My question is about a python that I have, but the issue is easily applicable to boas as well...and this forum gets a lot of traffic. I recently acquired this snake which was having some feeding issues as I tried to switch it to F/T...as I have never had this much difficulty in the past. I also noticed that I had never seen her flick her tongue so I began to think there was some kind of issue in her mouth. Since she was so tiny I was scared to force her mouth open (I've just never had to do this before), as she was eating live mice with gusto and perfectly healthy every other way. The breeder assured me that there were no issues and perhaps she just didn't flick her tongue that much so I was missing it. After some time I decided to go ahead and look in her mouth and her tongue curved at the very beginning so that it is growing backwards into her throat. The breeder has been amazing and told me I could keep her if I wanted to but he is still sending me healthy replacement snake. Although she should not be bred, I'm going to keep her as a pet. My question is, will it be possible to switch her to F/T? I'm not sure she can smell properly. If you place a mouse in her enclosure behind a hide, water dish, etc. she does not appear to know that its there, even if its only a few inches away. As soon as it enters her visual field she goes crazy, but not until then. I hate feeding live, and have not fed live, except to very young snakes in years, but I'm worried that its all she'll eat.

Thanks in advance

Oh..and here's a pic of my boa..just to stay a little on topic

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• a little off topic - amelthia, Sun Jan 25 10:04:19 2009
• a pic of the tongue - amelthia, Sun Jan 25 10:05:43 2009
• RE: a little off topic - Joel_Thomas, Sun Jan 25 10:29:03 2009
• RE: a little off topic - ilovemylizard, Sun Jan 25 13:32:24 2009
• Good suggestion Heather but..... - Joel_Thomas, Sun Jan 25 13:47:17 2009