Hi there...

Just today, my ball python, Monty (see if you can find the thickly-disguised cultural reference there...), died.

Me and my girlfriend found the poor guy coiled up in a corner, stiff as a brick. We tried to see if we could revive him, just hoping that maybe this was some sort of "thing" python's do at a certain point... but alas, he never moved.

I'm posting this because I have no clue whatsoever as to why he died, and it would serve to our peace of mind if we at least knew WHY he passed away.

I know it sounds very deep and emotional for just being a python, but we'd had him for a year and grown quite fond of him.

Just to list some stats: He was about 15-18 inches, estimated. They told us he was a baby when the breeder gave him to us.

He was kept in a nice-sized, 30 gallon terrarium, with good mulch, a water bowl and a hidebox. A lamp heated one side up to a balmy 85 degrees (give or take) and the other side was kept cooler. We had everything set up the way in which we were instructed and according to everything we read about pythons. We fed it mice every ten days, pre-killed (save for few occasions when the mouse was deceptively knocked out and woke up).

There were absolutely NO abnormal signs other than the fact that he hadn't shed in a while... but nothing out of the ordinary. It must've been about a month or so since he last shed.

The only other outstanding fact here is that about a week and somewhat days ago, we fed him a small Hamster instead of his usual meal of mice, since the petshop had run out of mice. We did, however, make sure it wasn't too big or anything.

He ate it, pre-killed, and then went on to defecate it just a few days ago. Pretty much the usual routine.


We have looked and looked and asked and thought about it, and we still cannot come up with a valid explanation for his death.

It would mean alot to us if we could just figure out why it happened. I doubt we'll be getting another snake (or any pet, for that matter) any time soon... but we'd still like to have one, in the future, and if would help to know what kind of things can go wrong and unnoticed, like this.


Thanks