Hi Dawn and welcome to this site. We too are brand new owners of our first ball python and found this forum invaluable! We also live in a small town with almost no resources for snake owners and got our ball python from a small local pet store.

May I ask what type of housing you are putting the new snake in? We had thought of using an aquarium but after joining this forum and reading so many threads here and asking a ton of questions we went with a 40 qt/38L #1986 Clear Sterlite blanket box from Wal-mart. It has been perfect! Easier than an aquarium to heat and more importantly to keep humidity to the right levels and very cost effective. Our entire set up (except the cost of the snake) has been about $65.00 and everything was purchased either at Wal-Mart or Home Depot. As Tigerlily advised it's best to get the housing sorted out first and all the levels stablized before the snake is introduced.

One piece of advice we got....for the first while, put papertowels only in the bottom so you can easily see the snake's poop and urate (the white hard stuff that is a snake's urine). There are many choices of substrate. We will eventually go with double-milled cypress.

We've had our snake only 28 days but with the help of the wonderful people in this forum it's been a great experience. Please feel free to ask any questions, I know from our experience here as new owners you will get lots of great information back.

We did not handle our snake (who was 2.5 months old at purchase) at all for the first week. Now we handle "her" each day about 10 minutes or so (sometimes more) but not at all for 2 days after she eats. She eats every Monday and has a great feeding response. What are you planning to feed your new snake?

Some of the advice we were given when purchasing our baby snake was too look for any evidence of mites or ticks on the snake, very lightly pinch the skin of the side of the snake to see if it "tents" as this means dehydration, to check for any retained shed on the snake (especially retained eyecaps), find out if the snake is really captive bred and if it's been eating and shedding as it should, ask to see the snake feed if possible, check for any evidence of bubbling or wheezing as this can be a very serious respitory issue, make sure it's backbone is not pronounced (sort of a triangular shape) which can mean the snake is underweight. Just generally feels fit and athletic in your hands, not wispy light and at all "limp". Hopefully some of the more experienced owners can chime in here with advice on picking a healthy young snake.

Oh and find a vet locally that will see your snake and can sex it if you want that and do a general health check or deal with any emergencies that might come up.

Good luck with your new snake!


~~Joanna~~