A little advice?

[TheSquigglyExplorer]

Hi guys, I'm new here buuut I could really use the guidance of some BP lovers with a lot more experience than me.

My history with big snakes begins and ends back when I volunteered at a reptile reserve. I worked for about a month with a six foot reticulated python last year and she was an absolute doll. Very gently (except when it got close to feeding day) and super easy to handle. SO, when I went to the pet shop the other day all I had in mind was to ask some questions and get a feel for snake husbandry. I was under educated about all that. Well, after talking with their reptile expert he assured me that I had very good basic knowledge of their care and so forth and that if I were gonna start out with big snakes I should get a BP because of their gentle nature. He handed me one of their little ones, she's probably just over a foot long, and she was great. Very relaxed and sociable, if you can call a snake sociable. He was even nice enough to inform me that on my tight budget, I could get away with buying cage accessories and substrate from petsmart, since it'd be cheaper. Well, anyway, I feel like I'm rambling so I'll try to go ahead and jump into stuff about my snake.

I've had her for a day now and this is what all is going on: She was perfect on the ride home, she did NOT want to be in the bucket they gave me, she kept popping the lid off and hanging on to my hand. Not squeezing or anything, she'd just crawl onto my hand and sit, very relaxed and even yawning a bit (Is yawning good? I didn't know they did that!). So once we got home it was time to introduce her to her new home. In her tank the warm side stays about 80 degrees fahrenheit and the cool end is right at 73 with a heating rock in the corner. She has fresh water, a log to hide under, aspen bedding, and the whole tank is about 20 gallons. As expected when I put her in, she explored a bit, got something to drink, climbed on top of her thermometer, and then hid. She would come out about every thirty minutes or so, check it out again, then go hide. I feel like this is normal? After all the guy at my reptile shop said he'd just gotten her from the breeder about two hours before I arrived, so she moved a ton in one day.

But here's where things go awry.

Today. My boyfriend decided that he wanted to try and hold her again, since she did so well on the ride home he thought she wouldn't mind it. Well she minded it. A lot. Before I knew it he had brought me a snake that was tightly curled up in the palm of his hand but, not in the protective ball way. She had her head and neck positioned in a very tight S shape, raised up from the rest of her body which was extremely tense. I told him he needed to put her back, she wasn't ready to be held but when he realized that looked to be a striking position he sat her on my bed and backed away. It took a solid hour to get her to relax enough to where I could walk her back to her tank. She explored her tank for about two minutes once I put her back in it (by this time her breathing had relaxed and she was exploring my arm and so forth) then went into her log and hasn't come back out. Also during all this she would "stand" really tall while she moved around. Kind of like a cobra but she wasn't all coiled up.

My major questions are really: She's a little more than a foot, but chubby, so is she very young or are they super slow growers (I forgot to ask her age ^^')? Is the fact that she had her neck raised up off her body in an S shape a bigger warning than if she were just laying down like that? Is the cobra thing she was doing a defensive posture? When should I feed her, the guy said she was scheduled for Wednesday feedings but I feel like she'd be too tense to eat now? Is it normal for them to be so active and friendly at the store then be a bit skeptical at home? Am I already a horrible snake mama on day one, because I'm really nervous and I just want my lil Winry to have the best snakey life possible

[redshepherd]

ETA: First of all, take out the heating rock asap! Those are dangerous to snakes. It can seriously burn or kill them.

Don't get advice from petsmart/petco employees- 99% of cases, they give bad advice... such as the heating rock.

Read up thoroughly on this link to get info on what temperatures and setups are appropriate for ball pythons. http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...thon-CARESHEET

Yawning is normal. Poking around to check once in awhile and returning to the hide is also normal. But 90% of the time, they will be in their hide. If they are coming out TOO frequently, it usually means that either the temperatures are off, or they are hungry.

You can't tell a ball python's age from size, unfortunately. Some who are malnourished or underfed or on "maintenance feeding" will be much smaller at an older age. Some who are fed a lot and frequently will grow fast. Their size generally depends on their feeding schedule since a young age, but also genetics. If you see that she's chubby, and her spine is not a visible triangle shape on her back, then it sounds like she's fine.

By cobra thing, do you mean lifting their necks straight up? That's called periscoping, just them checking the environment, not defensive at all.

A ball python being particularly active/moving fast is actually nervousness, not friendliness. If they are content, then they sit still like a mushy blob (LOL) or move quite slowly.

An "S" shape neck with a pulled back head, and holding her head very still, is defensive- but it's not always going to be the "S" shape when they are defensive. Sometimes they will simply pull their heads back a bit and hold very still + stare at your hand/object of their fear.

If you weigh her on a scale in grams, we can tell you how frequently and how large size prey you can feed her!

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Any new animal should be left alone for a week, which means NO handling. Once a week has passed offer food in the enclosure. If the snake refuse it's first feeding, husbandry will need to be assessed.

NO HANDLING until your snake successfully eats for you.

As for the defensive behavior this is a snake that has moved from it's breeder to a pet shop and from the pet shop to your place, it is stressed and need to adjust to it's new surrounding.

In the future always keep in mind that S it for Striking, so if your snake is in a S position this means you need to leave it alone, and try handling at another time.

[TheSquigglyExplorer]

@Redshepherd Thank you so much! That really helps me relax and understand better handling. I had no idea about the yawning or periscoping! I really hope she keeps it up though because the yawning is precious, and when the periscoping isn't completely stress induced then that'll be adorable too<3 I wish I had a scale to weigh her on, I should really look into one but the man said she was easily being fed fuzzies on a weekly basis so I'm hoping she doesn't give me any struggles.

@Debohra Oh wow, thank you! I was really worried I might hurt her if I didn't follow the every wednesday feedings that they'd been giving her but, a week is the kind of structured "this many days" answer I really needed. Everyone else keeps telling me I'll just know based off her personality but I just don't have the experience for that kind of intuition I don't think. And I don't plan on handling her any more at all until she's well digested her first meal, and people who have access to her enclosure now know that too.

Another question. Does she need really special humidity? I keep getting 50/50 answers of no and yes. Her humidity is currently VERY low at just 24% and that worries me a lot but at the same time we didn't even watch the humidity on the reticulated python's enclosure when I worked at the reserve so I feel completely in the dark despite research. Even my python care pamphlet told me something obscure.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Another question. Does she need really special humidity? I keep getting 50/50 answers of no and yes. Her humidity is currently VERY low at just 24% and that worries me a lot but at the same time we didn't even watch the humidity on the reticulated python's enclosure when I worked at the reserve so I feel completely in the dark despite research. Even my python care pamphlet told me something obscure.

Yes she does low humidity can be has bad as high humidity to you should strive for 50% and 60% to 70% during shed.

Make sure you are measuring the humidity with a digital hygrometer as dial ones are not accurate.

[TheSquigglyExplorer]

@Deborah You are a god send, thank you so much. I went ahead and moved her water dish to the warm side of her tank to try and up the humidity. Any other ways of doing so, and do you have any recommendations for a digital thermometer? I saw a super cheap one at petco but it's accuracy seemed sketchy to me, probably no more so than my little dial one but still.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Any other ways of doing so, and do you have any recommendations for a digital thermometer? I saw a super cheap one at petco but it's accuracy seemed sketchy to me, probably no more so than my little dial one but still.

I personally prefer temp guns but than again I have a fairly bigger about of animals and this allows me to get reading randomly in various enclosure and in my incubator as well.

For a single enclosure this http://www.amazon.com/AcuRite-00891A...te+thermometer which can also be found at Walmart will do the job allowing you to measure the hot spot with the probe the cool side with the display itself and humidity as well.

[TheSquigglyExplorer]

Fantastic! And it's a reasonable price. I'll definitely be checking the local walmart for that tonight, if I can't find it I'll go ahead and order one. I read online that misting the tank with water is also a good way to keep up humidity, would anyone really suggest this or will a large water dish provide enough moisture for 20 gallons?

[spikell75]

If you can show a picture of your set up would help a bit. I started out with a glass tank, which need modifications. It's hard to hold humidity in with out covering the top of the tank. I taped plastics over the the top except around the light.
I still had to mist daily to keep humidity up. Your gonna want to heat the bottom of the tank with under tank heater regulated by a thermostat.
I also had to switch substrate to repti bark, keeps humidity very well.

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[TheSquigglyExplorer]

Heating! My next series of questions~ I have a 60 watt over tank red bulb that's doing all the heating right now, the tank is about 80-82º on the warm end. Is that too cold? Because I wanna get her an undertank heating pad too, but I'm scared it'll make it too hot. She has a warm rock too that she really likes to stretch onto whenever she comes out from her log?

It's got a mesh top so for now I've got moist paper towels on one half of it to try and retain moisture but I'll probably tape it up like you said so that it holds better. For now I just misted the tank and it's a happy snake 50% I'll keep my eye on it to see how fast it evaporates but I sprayed mostly the aspen and back side of the tank to see how it holds up.