Now What's Wrong?

[Patricia]

Is it possible he's going into shed? Two of my snakes reject food during shed, sometimes before I can even notice the signs.

Could be. It's been hard to tell these past few days if the belly is pink. The one time it's shed here, it ate with a pink belly and later when completely blue, probably because it was simply so hungry.

Perhaps it feels caught up with food intake. It's hard to tell why it's now behaving this way after a month of normal BP behavior of eating and hiding. This sounds contrary to everything I've read, but it seems like (a) it's become comfy with us to the point of not feeling the need to hide all the time, and (b) it knows there's a world beyond its 4 walls and wants to explore it.

[rabernet]

How large is your tank? The cool side needs to be 80-82 degrees, the lower end of the 70's is far too cool. At 150 grams, he doesn't need to be in an enclosure any larger than 10 gallons at this point.

All his behaviors sound like stress related behaviors, including the refusal of food. A hatchling ball python, up to at least a year generally doesn't refuse food when not stressed, as it's in their best interest to grow as quickly as possible so as not to be prey themselves.

Have you reviewed the "Why won't my snake eat" portion of our ball python care sheet to rule out each reason one by one yet?

In order to settle him for now, I would recommend filling his tank with loosely crumpled newspaper, all the way to the brim. Not pretty, but it helps to settle a stressed out snake, especially a baby, by allowing him to feel something touching him on all sides. Don't handle for at least a week, and after a week, drop in a live small mouse (in his enclosure, with the newspaper still in there). Walk away, check back in 30 minutes. The mouse should be gone.

At that point, you can begin to "wean" him of the newspaper, by removing a piece or two, every 5th day or so.

[CoolioTiffany]

How large is your tank? The cool side needs to be 80-82 degrees, the lower end of the 70's is far too cool. At 150 grams, he doesn't need to be in an enclosure any larger than 10 gallons at this point.

All his behaviors sound like stress related behaviors, including the refusal of food. A hatchling ball python, up to at least a year generally doesn't refuse food when not stressed, as it's in their best interest to grow as quickly as possible so as not to be prey themselves.

Have you reviewed the "Why won't my snake eat" portion of our ball python care sheet to rule out each reason one by one yet?

In order to settle him for now, I would recommend filling his tank with loosely crumpled newspaper, all the way to the brim. Not pretty, but it helps to settle a stressed out snake, especially a baby, by allowing him to feel something touching him on all sides. Don't handle for at least a week, and after a week, drop in a live small mouse (in his enclosure, with the newspaper still in there). Walk away, check back in 30 minutes. The mouse should be gone.

At that point, you can begin to "wean" him of the newspaper, by removing a piece or two, every 5th day or so.

That seems like a really effective way. Always gotta take things slow, especially with a BP since most stress easily. I find my BP stressing out the most when outside. For some reason, she hates being outside. Maybe it's because of the low humidity and dry air as well as hot temps (though I NEVER EVER take her out if it's over 95F outside, the Arizona sun would cook her alive right in my hands).

[Patricia]

How large is your tank? The cool side needs to be 80-82 degrees, the lower end of the 70's is far too cool. At 150 grams, he doesn't need to be in an enclosure any larger than 10 gallons at this point. Have you reviewed the "Why won't my snake eat" portion of our ball python care sheet to rule out each reason one by one yet?

The tank is 10 gallons. Yes, I've read through that care sheet and we seem to OK on all the points, except for the cool temp. That is a problem because if we use the overhead heating lamp, the humidity drops from 70ish% to about 40ish%. How else can we raise that end to 80 degrees?

HOWEVAH... our snake has been in the cool hide for nearly a week now. I'll start a separate thread to ask about that.

The belly is definitely pink, so perhaps that's the reason for not eating. However, it's been devouring its food up till this past week during its prior shed, with the low temp in the 70s, and with everything as it's been. These stress symptoms seemed to have come from out of nowhere.

The behaviors that you have described are of a ball python that's looking for weaknesses in its enclosure in order to try to escape (the constant climbing up the walls).

That's exactly what it looks like. I'll try your suggestion of crumpled newspapers. Thanks!

[Danounet]

Hmm well not sure if my info will help but here it goes.

My 2 babies (normal and pastel) are just under 3 months. They weight 240~ as of now. empty stomach and one has pooped recently. They eat every 5 days. They havent refused a meal.

My snakes are on 28qt tubs with 11inch heat tape. Tstat is set to 97, 93~ inside hide. Cool side is around 80~ usualy. Humidity is high always, around 70% I live in florida, I have a hard time trying to keep it down.

The babies are not fat. But they seem to have grown long in a short time. I feel bad when you say yours weight 150 .

What are you feeding it? and what size?

I hope this helps.

[Patricia]

I feel bad when you say yours weight 150 .
What are you feeding it? and what size?

Don't feel bad, it came to us around 120g (or less, since that was after its first meal here), so thin it was shaped more like an eel than a BP. It's filled out nicely and has shed since we've had it. That's why I'm surprised it's stopped eating, unless it's "full" from catching up quickly.

We're feeding f/t mice from Petsmart. I weigh each one and write the weight on its baggie. Hoppers were too small, and medium mice seemed much better. The last one it ate was the biggest, at 18g. I've since bought a pack of bigger mice, with the smallest being 18g. It has crossed my mind that this current mouse being rejected might appear too big. (That last one it ate, 18g, took nearly 1¾ hours to position and swallow.)

[Danounet]

Thats what they were eating when mine were that small. Sometimes a little bigger. I dont know what to say, Maybe he is just full. But that doesnt explain the roaming.

[Patricia]

I feel bad when you say yours weight 150 .

Woohoo, Patriot has finally reached 200g!!! (Which is nearly double the size of when he came to us.) He's gained around 4" in length too (26"), but his girth now seems sooooooo much bigger. And especially since he shed a couple of days ago (90% intact, long "stocking), the new brightness combined with the new size is just "WOW!" We can hardly take our eyes off him!

And oh, those crumpled newspapers are still in there. He's been perfectly content ever since they were added and becomes very uneasy when exposed (e.g. when being held), so they just might be permanent!

Here's our growing, glowing one:

[Danounet]

Congratulations!

Have you considered moving him to an opaque tube? I mean you cant even see him anymore with the newspaper in there now anyways lol.

He would probably be less stressed in a tub. I use 28qt sterilite for all mine, but being as he has open space issues, maybe a 15-16qt? unless he is too big for those, hard to tell. Anyways, just an idea.

[Patricia]

I mean you cant even see him anymore with the newspaper in there now anyways lol.

We can still see him in the hides, or at least which hide he's in! For pictures, I just remove a piece or two of newspaper, click-click-click, then put the newspaper back. Yesterday I posted the video I took of him shedding, where you can see the newspapers around him. The clear gap where he was visible to the camera was where a piece had been removed just during filming.

Thanks... I'm so happy about how he's growing. At first it took him forever to position and swallow a mouse, and his first shed with us left several pieces stuck on. Now he seems to have become more efficient at both eating and shedding. Filling out nicely, hiding contentedly... all is well in his little world.