Ball pythons are nocturnal, and babies will not have adjusted to human schedules. Provide enough substrate to burrow in and consider covering the sides of an enclosure. Never allow this to drop below 75 degrees.
The python must also have a basking spot, with a heat lamp. This corner of the enclosure should be between 88 and 96 degrees. Snakes can only digest food in an appropriate climate.
If the snake is too cold, it will not have fully digested its last meal. This will throw the feeding schedule completely off-track. The snake will not be hungry when you offer more food. This will make the python sick, or worse. Baby snakes, in particular, have limited immunity and hardiness. Brumation is the snake equivalent of hibernation through winter. Essentially, a snake becomes lethargic and rests for a prolonged period of time. This means the snake will not need to eat. It can happily survive for several months in this state.
Ball pythons sometimes choose to enter brumation. If differs from snake to snake. As a result, a snake planning to brumate stops eating for some time beforehand.
It needs to ensure that its stomach is empty. The snake may also bathe more often to encourage elimination. Brumation is not ideal in baby pythons. It is preferable to encourage your snake to stay active for at least one full winter. If a baby python does lose interest in food during winter, brumation could be impending.
Your baby ball python will typically tell you when it is hungry. If you feed your snake once a week, you should be able to avoid this. Just remember to moderate the schedule as your python ages and grows. Ball pythons do not remain juveniles forever. Your email address will not be published. Save my name and email in this browser for the next time I comment. Contents hide. Leave a Comment Cancel Your email address will not be published.
If your snake has a suddenly reduced appetite and refuses food, there are several reasons this may have come about. In most cases reverting to the prey your ball python is used to, and ensuring the tank is warm enough, will resolve any feeding issues.
If your snake still refuses to eat you may need to examine it for disease or parasites or take it to a vet. Video on getting a picky ball python to eat. They could easily live their entire life eating only mice and rats, but that is not entirely necessary. Some ball pythons may even accept fish in lieu of their usual diet of mice. This should not be a regular occurrence, however, as mice and rats will forever be their most preferred source of food.
Ball pythons of any age make low-maintenance pets. They do not require complicated feeding schedules, are happy to stick to mice and rats most of the time, and can go for long periods without any food whatsoever.
They are easy to please and nearly never fussy. Bridgitte grew up on a farm and eventually spent 5 years on Mahe Island in the Seychelles during her teen years.
Her time living on a farm was spent mostly around animals including dogs, cats, cows, horses, and all sorts of fowl chickens, ducks, and geese included. She loves writing about pretty much all animals, and particularly dogs, cats, small mammals, horses and reptiles. Rats come into our homes for two reasons — food and shelter. Now as much as we all love the movie Ratatouille, if you have a rat in the house, they are unlikely to cook up culinary delights for you Is a rat likely to eat its babies?
Skip to content New owners often find themselves overwhelmed by the information available on how much and what type of prey to feed their ball python. Juvenile ball pythons would do well with one adult mouse instead of pinkies. It is covered below. Although live prey is acceptable, it is not recommended for captive ball pythons. Feeding ball pythons after sunset or late at night is the best choice.
Younger snakes should eat more often since they are still growing. They should eat at least once a week, or even once every 5 to 6 days while growing. If your snake doesn't want to eat weekly, it is okay to wait longer to feed him again the next time.
Also, if your snake seems to be overweight the tail should slowly taper to a point, not have an abrupt change in width from the vent to the tip , you should wait longer in between feedings to prevent obesity issues. Aside from major medical conditions, snakes can refuse to eat for a multitude of reasons. Being too cold is a common problem for many pet ball pythons, especially in the winter months, but is easily corrected by providing a heat light. Intestinal parasites can cause your snake not to feel well or not gain weight.
An annual fecal examination is recommended to screen your snake for a heavy burden of pinworms, coccidia, or other intestinal parasites that may need to be treated with dewormers. If your ball python is about to shed, then it won't be eating until it is all done getting rid of the old skin. Signs your snake is about to shed include an ashy appearance to their skin and milky eyes. Stress is an often overlooked reason why snakes won't eat. New enclosures, other snakes in the enclosure, or too much handling can cause your ball python to get stressed out and not want to eat.
Differences in prey will also cause a picky snake to stop eating. The smell, the size, whether the prey is alive, freshly killed, or frozen and then thawed, the kind of prey and even the color of the prey can all determine whether or not your snake is going to take in his meal. If you've already explored the reasons why your ball python isn't eating and make any possible changes including the kind of prey offered or increased the temperature in the enclosure , there are some things you can do to get your snake to eat.
But make sure you are feeding your snake in a feeding container separate from his regular enclosure and are covering that container with a towel to prevent your snake from being distracted while he should be eating. When you see the python notice the prey, move your hand away quickly but not so jerky it locks its attention onto your hand. This is why you need to know what to feed a baby ball python.
Check out the rest of the post for more details on what and how to feed a baby ball python. Table of Contents.
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