Okay....I don't know the age of Baby. "She" hasn't been probed. Bought her in Jan. from a private owner, so I don't know if she was CB or ?? She's about 2.5' in length. The owner said Baby would eat live juvie rats, (no particular color---a guy @ the pet store said HIS BP would eat only white mice). I don't know when the owner fed (evening/day). After the 3rd or 4th question, she was getting peeved at me and wouldn't answer me.

The tank is on an inner wall in my livingrm where it's warmer, but I have cats that roam. A humidity gauge in the center of the glass, the digital thermometer is 1/2 'n 1/2 length and height in the tank on the back glass. Water bowl in the corner, natural branches both on the cool side. The 1/2 log hide is along the back wall--part of is is warm, some cool. The substrate is a reptile felt. I'm using two lamps, with the one "light" being turned off at night so that only the red would provide heat. An under tank heat pad is on all the time. Day temp is 88-90, and when I've turned off the one lamp, the night temp is 76-80. Humidity @ 50%. When she shed the 1st time I didn't have a HG, and it was incomplete. This last one, I made sure to mist and keep the humid. up, so it was complete. I've got a humidifier going now, but the humid. is still only 50% because of the screen top. She's shed twice since I've gotten her, but hasn't eaten yet. She's made waste in the tank 3x.

No external parasites.

I was handling her, before reading that they need to destress for a new home. Now she's been left alone except when I lifted her out to remove the mouse she wouldn't eat last week.

I've tried juvie rats 3x, a mouse 3x (last time just last week after my roommate thought the rat was too big--found out via Shrap's size guidelines it was probably okay) after she hadn't been handled for almost two weeks. Tried the mouse both daylight and in the evening, leaving the mouse for about 20-30 min. before removing. Except for the nighttime attempt where I left everything in the tank, I've removed the hide and branches from the tank before dropping the prey into the tank. The last couple of attempts she wouldn't even strike but would occas. yawn. The 2nd rat try (two months ago), she struck a couple of times, but didn't grab the rat or coil. I've tried just dropping the live prey in, with and w/o the calcium dust on it (usu. w/o ) or holding the prey above her head.

With all these attempts, we've now accumulated a pet rat and mouse since now "Scabbers" is too fat to feed to Baby. I really don't want to end up with more rats and mice if Baby won't eat. (I'm going to try the mouse again eventually). When observing, Baby acts like she's afraid of the prey---it gets close to her or touches her and she recoils. Occas. she'll track it around the tank, but she won't try to kill it.

I've read some of the different care sheets here and on some of the other websites, as well as a bunch of different care books, but I'm not sure what to try next. I'd rather not consider force-feeding. She doesn't appear to have lost any weight (yet).

Any other suggestions that I can try???? I'm not thrilled with the idea of F/T. I even tried fresh, PK'd and that didn't work either. I can try the sep. feeding box/bucket, but I'm on a limited pet budget and would prefer to try something else first.

I took care of the biology prof's snakes/rats/mice in college, but this is the first snake that I've OWNED. I've wanted to own a python/boa since I was in college, and Baby w/accessories & tank was a really good deal.

Any other suggestions or ideas would be appreciated, THANKS!