While I'm glad your methods are so successful for your collection, words do matter, and letting a healthy Ball Python go more than two weeks while trying to switch them over is not starvation. As for a healthy GI tract, as long as they are parasite free, their GI tracts are plenty fine...eating, fasting, or playing hop scotch. We are talking about a species of snake with a metabolism just slightly faster than stalagmites grow, and who regularly fast for long periods.