you have?
2. What are you using to heat your cage?
3. Do you have anything controlling your heat sources?
4. What are you using to measure temperatures?
5. What are the current cage temperatures/humidity?
6. What type/size rodent are you offering your snake?
7. How often are you offering food?

Pictures would be great:

How to post pictures: http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...with-pictures)

[NYHC4LIFE8899]

He basically said it's been eating,he also said everything is set just about as perfect as it can be... So that's apparently not the issue..I'd think maybe question6&7 may be it..unless he is just going off feed cause of the season

also what I'd ask is ..have you made any changes to your enviroment or enclosure?

[gazzaboy88]

He has a 3ft wooden viv with 2 frontal sliding doors.
I'm using a 100 ceramic to heat the viv
I have a habistat thermostat (dimmer) to control the heat lamp
A digital thermostat is in use to monitor temps
Currently in the warm side the temp is 31.8 degrees C, in the cool side it is 26.6 degrees C
I have been offering my snake a weaner rat once a week, the weaner is roughly the same size as a XL mouse

I will upload a picture of the setup

[gazzaboy88]

No changes to the environment recently, small changes where made with hides and decoration around 2 month ago and he has eaten numerous times since. His enclosure is fairly built up and absolutely no sparse areas

[The Serpent Merchant]

He has a 3ft wooden viv with 2 frontal sliding doors.
I'm using a 100 ceramic to heat the viv
I have a habistat thermostat (dimmer) to control the heat lamp
A digital thermostat is in use to monitor temps
Currently in the warm side the temp is 31.8 degrees C, in the cool side it is 26.6 degrees C
I have been offering my snake a weaner rat once a week, the weaner is roughly the same size as a XL mouse

I will upload a picture of the setup

Ok, everything looks good. Often times people come on saying that everything is in order, but they really don't know what they are doing. For once it's nice to be wrong!

It sounds like your BP is just gone on a feeding strike. unfortunately BP's are notorious for doing so with little to no good reason for it. All you can do is make sure that you continue to give your BP proper husbandry, and keep offering food once a week.

Are you offering frozen/thawed, pre-killed, or live rodents?

[NYHC4LIFE8899]

Maybe he is just fasting,maybe cause of the season..I've heard it's common this time of year for them to go off of feed...what are the temps in your place? Maybe it's colder no that's caused your temps to drop..a buddy of mine his boa stopped eating for 6 weeks when he finally noticed his heating pads crapped out..he changed them and within a couple days he was eating again like normal.

[gazzaboy88]

I'm offering thawed prey. Always at night just before we go to bed to give him complete privacy to eat. How long do these this feeding strikes usually last?

[The Serpent Merchant]

I'm offering thawed prey. Always at night just before we go to bed to give him complete privacy to eat. How long do these this feeding strikes usually last?

They can last months unfortunately.

How are you warming the rodent. Sometimes heating the rodent up a little more will help.

[gazzaboy88]

Maybe he is just fasting,maybe cause of the season..I've heard it's common this time of year for them to go off of feed...what are the temps in your place? Maybe it's colder no that's caused your temps to drop..a buddy of mine his boa stopped eating for 6 weeks when he finally noticed his heating pads crapped out..he changed them and within a couple days he was eating again like normal.

The digital thermostat has a prong inside the environment which reads the temp from inside so the temps are definately ok... and my place is warm the wofe never leaves the heating alone!