Hi everyone, ultimate newbie here!
My question might seem odd or stupid but I was wondering how long it takes on average for a snake to digest and poop out a mice after it's eaten? I am asking to make sure I am not doing anything wrong or that could stress the snake out, since after 3 days I still can't find anything in her tank.
Back story:
After years of obsessing over them, I finally decided to get my first pet snake! She is a baby ball python (normal/wild type), about 15 inches long and I haven't weighed her yet since the scale I ordered online is still not here...
Before buying her I did the whole checking for blood mites and for mucus around the nose thing, even handled her a little, and despite being a little skittish she was all good. Now I have her in a 20 gallon terrarium with a temp gradient (originally planned on getting an older and bigger snake but kinda fell in love with her). I have a heat mat on one side hooked to a thermostat set at 90F, a hygrometer to make sure the terrarium stays above 50% humidity and a thermometer to make sure the ambient temp stay around 80F. I also have a Zoo med 60W Nightlight red heat lamp that I turn on at night.
I left her alone for 72 hours after getting her home to make sure she would get used to her new habitat, and thought she did. She hides all day in either the warm side or the cold side depending on her mood, then comes out at night to explore. I handled her once on the forth day but she was still kinda tense, she'd explore around, going up my arm but stop as soon as I moved and go into a defensive positon.
On the next day, I decided to try to feed her and she took the F/T mouse no issues. She's been spending her days in her hide on the warm side ever since and it's been three days. Every other day I open her tank to change the water and use that opportunity to spot clean ( which is hard as hell on cypress mulch substrate) but I still can't find anything, yesterday she even hissed at me while I was doing that, something she didn't do the previous times.
Any suggestions on anything I should change/ do better?
Also here is a picture of baby Hebi ( that's her name)
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