Greetings, all - Hoping someone has seen this odd behavior in a BP before, so far I've found nothing in my internet searches... I have a female ball (proven female, had her probed over the summer), almost 3 years old, and my question is this: Has anyone had a ball who seemed insistent upon over heating itself, and if so, why would she do that and how do I make her stop? She's never behaved this way before, the temps in her enclosure are the same as always, I've not turned the heat up or down, but recently, she continually keeps digging in under her warm hide, coiling in circles until her belly is directly on her heat pad. She's shown pink belly on at least 3 separate occasions in the last several weeks, but does not go into shed - After a day or two, the pink subsides and she's just her normal off-white belly color. Only once have I pulled her out of the tank where I actually thought her body felt too warm, but all other times she's just felt normal (I handle her almost every day), and as I stated, her tank temps are unchanged. She has no apparent damaged scales, no blisters, nothing like that. She's currently on a hunger strike (last accepted food September 26), but considering her age, size and time of year, I assume it's breeding season related and since she's not losing weight or having any other apparent health issues, I'm unconcerned. I've had her since September of last year, so this is only my second breeding season with her, and she was so young and small last year, I think this is the first *real* season for her, and maybe this strange behavior is part of that and I should stop worrying so much.

I assume anyone attempting to help me answer this will want to know her setup, so here goes:
- typical 45 gallon long tank, sliding locking screen lid
- coco husk substrate
- under tank heating pad on one end, covers about a third of the underside of the tank
- heat lamp over same end (I've found the combination of the pad and the lamp has been the best for maintaining ambient temp, without the lamp, it's just too chilly) - I do not use day bulbs at all, just a simple black night bulb, and she gets normal daylight hours according to season.
- large water dish, but not large enough for her to coil into (she's pretty big, I'd need a much bigger tank!)
- hide rock on warm end, plastic plants to hide in on cool end, homemade PVC pipe climbing stick across middle
- probe thermometer on warm end, and probe thermostat to control heat - I keep both probes on *top* of her substrate, right where she coils inside her hide, so that I'm reading temperature of the ground she's actually laying on. Max temp set for 88, the thermostat shuts off when it reaches max and it'll go as low as 82 before it kicks back on.
- digital hygrometer and ambient thermometer attached about mid way up on back side of tank

I recently purchased an infrared temp gun, specifically because of my concerns over her behavior, so that I can verify that the probes are in fact accurate. They are, within a couple degrees. Her ambient air usually reads around 76, which I realize is cooler than recommended, but any time I've turned up the heat to increase that temp (which I attempted to do the first weeks I had her and was still learning), the warm end gets waaaay too warm, she overheats, and since I've been maintaining her tank at this level for over a year with zero issues, I've just not made a lot of effort to mess with it. I suspect it's more to do with the position of the hygrometer/ambient thermometer anyway, if I move it lower toward the substrate, it does read higher temp, and the infrared gun tells me all's well. Plus, at this point, if I turn up the heat, I'm concerned she's really going to burn herself!!

I've heard of gravid females doing this coiling/digging into the substrate right before they're about to lay their eggs - However it's totally 100% impossible that my girl is gravid, as she's never even met another snake. But, I was wondering if it's possible that even though she's not gravid, if she might pick up some of the instinctive breeding behaviors like that? I have no idea if that's at all feasible, but I'm baffled - She's my favorite because she was my first snake, she's beyond tame and sweet tempered, I just adore her and would be devastated if something happened to her, so I really want to make sure she's healthy and uninjured. Suggestions?

Thanks in advance for your help,
Phoenix