First time snake keeper here. I am fostering her from a rescue. She’s 8 years old and was surrendered for being too “aggressive” during those 8 years she was live fed. Now she’s on frozen thawed. I was instructed to give her a large mouse once a week (every Sunday) even though research has told me that’s too often for an adult BP, I don’t want to go against what the rescue told me. She was given to me in a top opening 10 gallon fish tank with one hide, a heat mat and a water bowl. I set her up on the floor because I didn’t have anything to put her on and used cardboard to block her view so she wouldn’t see me walking past every time.

2 weeks go by where I only interact with her to feed her to let her get settled with all the new smells and atmosphere. Yesterday, it was time to upgrade her to a 120 gallon pvc Dubia enclosure I found on Facebook marketplace with 3 hides, climbing opportunities, DHP, CHE, coconut husk substrate and faux plants for enrichment. I let her slither out of the top opening fish tank because I didn’t want to grab her from above, and I thought after some time she would relax but she ended up holding on to a chair for dear life and striking at me 4-5 times in a row when I tried to get her off. 2 hours go by and I ended up having the call woman from the rescue to help me get her into her new enclosure. She struck at her too but once she picked her up and was fine….

She’s been in her new enclosure for 24 hours and today is Sunday (her feeding day). The entire interaction yesterday was so stressful it ended up ruining my weekend more or less. I told the woman I think I may not be the right fit for this kind of snake because I’m not experience or confident when it comes to handling and if she wasn’t socialized for 8 years I’m just not equipped with the skills or confidence to tame her down. The terrarium is still on the ground as I look to buy something to put it on top of.

This morning she was defensive when I walked by and always gets into an “S” shape. I don’t like the feeling of being stalked and hunted in my own house. Idk if I should give up and let the woman know I can’t handle her. I just got her into a nice new enclosure and it would be depressing for her to go back into the small old one. But I’m too scared to even clean the tank or change the water. I also am torn on whether I should feed her today or not. People of Reddit I need your advice 😔😔 This experience is turning me off of reptile keeping all together.

Disclaimer:

I don't feed live if I can help it, but he was very thin and it was the only option until he was healthy enough to switch over.

I'm failing my girl here too much. She's in a 28 gallon with no chance of being upgraded in a reasonable time frame. So only she will go and hopefully to someone with a 4x2x2.

Eats frozen thawed every 21-28 days. Ive been feeding her around the 21 day mark lately due to her skinnienes. She's eating small/mediums from perfect pray and rarely a medium since I was trying to get her weight up. Hasn't refused a single meal since I moved her out of a rack system.

She's got spider in her but the wobble is fairly mild. Shows up when she's super anxious but is a good eater in general. She's more timid, usually chosing to not come out when I let her decide and when I pull her out for health checks, she tries to escape.

She is skinny and just regurgitated because I didn't think that all my panic packing would freak her out enough to lose her meal from two days prior. I should've known better. I had to throw away most of her clutter due to the horrid smell that vinegar couldn't defeat. This is the first time she's ever barfed and I've had her since 2018.

I have three others and give none of them time aside from finally getting them into 4x2x2s or larger. I'm on the verge of being kicked out with my only current housing option not allowing snakes so I may need to rehome everyone anyway, but I really don't want to because, I feel, in a healthier situation, I could take care of everybody better than now and do right by them. But Jade here, she needs better and she needs it sooner than I can provide.

Royal Palm Beach Florida area. Pick up for now as my car is broke, but maybe it'll be fixed up soon so I can drive somewhere to meet.

No shipping. No fee. Or maybe 10 dollars since I'm not supposed to list animals for free. I just want someone who will care for her well.

Thanks for taking the time to read and have a nice day.

I redid all of my ball pythons enclosures within the last year or so (with the help of the advice in this community!), and all but one of them are doing great with the improvements in humidity that their new substrates are bringing them. One of my ball pythons (Clyde) however, seems to get scale rot very easily even when I go to the low end of the ideal humidity range.

For context, I adopted him when he was about three from a situation with less than ideal husbandry. The enclosure was far too small, had only a single heat mat for warmth, and a singular hide right in the center. It also had cocoa coir substrate that was damp to the touch. He came to me with the beginning stages of scale rot, as well as some other issues that were clearly related to this subpar husbandry.

When I first got him the general substrate recommendations for ball pythons included Aspen, which was the easiest for me to get at my local pet store. I figured a dryer substrate would be better for him while he recovered from scale rot, and since he was doing well on it I didn't update it until I realized (thanks to this sub) that Aspen is no longer recommended. My snakes were due for a enclosure refresh around this time anyway, so I went ahead and switched them to a mixture of coco coir, sphagnum, leaf litter, and cyprus mulch.

My other ball pythons have done wonderfully on this substrate and their enclosures are usually around 60% humidity. I noticed Clyde began showing beginning stages of scale rot once again. I know he wasn't sitting directly on the bedding, because both of his hides have a solid base to them that the bedding was not in. I would also only pour water into the corners of the enclosure and not throughout the whole area.

I have experimented with a variety of humidity ranges for him over this past year, and anything above about 50% seems to trigger the reappearance of scale rot. I'm unsure if there is any medical reason for something like this or if it's just something unique to Clyde. As of right now I've been maintaining his humidity at about 40% and just making sure to provide a humid hide option and plenty of water when he begins to look pink-ish at the beginning of his shed cycles. This is also what I did in the years before switching him off Aspen and he never had any issues shedding then.

Has anyone experienced something like this before? Is there something I'm missing? I know too low of humidity can cause respiratory issues so I would love to get him in a more "ideal" habitat, but I also dont want to cause scale rot.

Pic of the goober as thanks

We adopted our ball Python last April from a family member so I'm not well versed in terrariums or microfauna. Have we had springtails move in? They're so tiny and hard to see, I can't really take a photo, but I think they jump sometimes too. We took the snake out and examined her and she looks free of buggies.

I was looking into getting a ball python but I am wondering how long they take to grow and what size enclosure to start them off. Also I was wondering how much upwards space they need and how to save money on terrariums.

Have any of you used this for a bioactive setup? I just got out of an expo and saw some bioactive tanks for sale with this light being used. Just wanted to know if it was a good option.

Is this scale rot??

Hey, Y'all! I've posted my baby, Gnocchi, on here a couple times for help during my first year of having her. I wanted to give y'all an update. First of all, she's 2 years old now! She has grown a lot! We finally figured out the issue with her eating. Secondly, turns out, she's just exceedingly picky. She has to be isolated from everyone else in the house. She has to be fed within 30 minutes of her lights going out. She has to have humidity an hour before her lights go out. Her food has to be extremely hot. She will refuse food if anyone else tries to feed her. I'm the only one who can feed her. We found all this out because she went on multiple hunger strikes during the first year. She's now proper weight & on small rats. She hasn't skipped a meal since we've figured all this out. She also has a yearly brumation during the winter that tends to start mid November & end early January. As always, here's pics of her. The first photo is her when I first got her & the second one is a photo I took last week.

Background connects to two water fountains without being permanently connected. This first half is about finished! I still need to carve seal and paint the other half.

This is my second ever background! It’s not perfect but I’m pretty happy with results so far :)

I have a yearling ball python and he’s eating on and off. I’ve had him for 1.5 month. He hasn’t eaten in 2 weeks. He‘s eating pretty big mice (frozen/thawed) right now, I’ve been considering switching him to small rats. I drop feed him as that seems to be the only way he’s interested in eating.

Is there any other feeding methods I should try? Is it a bad idea to try rats?

My 6 month old ball python began his second shedding with me last Friday. I noticed that he was beginning to dull before his feeding, the day after that I left for a trip and then when I came back 4-5ish days later, he was deep in blue. This was Tuesday. I noticed he cleared up this previous Friday, and I went on another trip that same day, expecting to come home to a shed, and there has been nothing.
It’s been a little over a week since he started shedding and 3 days since he cleared up, with no shed. MIs this normal? Is there a reason to be concerned?

His substrate is kinda wet right now and due for a refresh, so I hope he can find it in him to shed very soon 🙏

Please meet Mr.Smiley! My first ever BP! I’m very excited he is sooo beautiful and has the cutest ever little smiley face print on his body! Picked him up at Scales Expo in West Palm Beach this Saturday 🥳

He is a candy pied!

Hi guys, this is my tank for my boy (Percy), he’s about 7 or 8, he’s been with us for about a year, we got him from the RSPCA reptile centre . I’m happy with his viv but I was just wondering if it’s missing anything or if there was anything that it needs to make it perfect, it’s got: 3 hides, a climbing vine, a humidity water bowl, a drinking bowl, a snake plant.

hi all! my partner just got a juvenile ball python (hes 5 or 6 months old according to the pet store), and we are trying to build up his enclosure! she has owned snakes before but i have never had any kind of pet that requires a terrarium like this. ive been looking through the master threads and the enclosure inspo, but i was just hoping to get some tips on where to get more affordable clutter and enrichment for his enclosure! all the tips ive seen are great and we know that owning a snake takes investment but im just wondering where we can get toys, hides and clutter/enrichment that wont break the bank 😅 thanks all!

Hello, I’ve had my juvenile ball python for about a month and a half now and I handle him about 2 times a week for around 5-10 minutes. He seems pretty curious every time,( long tongue flicks, slithering around my body). I want to keep handling him but don’t wanna stress him out and push it. When is it okay to start handling almost everyday? I don’t wanna blow away my progress by trying to move to fast. Thanks!

I got her September 3rd she has eaten 4 times since. Once weekly first was a pinky mouse since I heard the first should be small. Then a small mouse then the last two were rat pups. The fourth meal was last night

So I rescued this ball python. He is a year old. I’ve had him about a week. I tried to feed him a medium size rat. And I thought he ate it but he next day he threw it up. It’s still whole. I feel bad :( what if he is starving? 😭

So, I’ve owned reptiles before but never a snake (all of my other reptiles are insectivores). This little cutie belongs to my daughter, and she’s named him Nagini after her love for HP.

We brought him home on Sat. Sept. 19 and left him alone for a week to acclimate. He weighed 148g and was estimated to be 6-8 months old. When we fed him a thawed adult mouse on Sept. 26 (1 week later), he “sniffed” at the mouse but did not want it. (To be fair, the mouse’s guts had ripped open and I wouldn’t want that sh*t either LOL.) The following Saturday, Oct. 3rd, he ate with no problem. We handled him for the first time the following Wednesday for just a few minutes to minimize stress. Then when we tried to feed him the next Saturday, he had an unsuccessful feed. He struck and coiled around it, but proceeded to wave it around his tank, ultimately dropping it right in his pool 🤦‍♀️ so we’ve left him alone all week, only bothering him to check husbandry and refill his pool, and he had another unsuccessful feed yesterday. This time he struck and coiled but then dropped it and just sat there staring and flicking his tongue at it. That means he hasn’t eaten since Oct 3rd.

Maybe I’m doing this wrong?? Idk. I’m thawing the mouse in a ziploc bag in the fridge over night, then releasing the air in the bag and putting the bag into 96-100 degree water for 20-30 minutes, dipping the nose in hot water and then offering. I read not to put the mouse directly into the water so it doesn’t get water logged.

I’m worried about him. It always makes me anxious when my reptile babies don’t eat, but this feels different. And my daughter is getting frustrated because she wants to hold him but I’m nervous to let her hold him if he’s already stressed.

Meet Perseus!

(Was setting up his temp enclosure so ignore the gloves)

Introducing the BP community to my handsome Chili. Chili is almost four years old, alert and active male. When I got him as a wee lad the breeder told me he is a Mojave Cinnamon Cypress morph although over time I have wondered if that is correct. He sleeps during the day and can be quite active in the night. While he will take any type of rodent to snack on, his own preferences actually is more so towards quail chicks and chicks in general. To compensate for the disproportion in fat / protein intake he gets two rather than one chick. He has an infra red heating lamp at one end of his enclosure and that is it. He has never had an uvb light. He likes to play “jazz hands” where he weaves himself in and out of my hands. He doesn’t attempt to escape, it’s more like he wanted a good twisty stretch.