Quote Originally Posted by bcr229 View Post
At first I thought you might be underfeeding, but two smalls a week should be fine unless he's huge for an 18 month old.

My guess is that by feeding outside the enclosure he's been conditioned to think that removal from the tub = feeding time, so when you pull him out he expects to get fed. This is why feeding in the enclosure is now advised, as the snakes learn that leaving the enclosure = no food. It's probably also why he's ok once you put him on the floor - it's not where he gets fed.

Try feeding in his tub from now on, and otherwise when you want to get him out, touch him lightly first with a hook as a signal that there is no food coming.
Yeah, I'm pretty certain that I'm not over-feeding him. He doesn't seem hungry after he eats and he's growing normally.

I'm a bit iffy about feeding him in his enclosure, wouldn't he just get reconditioned into thinking that everything that comes into his enclosure is food?
What I might do is just tough it out and start getting him out of his cage a lot more frequently for handling, that way he knows that he's not always coming out of his enclosure just to eat.