Quote Originally Posted by jglass38
You might want to take the hide out of there in the future.
Not that I want to ding you twice in one day (cages vs. racks), but I always suggest leaving hides inside of the enclosure if you're going to choose to feed live.

Hides give your ball python a natural ambush point to attack their prey from and an escape from the rodent in case the animal is just not interested in feeding that day. A ball python open and exposed in a cage with a rat is really not a good idea if you can avoid it.

In addition to leaving hides in the cage, a couple of good ideas for feeding live are to "pre-scent the room" by leaving the rodent in the room on or near the snakes enclosure for at least 30 minutes before feeding so that the snake can smell the rodent and get into "feeding mode" ... also, if your hide is big enough to fit your snake AND a small rat, it's probably too big for your ball python.

Hope this helps.

-adam