Everyone seems to have covered everything. My only comment would be that everyone jumps to feeding live extremely quickly. Remember that a healthy ball python can go a few weeks without eating no problem. Really they can go a few months if they are big enough to begin with. I recently had my BP refuse to take F/T mice. She went 21 days between feedings. There was no secret to making her eat again. I read over the care sheets again. Checked everything, I decided to increase the size of her hides just a bit so that she would have a bit more room to take a mouse in her hide and eat in peace. I offered her a mouse every 5 days till she finally ate. She has had 3 meals back to back 5 days apart since. F/T is a perfectly fine way to feed snakes you just have to be patient. Have your husbandry up to snuff and make sure the mouse is in good shape and heated up to the temp of a live mouse. Sometimes I find that my BP will come up to the mouse flick her tongue at it, stare at it with those heat pits of hers and I swear I can here her say "Could you warm that up a bit for me, and stop phoning it in. I need you to make the mouse dance, make me believe that its scared, confused and a long way from home." I heat the mouse up a bit more grab my tongs and give her a good show and she scares the crap out of me with a violent strike and wrap.
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