Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi there,
Well I just thought I would share this topic with all of you. It is a big deal for us, and some of my friends who breed locally, because we dont know whats going on. Maybe some of you have had similar experiences.
I have a female BP that is huge, gentle, and a great breeder, but she is absolutely sadistic to her food. She weighs in at 3000 grams, but only will eat live small or small/med rats. During this time of the year she only wants tiny rats. Well, she has a great feeding response, but as soon as a rat enters her bin she tags it as if she had fangs filled with venom. She curls up in the old "S" position and when the rats is close she will hit it again. She waits, and waits, until she can hit it again and again. She hits the rat so many times that it begins to bleed, and when she senses that, she coils it. We go through the same thing every week, and it has begun to really bother me. After every feeding I have to wipe her down because she is covered in blood. I also check her for bites from the rats. It scares me that she is like this, but what am I to do? She won't eat unless it is like this. This ritualistic behavior has been going on since I purchased her. If I try F/T, not matter how hungry she is, she just hovers over it. She will even poke her face at the F/T to see if it will move. Once she is convinced that it is not alive she leaves it alone. Does any one else have snakes with issues? Can anything be done? Why does she have to basically pre kill her food first when she is soooo big? She eats 3 or 4, sometimes 5 rats a week. I hate the way she eats. ANY thoughts would help.
Thanks in advance.

Have you tried "stunned" rats? Give a live rat a little whack on the noggin and see if that makes a difference. don't whack too hard or you will still end up with a bloody mess.

Hi -

It certainly sounds like a case of your snake perceiving the live rat as a threat. You really need to figure out a way to get that animal eating frozen/thawed or just-killed prey items. Do you feed all your snakes live food? How long have you had this one?

-Joan

Hi there,
I have had her for a year. She has 52 recorded weeks of feedings and all have been live. We tried very hard to get her to eat F/T and pre killed. Non woked, only live.
I do feed some live, some pre killed, and some F/T, but I raise my own rats.

Have you tried wiggling pre-killed or frozen/thawed using a set of tongs or long pliers? It really does sound like your snake is really defensive against live prey, either that or she really hates rats.
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PHLdyPayne

We have tried the tongs; plastic, metal, black silver, you name it and we have tried it. We even tried to just offer her F/T and fresh kill for months, but she never took. We had to feed her live just to keep her weight up. Before scheduled feedings, we prepare all rodents (live, pre kill, and F/T) in our snake room. As usual all head face us as the snakes smell the rats. You can tell who is hungry and who is not. Out of 30 adult female breeders, we have 2 that do not have a feeding response. All others are "out the bin" when they see or smell rats in the room. This female is also "bin out" when we open her cage to feed. We think she just likes to make her food suffer before she eats. I should take a video of this behavior because it is really crazy. She thinks she has venom or something. I was sure to get more of a response to this post than I did, and I was sure that there has to be someone out there with a similar problem. Thanks for the cander.

There are people who say fear makes an animal taste different and there are peoplewho say some animals like the taste. Who knows.
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3.2 Ball python (Hoss, Little Man, Adam, Helen, and the new girl who gets named when she eats)
2.2 Corn snakes (Orlando and Legolas and the newbies)
0.1 King snake (Sidhe which sounds exactly like "she"
0.0.1 GTP (Kissy the Red)
1.1 Haitian Boa (Enkil and Akasha)

And bunches of furry pets

Thanks for the info.

I may not be understanding what you said, but if a big adult ball python has fed every week for an entire year, that must be some kind of record.

I would strongly advise you to just stop feeding (and maybe not breed?) this animal – for awhile. Fifty-two feedings in one year is just “feeding” into the problem you have. I’d leave her alone for a month and then begin offering fresh-killed 100 gram rats on tongs, maybe at night in reduced lighting. And if that failed I’d try assist feeding 30 gram rats.

And before I tried any of the above, I’d offer dead, then live mice. Have you tried mice?

-Joan

>>Hi there,
>>I have had her for a year. She has 52 recorded weeks of feedings and all have been live. We tried very hard to get her to eat F/T and pre killed. Non woked, only live.
>>I do feed some live, some pre killed, and some F/T, but I raise my own rats.

I have a female that was similar - not quite so gruesome as yours - but when we'd put a small rat in with her (she was about 1500 grams at the time) she would strike at it several times, pin it up against the side of the tub, etc. and litterally seemed to play with it like a cat plays with a mouse before eating it. She would then either kill it and eat it or kill it and leave it. The previous owners confirmed that this was not odd for her and was how she ate for them - but it was sad to watch this poor rat get plugged repeatedly until she decided to kill it (and she would not eat f/t). Last summer I had more mice than my one mouser could handle and just to get rid of them I decided to try mice on her and she grabbed them and ate them up quick (like 7 at a sitting). Eventually I switched her to f/t jumbo mice and then on to f/t rats. Weird whatever her hang up was - I don't envy your having to watch that every week.
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Tosha

"Nihil facimus sed id bene facimus"

6.42.0 Ball Python (Harry and Fluffy and gang)
1.0.0 Angolan Python (Anakin Skywalker)
0.0.1 Green Tree Python (Verdi)
0.1.0 Bredls Python (Smurfette)
0.2.0 Feline (Pippen and Pandora)
0.0.1 Desert Tortoise (Pope John Paul aka JP )
2.2.1 Fish (1,2,3,4)
0.0.0 frogs rescued from pool skimmer
0.0.1 Lizard of unknown origin

Hi there,
Thanks for the conformation. I was ondering if others had he same problem. I will try F/T J mice. Havent tried that yet.
Thanx

And just for the PETA monitors IMHO it's very rare for any ball python to do this. Mine either strike and coil killing very quickly or try to hide from the rat if they aren't hungry.

I have a import female that also does this, My female will only eat mice, If I give her a small rat she just strikes it repeatedly and never eats it. I am thinking that these are not typical food items for them in the wild and don't know what to make of it. I am getting some African soft fur rats from a friend of mine in florida.{ Mike at ballroom south } They have been a hot topic for the last week and I have heard some really good storys, You might want to try some to see if this makes a difference and then you can switch them from there. Good luck. Erick

I have a female that started doing that exact same thing after i moved her into a bigger tank. (20gal)eating small rats. i dont have a scale but i can tell you she cannot fit at all into the Medium size Creature Cubby Hole from ESU but can , comfortably in the large.