Thanks for updating the Care sheet and I have taken a close look at it. And I hope you realize that I take all of these posts seriously and I have not given up on Oscar. Clearly I am hoping that the posts are correct and over time he will come around.

Oddly enough, as I do more research I find even more interesting things about this topic. Things that were not clear in much of the literature at hand in a variety of places. For example, some ball pythons never lose their aggressive behavior - when deeply entrenched in their behavior pattern they will not be tamed and will continue to snap for the rest of their lives. The issue that I have with this is that the majority of the literature does not make this clear enough. Some posters make this clear on this thread and others post just the opposite saying that in time everything will be fine. Secondly, I have discovered from reputable Vets and Herpetologists that the bottom line is that reptiles do not like to be handled, at best they tolerate it and exposing them to handling on a daily basis is not in their best interest - it only makes the owners happy. It is actually stressful for the animals even if tolerated.

What this means is that in your care sheets - if you are truly interested in the welfare of these animals - it should be made clear that they are really not excellent pets, are not really docile, do not care about being handled by humans - nor do they like it. They may have dispositions which are aggressive and if they 'tame' is it only an act of reluctant submission.

On one of the prior posts someone mentions that UTH are not naturally because BP's are do not receive heat from the ground - please re consider this statement - BP's are indigenous to Africa and portions of Africa where day-time temps hit the 100 or more degrees F. In these parts of Africa the air is thin and the sun's rays are intense. It is intuitive that the ground temperatures of these geographic locations easily hit 80-82 degrees F - the exact same range of the substrate in a cage-habitat with a zoo-med UTH (max wattage, on consistently) - I measured them accurately. The heat emanating from the ground is not mystical - it is quite natural in these temperate areas. In fact it would be quite unnatural for the ground temperature to be in the 70's while the air temp is in the high 80's. Furthermore at night - when the air temperature drops - the ground temperature remains high.

Another post asks me how experienced I am in keeping BP's - not very, however I have kept snakes before - a 6 foot Indigo for 3 years, a Red-tailed Boa for 6 years, a California king snake for 9 years and many others. The Boa was given away to a local pet shop when I left for college, the indigo as well, but because he was just too big and a bit fast.

One poster says that I am giving up too fast if I think his behavior is unalterable, but I never said that - I only said that it should be made clear that in some cases this is unalterable and the current day literature should reflect this.