New ball owner - Advice?

[Crawdad]

I have a hatchling BP that my wife and I bought about a week ago. It's been about 12 days since his last feeding, so I'm going to try and feed him tomorrow. He's been on live prey all his life, but the owner said that he has never had a problem eating. I'm probably going to feed live this first time (just to make sure he will eat), and then try and introduce F/T over the next month or two. I'm concerned about feeding in the aspen -- this is my first snake, so stories of bedding causing impaction sort of scare me. Is putting down some paper towels before I release the mouse enough to help, or am I worrying about it too much?

He seems to be enjoying his new home, though -- I have him in a Sterilite tub now, with a ZooMed UTH mat on one side, controlled by a rheostat (for now). Hot spot temps stay around 92-95 at the bottom of the tub, and cool spot stays around 75-79 ambient air temp. No hygrometer yet (soon), so I don't know the humidity levels, but I live in Alabama, which is very humid most of the time anyway.

I've got 3 hides in the box, and a water dish, 2 of the hides are paper towel rolls with one of the ends covered off with paper, and one is a small coffee stirrer box. He doesn't like to get under this one (I think it's probably a little large for him at this point), but he likes to get on top of it and try and escape . He absolutely loves the paper towel rolls, though -- with the way I have the end covered, it probably pretty closely mimics a mouse hole. He huddles down at the very end of the tube when he's sleeping.

The first few days he hid through the day, and then explored every inch of his enclosure during the nights, I swear. After that, he settled down, and has spent the past few nights with his head stuck out of his hide, like he's waiting for a mouse to run by . I'm hoping he'll be good and hungry when time to feed comes.

He pooped and passed some urates on the second day, which I'm taking to be a good sign. Should I?

We haven't handled him at all yet, aside from when we were buying him. He seemed very calm at the time, even when passed between me, my wife, and his owner a few times. We're going to give him a full week, then feed him (hopefully), and give him 48 hours before we try to pull him out for the first time.

Thanks for the advice, and thank you for this site! I've been poring over it for the past few weeks, even before we had settled on a ball python. I've learned more about snake husbandry than I've ever thought I would, just in the past few days. This is such a valuable resource.

[Kaorte]

Sounds like you are on the right track!

Feeding on the aspen is fine. Ball pythons rarely get impacted. You hear about it more with lizards and amphibians. If he eats a little bit of substrate its no big deal. Unless he is eating mouthfulls every day then there is no issue with ingesting a little substrate

I would probably think about getting 2 identical plastic hides. As great as the paper towel rolls are working for you, you will find that he will quickly outgrow them, or could possibly get stuck in them. Also, if there was an emergency, it would be hard to get him out.

Try some cheap opaque plastic bowl. Cut a small hole in the side and smoth the edges with a flame. These work really well and are reusable.

oh yeah, !!!!

[Vypyrz]

to the forum.

The paper towel tubes might work for now, but you will have to keep a supply of them on hand. I would guess your BP will out grow them in about 2-3 months once you have him on a regular feeding schedule. You could possibly use them as an entrance to a hide box, simulating a mouse hole and burrow...


Rob

[seeya205]

Try prescenting a few hours before feeding by leaving the prey item on top of the tank! That will get him really hungry! He sounds like he is ready for a meal! Good luck!

[Didgie]

If it's been raining as much where you are as where I am in Alabama, I think your humidity is probably going to be fine! I upped the humidity during this shed, but so far the humidity is spot on without my help. On the other hand, I may have to canoe to work tomorrow...x_x

I'm on my very first snake, too, so I'm glad you asked for advice. I was kind of nervous about asking myself. ^^;;

[Crawdad]

Haha, yep. We live in Birmingham, so I know what you mean -- I'm pretty sure that I could float my way down Red Mountain if I wanted. The rain has stopped so far this morning, but humidity is in the high 70%, and probably not dropping any time soon!

Thank you for the help everyone!

[snakesRkewl]

My only question would be why have you waited 12 days to feed a hatchling?
I feed mine every 3-5 days and most feed every 5-7 days.
12 days is too long in my opinion.

[BOWSER11788]

im getting tha the prev, fed him 12 days ago, anyway crawdad, good luck they get addicting, im already aranging stuff in my house to fit another setup, any chance of a pic or 2

[snakesRkewl]

im getting tha the prev, fed him 12 days ago,

Doh, read that wrong, sorry.

good luck they get addicting, im already aranging stuff in my house to fit another setup

+ + and so on, lol.
Very addictive

[Crawdad]

My only question would be why have you waited 12 days to feed a hatchling?
I feed mine every 3-5 days and most feed every 5-7 days.
12 days is too long in my opinion.

It's actually only been 10 days today since the previous owner fed him, but even then, we have had him for less than a week (will be one week tomorrow), so I am still waiting for the week to be up before I disturb him with food or anything -- I have just been spot cleaning the cage as needed, and changing the water every 2 days for now. I'm more worried about his stress level than his hunger at the moment. I think the extra few days between feeding will be well worth it if I can get him to take food in his new enclosure. Once he takes food, I'm going to start offering at the standard 4-5 days.

I bought an Acu-Rite thermometer and a oil heater for the room today, so I don't have to keep my whole house heated while we're at work. I've got the vents to that room closed off, so I'm (theoretically) just going to rely on the heater to keep it at temp. It's a very small room, so it shouldn't be a problem, unless any of you see a problem with that.

Edit: And they are addicting, haha -- my wife (who up until last week said NO! to snakes) is already looking at info on morphs, and corn and milk snakes. I told her we'll wait until we're sure we can take care of the ball python first .