Hi. I have a baby male ball python. He's a little over 5 months old now and he's 156 grams. He was about 149 grams when I got him from the breeder a little over a month ago.
He's been on a diet of live pup rats, and ate a weaned rat once with the breeder. When I got him, I left him alone for a week before attempting to feed him F/T for the first time. He smelled the mouse, poked his head out of his hide and struck it instantly. 30 minutes later, he dropped it. I left it in the tub overnight and he didn't eat it.
Next time I tried to feed F/T was a week later. This time was my bad, I opened his tub while he was out roaming and he got spooked. Didn't strike it. I left it overnight again and he didn't take it.
About a week later, we finally drove to get some live rats. He ate a live weaned rat, then a week later ate a live crawler rat. The weaned rat was a bit big but he didn't have any problems.
Now, it's been 8 days since he had the crawler rat and I decided to try F/T again. Same issue. He struck and coiled the mouse, then dropped it. He did this three times tonight. Dropped it every time.
I have no idea what the problem is. I THINK it's because the prey is cooling off too quickly.. but I have no idea how to control that. Or maybe he just doesn't like mice. I unfortunately don't have any frozen rats atm since my nearest pet store is almost 2 hours away. Same reason why I don't have easy access to live atm.
Here's what I do when feeding:
I thaw the rodent in the fridge over the course of the day. I make sure it's thawed out by feeling the tummy, and at about 8-9 PM I put it in a cup of hot tap water and let it warm up. Then I hang it in front of my heater til it's about 100-105 degrees. The rodent is dry btw. I dangle it in front of his hide (zombie dance scares him) and when he strikes it I'll pull on the tail to make it seem like the mouse is struggling. Then I shut all of my lights off and leave the room for about 30 mins to an hour. I feel like I'm doing everything I possibly can right with F/T but he still keeps dropping it.
I don't mind feeding live but like I said I don't have close access to it atm. I am moving in about 3-4 weeks to a big city so I can get live whenever I need it then, but for now I'd really like to get him to eat F/T. He went almost a month without eating (he didn't eat for a week before I got him since he was in pre-shed) and since he's so young I'm real concerned about getting him to eat regularly.
He has hides on both sides of his tub, and fake plants as well. The warm side is 88 and the cool side is 80. Humidity is 60-65%. Like I said he slammed down the live without any issues and his behavior has been great so I don't believe it's a husbandry issue. He is due to shed soon though, I believe. The scales on his belly are looking pretty pink.
Has anyone else had this problem? I'm just really frustrated :/ He seems like he really wants to eat but there's just something putting him off about the F/T.
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