Ensure your BP has lots of places to hide and feel safe. Also, follow these steps to ensure you don't get nabbed too much:
Originally Posted by ViperSRT3g
When Feeding If I am feeding my snake, I don't touch them prior to warming up the food. Once food is warming up, (I feed F/T) the snake gets no contact unless absolutely necessary. This allows them to concentrate on the food that they can begin to smell pretty quickly. After that I feed with a pair of tongs and dangle it in front of his face so he can strike it.
When Handling If I want to handle my snake, I tap on the top of his hide a few times to let him know that his hide is about to come off slowly. After lifting the hide off of him slow and steady, I give him a few rubs on his side to let him know it's me and that he's about to be picked up. From there he's all excited and will begin to explore the place. (I need some sort of snake pen for him lol)
These actions (or lack thereof) establishes behavior conditioning, allowing a sort of pre-command to let them know what is happening before any action takes place. This reduces their confusion, and results in a more behaved, and less confused snake. This means there will be far less cage aggression as they will know when it's feeding time and when it's petting time.
Originally Posted by dkspftw
My ball pythons, so far as I can tell so far, are idiots. Lovable all the same, but not smart. In fact, my main moral dilemma as a BP keeper is the fact that we have to feed animals that are so smart (rats) to ones that are basically as dumb as logs.
I'm working on a Snake Tracker App! If you have any ideas or suggestions on features, feel free to post them in the Development Thread! I'll also be posting updates on the development of this program in this thread!