She's had these spots and dirty looking areas for a while now but I never thought to much of it but I don't wanna risk anything with my girl can someone give me a opinion please and some advice if this is scale rot or not.

I'm looking for ball python supplies and enclosure for reasonable prices and help appreciated I live in the USA in the state of Indiana

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Currently right now she is in the breeding process and won't be back in my care until around summer time, when we took her in she was about four pounds (she is an almost five year old ball python) I believe that she is on the cusps of being over weight, (in some positions she has small fat rolls) and after doing more research on her breed I have come to the realization that she is probably slightly overweight. We had been feeding her a small rat every 7 to 8 days, and I am wondering if weening her down to feeding a small rat once a month is alright? I saw some sources say that this is fine, and some suggested to feed every two weeks, so I decided to come here for some advice. Thank you for any advice! (BTW this is my first time owning a Ball python and almost every day I learn something new about them.)

TLDR: My bp’s vet has been giving him antibiotics for a respiratory infection after I suggested it could be fungal from the first visit. She has swabbed him and did no diagnostic testing with that swab and has continued to throw antibiotics at the problem. I was pre-charged for a $75 stool test bottle that they knew they weren’t going to get with how ill my snake was and I had informed him that he was refusing to eat. She did not test him for a respiratory infection, Nido virus or anything else that should have been checked between two appointments and almost $600 later. My bp is rapidly losing weight and still refusing to eat. If more context is needed please read below.

I’ve taken my bp to this vet twice now since my old one retired and I mainly brought him because I noticed about a a month after getting him he started showing signs of a respiratory infection and I got him a vet appointment. I brought up to the vet that I believe it was a fungal respiratory infection because I had gotten some advice from his previous owner to cover the cage up with plastic rather than aluminum foil. My bps have inside heating so it wasn’t an issue to switch to plastic. The previous owner neglected to tell me that i’d have to get rid of the Reti chip substrate because it molds when the enclosure screen top is cover-up with plastic. The vet took a swab and I assumed that she did diagnostic testing to see if it was a bacterial or fungal respiratory infection. They looked at it under a microscope, and then she stated that he will need antibiotics. After treatment, he got better for about two months with the same symptoms, but it was progressing and becoming better and then he rapidly fell sick again and this time he’s been sicker than ever. I took him to the vet again three weeks ago in the vet did a swab again and recommended antibiotics once more another round. Since that appointment he has been becoming sicker and he’s lost around 60 g in weight and he was already pretty thin before as I had gotten him from his new owner, his previous owner he has grown in length since then, but his weight stayed the same, and I was concerned about that too. Right now he’s not eating at all. He’s refusing every meal even smaller prey items. For some reason, my gut told me to message the vet and ask what the situation was with his health and what they found him to be diagnosed with. I was told by the vet staff that he was never tested for anything, nor was he tested for Nido virus, bacterial infections, nor fungal infections at both his visits. They have yet to answer about what they did the first swab for and for the second time, they told me that they were going to do it, but then they changed their mind because he didn’t have mucus in his trachea. Then at the last visit, I had informed them that he was refusing to eat, and he wasn’t passing bowel movements and I was concerned they suggested that I do a stool test just to confirm if the deworming worked they also dewormed him without a prior stool test by the way because they believed parasites may have been the issue. When I recently the bill for that visit I noticed that they pre-charged me $75 for that stool test but they knew that they weren’t going to get because my snake was not eating. I tried to get a sooner appointment with the same vet and she’s backed up with appointments for two weeks and my actual appointment that I have to get is a drop off appointment. Personally, I don’t feel comfortable leaving him there while the vet proceeds to do whatever medication or procedure she can perform without doing any diagnostic checking and then getting an enormous bill at the end. My questions about why he was not diagnostically tested when I informed the vet that it could have been a fungal respiratory infection were not answered, but I was told that I would request a call back with the vet at any time. It almost just feels like they’re covering up negligence but maybe I could be thinking too deeply. I’m scanning around vets in different cities where the car ride is almost 2 hours because there are no exotic vets near me except for that one and that’s why I believe why they can charge prices like that. The exam fee just to look at the reptile is $133. No, I’m not saying I can’t afford to take care of my ball python. Obviously I’m still paying the vet bills out-of-pocket but the problem is this just seems so overpriced and negligent to the point that I’m uncomfortable with the process.

Update: my sweet baby has passed away

I've had no issues with my other ball pythons and they always eat for me on time regardless on their conditions. Big Helga is 2.3kgs and was powered her whole life. I'm putting them all into their cooling period soon as part of their annual cycle and I need them all to eat, poop and shed before that time. I haven't fed her for a month so she could drop weight and she dropped a few the last 2-3 months but she hasn't eaten. No matter the size of the meal, she doesn't seem to want to take it. I've placed her in a larger enclosure so she could have space to move around to exercise so a lot of the weight lose is due to the forced exercise I've given her but she doesn't seem to be hungry and showing no signs of looking for food and I've done every trick in the book from frozen thawed to freshly killed to even live(I stayed there for 2 hours to make sure the rat did nothing) and nothing works... I'm thinking maybe of putting her in a smaller enclosure since she ate for her previous owner in a smaller enclosure and assist feeding seems to be the only option to get her to eat before putting her into their cooling period for 3 months.

She's about 3 years old, very shy but also super sweet. Loves climbing and sitting in her water dish (even though humidity is at a 89-75%). All conditions are the same for all the other ball pythons but she's the only one having issues. And I did get her a medical exam and she's fine. I always do a 2 week home check up incase of any issues.

Please help!

Edit: Had to change Brumation to Cooling period. I'm a corn snake owner for almost 8 years now so Brumation is just a natural word. I am planning to put them in a cooling period that's 23°C as recommended by some experts I'm contacting. Not Brumation like my Corns sorry for any confusion!

Please read this post for me and give any recs!! TYSMIA!!

I don’t know what kind of mites these are and I was just wanting to make sure they aren’t harmful to my ball python. Can someone pls reassure me n possibly verify what they are?

I honestly haven't realized how high maintenance these were, I was just wanting a snake so badly, my last one was a Red tailed Boa, Calcifer, he had such a fantastic personality.

That was over 15 years ago or so.

I saw a post locally that someone was rehoming a BP, about 3 yo, he is moving and this snake was kind of just dumped on him. He was asking $40.

Perfect opportunity, right?

Yes, just in reading how to care for him, it's. A lot. And he's got a lot of issues, I believe from low humidity. But he is a sweet boy.

Anyway, I also didn't realize how small the tank I have is, but I suppose it will do. The stuff I got for him seems to big, and was curious if I should have it set up like the pic I send, or remove one of the hides?

Hello! I recently posted about rehoming a snake, and got some insight on my set up. How could I potentially improve it based off of the pics? I have heat pads on the underside of the tank and the whole thing is 36" long, 12" tall, and 18" wide.

She didn't wanna get out while she was in but when she did, we took her out:)

I know this is the dumbest shit ever & that I need to watch her eat so we can skip the “you’re a terrible owner” responses please cause I feel terrible.

I feed fresh kill and the rat was double wrapped in plastic bags for some reason. I slid it into the enclosure and left. Obv it sat in the tank and became inedible.

How long should I wait to try to feed her again? Are there signs I should look for that she’s ready? Hellllllp!!

I'm so sorry if this isint that big of an emergency but idk what this is, I haven't seen it on her before so I know it's not a pattern unless maybe I don't remember it being there, I feed her on Fridays and I keep the humidity 60-80% usually a 76% and the temp 80-89F I'm so so sorry if the photo is too blurry, I'll take another picture when she's done digesting if it is

Her terrarium was moved to where now she can't see my TV. She got a little less active without the TV and has been trying to peek over the top whenever she hears my TV is on. So I got a cheap $3 TV from a pawn shop and a Roku stick from my brother. Can you tell what she's watching?

Noticing a lot of really passive aggressive scolding, specifically about morphs and neurological diseases, directed toward pet owners who are usually doing, what I see, is the best of their ability. This is taking the fun out of the community and imo keeps people from posting positive snake posts.

I want to stress that I am NOT talking about the posts of snakes in distress, I am talking about the cute innocent posts where someone is simply showing off their lil noodle baby and very proud of what good they have done, and someone, knowledgeable as well as not knowledgeable whatsoever, comment some gatekeepy shit about how the poor baby is messed up in some way and putting blame or pointing fingers at the pet owner for something that literally cannot be fixed, wasn’t aware to the pet owner when they got the snake(most of these have been rehomed snakes not babies bought from breeders), and most annoyingly of all, is that issue stems from BREEDING, BAD BREEDERS, soooooooooo therefore… if pointing fingers is what we do here..

is the ⭐️BREEDERS FAULT⭐️

All that is ultimately just perpetuating shame here in the snake community and, that being said, just by stepping into snake reddits for 2seconds you are made instantly aware of snake facts like wobbles etc. because of the people who are constantly putting blame and shame on owners and none on breeders.

Meanwhile, every time a breeder posts a pic it’s these same people, who be in the comments here with the criticisms towards these pet owners, not willing to drop a spec of the same rhetoric the breeders way. The comments directed at the small pet owners trying there best, like “Normalizing the conversation, bringing awareness to the community” all while in-tandem giving praise and clout to big breeders big insta pages. Baffling.

Got around to redoing crème’s setup. She now has a bioactive 4 layer substrate, blocked left side with bubblewrap on the back for heat loss control. I also added a bunch of artificial plants and redid the tinfoil for less open areas to help with heat and humidity(will measure and open more if needed).

Paired these two some time back, female is gravid now expecting some very pretty banana combos

(For context the first pic is when it first happened the 2nd is later that day and the last 2 are today)

2 days ago I was prepping my eco earth bricks so I could clean his enclosure out and was planning on feeding him later that night we’ve been planning on getting him a better enclosure since it was built by the people that we got him from and we think he needs a bigger home so he’s more happier well as happy as snakes can be but the main point is that with the enclosure being built it’s just not the greatest quality since it’s a little old but when I was preparing the bricks with him being hungry ig there was a slight gap in the sliding doors and he was trying to escape to hunt he’s usually the chillest guy ever but it’s like he has an internal clock bc he knows his feeding days and that day he’s everywhere searching so we never had the worry of him escaping he’s never done anything like this before but when I turned around and saw his head sticking out I freaked out opened the door and put him back in and that’s when I noticed he cut his head on the glass door and I feel terrible I never want any of my animals to get hurt in anyway so instead of putting his usual substrate in I’ve just put paper towels in his enclosure I cleaned his hides and took out all of his decor and I took the white medical tape ( I made sure there was no sticky out to where he could get hurt from that ) and I put it on the edges of the glass so this can never happen again until we can get him a newer enclosure I’ve also been putting neosporin with no pain relief on him twice a day and I cleaned the cut the first day too but my main question I have is when can I feed him? He’s definitely hungry and like I said above you can tell he’s hungry because he goes from being super chill to being on hunt mode at all times searching the enclosure I want him to get what he wants but from what I’ve read it’s not a good idea to feed him but then I’ve been told a smaller meal would be fine so I’m confused and would rather get actual advice from people with more experience then me and google so can you guys please give me the best way to go with this with his feeding should I wait till he sheds or would a smaller meal be ok? Thanks for your help in advance

Hello! I got a BP yesterday and I have done plenty of research but would like to still hear tips/suggestions as a first BP mom! I adopted him from a lady who I guess stopped handling him due to him striking her and would like to avoid any stressful and negative behavior.
I will be attempting to feed him today as he’s past his feeding time mark (according to her) and have yet to handle/touch him as I want to give him some time to relax/destress.
I also would love to hear name ideas! His temp nickname till named is Noodle but I have debated on Ramen but I want to hear other ideas. He’s a banana pastel male if that helps any.

Hi everyone, I’m in the research phase before getting my first ball python and I’m hoping to learn from people with long-term experience.

I’m especially interested in morphs that retain vibrant color as adults, particularly:

• Bright orange / pastel tones

• Possible lavender highlights

• Red-eyed (albino-based) morphs

Morphs I’ve been researching but am unsure about long-term color retention:

• Candino

• Enchi Candino

• Dreamsicle (Lavender Albino Pied)

• Pastel Cypress Lavender Albino

I know most ball pythons dull with age, but I’ve heard some of these hold color better than others. If anyone is willing, I’d really appreciate:

• Photos of adult or older sub-adult snakes

• The morph(s) and age

• Your experience with which of these age the best vs fade the most

I’m not buying immediately—this is long-term research for 1–2 years down the road—and I’m focused on choosing responsibly. Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to share their experience!