I got my first baby Ball Python in early december and he was already eating larger size mice at the pet store. When I got him I asked the guy in the reptile shop to feed the tank of baby BPs, so I can pick one that would eat right away. There were about 5 or 6 in the same tank, yes i know this shouldn't be done, but it was a pretty good pet store, more specific to reptiles and also fish, called Slither and Swim in Connecticut.

They all pretty much ate right away after he knocked the mice out and offered them to each of the snakes. It was also good because I got to see which ones had aggression strikes, which ones ate right away, and which ones didn't take the mouse. Well i picked one that ate right away, strike and coil, no aggression strikes...

I've fed him every 7 days, in a seperate tub, and he always took the mouse within a few minutes of the mice going into the tub and wondering around (i fed them live, not stunned or knocked out)...

Since then I've read that rats are much more nutritious, and have decided to switch him over to the smallest rats i can find in my area. I was able to find 40g small rats at Petco in a package of 3. Also by switching to f/t, I was going to make the switch to feeding in his enclosure (with eco-earth substrate, which I was a little weary of)...

Last week I fed him one of the f/t small rats (advertised as 40g on the package), which I wasn't able to weigh to make sure since I didn't have a scale. I also had no measurement in weight for the snake to go by the 15% rule, but the width of the rat was about equal to the thickest part of the snake. I didn't feed him the week before on purpose so he would be hungry for the transition from live to f/t. He was definitely interested and smelling around but he was probably confused since the rat was already dead, and not a mouse. I kept offering it to him with tongs but he would come up smell it then turn around, he kept coming back but not striking or coiling. I was dangling and wiggling the mouse with the tweezers gently to try and trick him into thinking it was moving around. After a while, my hands started to get tired so I left the mouse on top of his hide. after about 10 minutes he kept going to the mouse and checking it out, but not striking. He then opened his mouth and bit down on the middle part of the body, moved it around a bit then let go. He then did the same thing but with one of the rats front arms, letting go again. I took the rat out and blew dry the head to heat it up again some more. He bit down on the body again, dragging him around for a bit, then finally found the head and took it down. Everything seemed to go well after he found the head. The rat was a little larger in length then the mice i was feeding prior, but the girth was pretty much the same as the snake, and also the large mice he was eating. No problems from what I could observe.

I haven't had a scale until this week, and I weighed him today before I fed him.

He weighed in at 172 grams.

I then weighed the rat before i fed him, and it was in fact 40 grams (as advertised on the bag).

So according to the 15% rule, i should intact be feeding 25.8 gram rats/mice.

Since he ate the 40g rat 7 days ago, I figured id try again with another 40g rat since it was already defrosted (plus i can't find smaller, pretty much tried everywhere in my area for live or frozen)...

He did pretty much the same thing as he did last week... Biting in all the wrong places and not coiling. He would bite, figure out that he got the wrong spot, circle around a little bit and then do it again. I watched for over a half hour, maybe 40 mins, and I took the mouse out a 3 different time to heat up the head again, hopping he would be able to find it. He bit it a few times again, this time actually coiling it a bit (but not like he did with live, but then letting go) After a while I thought he wasn't going to eat it so I figured I would leave the room and shut the lights off. I came back about 10-15 min later and he had the head and neck in his mouth, moving on the the body, and he soon finished it off. From his body position and where I left the rat, I don't think he coiled it before he started eating.

He always had great a great feeding response with live mice, always striking and coiling as he should to kill them. But now with the f/t he doesn't strike hard, or strike at all for that matter, he slowly goes up to it and calmly opens his mouth and bites down. Im finding it odd that he's taking so long to find the head, and trying to bite on the body and arms instead.

Can this be normal?

Is he not striking or coiling because he figured out that there not alive?

Any reasons why he can't seem to find the head of the rat for an abnormally long time?

Can I be doing something wrong?

Is it ok if I stick with the 40g small frozen rats every 7 days since he successfully ate them 2 times, and they are still about the same girth as the snake

Also, does everyone offer the rat with tongs or a hemostat, or just place it in the cage on top of their hide or something, so the snake can get it on their own when it is ready?

I definitely need to invest in a hemostat, at the rate this guy is going, he's going to give me carpal tunnel from squeezing the tweezers for such a long time lol

Sorry that this turned into such a long post , I didn't want to leave anything out...

Thanks in advance