Quote Originally Posted by waldo View Post
@ RockNRollProcelain
Thank you for the advice. Her husbandry is spot on, heat and humidity is good, she has 2 hides, Cyprus mulch substrate, a large water dish and drift wood for clutter. She is in a dimly lit bedroom and thats where I usually handle her so the TV and dogs won't bother her.

I'm only handling her once a week for just a few minutes, I actually think she needs more handling at this point. When I do get her out, I reach in and pick her up from the middle of her body, as soon as she is out of the cage I support her with both hands. Most of the time, she balls up in my hands so I rub her back while she hides her face. If she settles down and stops trying to eat me, I let he slide from hand to hand. If she starts getting feisty, I cover her eyes back up until she calms back down. I continue to handle her even if she does start striking, I won't put her back until she has calmed back down.

I do use rubber gloves to remover her from the cage, the kind you wash dishes with. Once I get her in my hands, I remove the gloves. She hasn't bit bare skin yet and I'll do all I can to keep from getting bit. I react badly to snake bites, even a corn snake bite will swell up and get nasty, no amount of disinfection or medicated cream will prevent infection. Got tagged once on the thumb by a tree boa, my joint swelled up so bad I couldn't bend it for 2 months and it took forever for the swelling to completely go away.

Its feeding day today so I did take her out for about 15 minutes. She was pretty good today, no striking but she definitely wasn't happy. She is extremely jumpy if my hands get anywhere near the front third of her body and will freak if I touch her tail. I try not to make sudden movements around her head but I do touch her tail to try and desensitize her.
She sounds like she's just a stressed out BP that's not used to being handled. Bump it up to two or three times a week of handling for no more than 45 minutes each time, and see how she reacts. She may get more used to you handling her, or she may get stressed. You'll just have to gauge by her reactions. =] It sounds like you're doing a pretty good job with her. You just have to have a LOT of patience. Think of it like this: when you get a dog from a shelter, you don't know what the dog has been through. You might end up with a very abused animal as your new member of the family. This dog may be skiddish, nippy, pee itself every time you come near, etc. What "cures" this? Time and patience. Lots of time and lots of patience. And constantly working with them to let them realize you're not a threat. It's very similar with snakes. The snake you rescued may have been severely mistreated, and is going to need lots of effort, time, and patience in order to come to the conclusion that it's okay to be held and handled. I'm sure she'll be fine in time =] Where are you located? There may be some local herp societies that have dealt with rescue animals that react poorly (in case you end up needing extra help/better advice?)

And that sucks about your being sensitive to bites >.< I've only had one small nip that actually broke the skin, and it did nothing to me. But out of the 11 snakes I currently have, only one's ever bitten, and he only broke the skin once. That's kind of crazy though that you can't use any kind of disinfectant or cream to prevent the infection.