He's definitely feeling a bit skittish in this habitat and I'm sure it is contributing heavily to defensive behavior. He is also definitely hungry if he's coiling after striking and it's tough to see, but if his spine is raised up where his body is making more of a triangle shape and the previous owner fed once a month, the snake is definitely needing to eat quite a bit to get up to a healthy weight. I think you should proceed like this:

1. Get a background for the tank that covers at least 1 side but preferably the back and sides. You can use something like black poster board or get one of the jungley backgrounds from the pet store.

2. Get him some proper hides that he can feel safe inside by keeping most of his body pressed against the wall. If you want something natural looking, get 2 of these and put them on opposite ends:

You want the hide to have only 1 opening and be able to fit the whole snake nice and snug inside of it so it can 'defend' the door with its head.

3. Feed a small to medium F/T rat once a week in the enclosure until the snake is nice and round like a sausage.


Try to handle minimally until you've got those 3 taken care of and he has eaten a few times, then come back to us and tell us if he is still behaving this way. It is very unlike a ball python to behave as you described so we have to assume the previous things will make all the difference.

GL!