lesser female still hasn't eaten

[reno-cg]

My female lesser I picked up on June 3rd has not eaten for about 4 months now. The set up I have her in these photos is roughly the same as the one she is in now. The only difference is that she is currently in a rack system I built. I added the plants for extra security and I am now using a plastic hide rather than the cardboard hide you see is this photo. Also, the golf ball is for size comparison. These pics are about a month old and she looks perfectly healthy, in fact, she still looks pretty healthy but I can tell she has lost a bunch of weight.

The temps are 95 on hot end, 78 on cool end and I keep the humidity at around 52%. I am sure she doesn't have internal parasites as the breeder I purchased her off of kept very good care of his animals. She was a monster when I first bought her, about 1100g, now she is just shy of 900g. The problem I am facing is that she was fed live rats her whole life and these past few months I have been trying to switch her over to f/t. I have also offered small live rats in the past which she didn't take. I offer f/t now once a week. I am aware that some bp's will get stressed when moving to a new enclosure, but that was months ago so I have no idea what could be causing the issue now. Last week she seemed "interested" in the small f/t rat I offered but ultimately turned her nose up at it.

Will she eventually eat or will she starve herself? I am not prepared to offer live as then I have a rat I have to look after and I don't want to feed it to my other bps in case they get the idea that they will be getting live all the time. I really want to get her eating f/t soon. I'm beginning to worry that she has forgotten how to eat lol. Thanks for reading.

[don15681]

some snakes when they hit around 900 grams will go off feed for a while when they are being feed well. by the looks of her, she looks healthy. a good dump a snake can lose some weight. the 1100 grams could of been a full weight compared to 900 gram empty. I have a male that I moved into a larger tub and he's been off feed for months now. she will most likely feed when she's ready. I would offer her what she ate before going off feed and then chenge her to F/T. that way you know she's off feed and not because it's prepared different or because it's a different type rodent. I know, a female this close to breeding weight being off feed this close to breeding season sucks. I've been there too.

[rabernet]

What was she being fed by her previous owner? I know you state you don't want to feed live, but if that's all she'll eat, why deny that from her?

[JLC]

I can understand the reluctance to try live. Dealing with and/or disposing of a refused live rat can be a pain in the tush. If you can make a little CO2 chamber though, maybe you could try offering live, and if she refuses it, you can put it to sleep (kill it), freeze it and save it for a later feeding for those that do eat f/t.

Can you get your hands on some frozen mice? Maybe try that. My big girl went off her food around that size and it took switching from rats to mice to get her to eat again.

GORGEOUS lesser, by the way!!

[reno-cg]

What was she being fed by her previous owner? I know you state you don't want to feed live, but if that's all she'll eat, why deny that from her?

Well I have been told by people on this forum that they regret offering live because it ruined the months of preparation for their animal to take f/t. I have offered live before, 2 months or so ago, but she didn't want it. I've dealt with picky eaters in the past, but never this picky.

I think I may take don's and JLC's advice and offer her live just so I know she CAN eat lol. I'll have to read up on a CO2 chamber. That is something that I don't want botch. Thanks for the replies!

[snakesRkewl]

chambers are super simple, I use mine every now and then but not for pre-kill as I feed live

2 small holes to allow the oxygen out when the co2 comes in.
Screen in the bottom to keep rat off of it's own pee/poo as they do that when they die.

[WingedWolfPsion]

Offering live doesn't ruin anything, and switching an animal to FT doesn't take months of preparation.

You ball python will make the decision to try or refuse FT in about 3 minutes, tops. It does this when the food is offered. It has been my experience that an animal that is off feed is actually less likely to try something new than one that is eating regularly. Ball pythons that refuse food do so for a reason. A) They do not feel secure in their environment. B) It doesn't smell like safe food to them. C) Hormonal changes (winter breeding, shedding, etc). D) Health issues (disease, infection, or parasites).

That's really about it. I do NOT believe that your female is 'just at that age', because she stopped feeding in the summer, and adolescent females usually go off feed over the winter breeding season, not during the summer.
I do think it looks like she may not like her hide, unless you moved her to take the photo. It really could be as simple as that.
Try draping all but the front of the bin with a piece of opaque fabric, to block the light and view. Wait 1 week, then offer a live rat hopper at night, at least an hour after all lights are out.

If you can get her feeding again, it's important to do so soon, otherwise she may indeed go into her 'teen female refusal' period, and not eat until spring.

[XSReptiles]

Try filling up the whole enclosure with wadded up newspaper.

[reno-cg]

Well she finally ate last night. Unfortunately it wasn't the prey item I had in mind but I'm glad she's (hopefully) eating again so I can get her up to weight for breeding next season. She ended up eating a live natal rat, so I will try the same thing next week. I just hope I don't get her hooked on ASFs because they are sort of expensive where I'm located. Nonetheless, thanks for everybody's help. This has definitely been a stressful 4 months