Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I understand when people say that Ball Pythons feel more secure inside a tub in a rack setup, but even if they spend 98% of their time in the hide, feeling secure in that confined space, this doesnt account for the 2% when the snake chooses to leave the hide and strech out its body and crawl around. In most rack setups they are denied this very basic choice and you cannot get away from that fact. In addition, many snakes choose to leave their little secure hides at night, whether it is to search for food, or because its body intuitively knows that movement and muscle use is healthy for it, or simply because instinct tells the snake to relocate periodically to where new food sources may be - who can say? Maybe some of the people who report that Ball Pythons very seldom leave their nice and tight hiding spots are asleep when the snake chooses to go on its exploritory 3am jaunt?

I use a rack setup myself and while I have been trying to use larger sized tubs so my snakes can move around if they choose, it is a fact of life that with a growing collection, I will be forced by space limitations to have to go with smaller tubs for some animals. What irritates me is when people say that Ball Pyhons feel safe in confined spaces, so this means that they never want to fully stretch out and move around. I am not sure if people say this because they actually believe it, or if it's just to make them look and feel better about the whole situation somehow?

~Alan

I don't know the answer to this either. But this we do know. If ball pythons are stressed by any little tiny thing , they go off feed? There was a pet shop in hamburg near where I live. They had a burm and this snake was kept in a fish tank that it was coiled tightly in for years till eventually moved and live for over thirty years. This is not to argue. Just some thoughts on the subject.
Casey

*** I agree they do crawl around at night but they are definately comfortable coiled in a tight hide. The lenght and width of the tub should allow the snake to fully extend its body.A tub that is 33 x 17 should easily accomadate a 4 foot snake.
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The Crawl Space

It would take a big ball for it to not be able to stretch out in a CB 70, general rule for me is 1/2 the radius of the tube so if it 3ft long and 1ft wide should hold a 4ft ball.IMO
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Vince Pramuk []__[]

Of course, in the wild, snakes leave their hides and dens to roam around. But if that den had a clean water source and food entering it once a week, would they infact roam as much as people think? Other than breeding season, A snake in the wild searches for food and water, then hides for a while digesting its meal. Then returns out looking for food again. These are not sociable animals.
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0.0.3 Green Tree Pythons
3.4 Ball Pythons
...(2 pied, 1 Albino, 2 Het Albino, 2 Normals)
1.0 Leucistic Texas rat
1.0 Albino Corn

I base saying this on my observations:

I have a 55gallon display tank in my living room. I occasionally rotate different animals into this tank and I try to keep it looking really nice; cypress mulch, a large chunk of decorative natural white quartz, 1 hide hot end and 1 hide cold end, large drift wood pieces to crawl on or under or for the snake to bask on closer to heat lamp.

I have no problems feeding,(unless the snake is a problem feeder to begin with), and the snakes seem to enjoy moving about. Some may climb onto the driftwood up by the light and warm up, many stay in the hides most of the time - true. But at night, when I am up watching TV and all the lights are off except the red night light in the tank, I see them tooling around, many for hours... They are not just getting a drink either. While they may be looking for food, it has to be healthier for them to wander, explore and exercise, than to just lay inside a tiny hide, with the only requirement being that they have to open their mouths every 7-10 days and have a rat shoved in?

Really, it is what it is, and I am not trying to pass judgement on anyone. Everyone should take care of their own animals the way the think is best. It just irritates me when people make the "snakes prefer small enclosed places" statement like it isnt anymore complicated than that, when it is actually a far more complex issue if you just choose to be intellectually honest about it.

~Alan

if you think about it a 55 gallon tank isn't much larger as far as floor space goes than a cb70 tub. Granted you can't put climbing branches in a tub but you can put items they can crawl over. Also if you want to think about this in an intellectual way, here we go. BP's aren't designed to be active hunters. They have the body shape of ambush predators, short and fat. Why don't they have to move much in the wild. Well they have evolved in a way that they eat only the most abundant prey items in most areas, rodents. these prey items aren't easily erradicated so therefore the bp's don't need to readily relocate themselves.

now let's look at snakes of the opposite, long and skinny. Retics feed on alot of small rodents and birds as small babies and therefore need to be able to cover large areas of land to find the numbers of prey they require. As adults they consume large prey which have large home ranges so they must be mobile to be able to find the prey.

If this makes no sense to you, I challenge you to find one example of any boid that is built like a bp or a retic that doesn't follow these same patterns.
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Josh & Krysty Hutto
J&K Reptiles

Various Ball Pythons:::

1.0 striped vanilla
1.0 spider
1.2 Citrus Ghost and hets
1.2 Albino and hets
2.3 het Pied
0.6 50% poss het pied
1.1 Pastel (male has additional gene going on with him)
a bunch of normal female breeders
a bunch of normal female holdbacks and several rescued normal males

0.1 columbian boa, she's a feeding monster, controls my
over production of rats, lol
0.1 brazilian rainbow boa, another rat eating monster
1.1 corns

a BAD dog is MADE not bred, support the American Pit Bull Terrier as the greatest breed of dogs on Earth!!!!!

You're going to see individual behavior patterns even within a species. We all manage our animals on an individual basis. Some snakes need this, some like that. Some would probably do better in a set up other than a rack system, but most appear to thrive in it.

How many of us know which snakes to watch for when you open the tub? Which will take food right after a cage move, right after breeding, even while in shed?

Acadamia tells that the typical ball python is not likely to take food in these situations and that is-most of the time- correct. Folks, there are people, true herpetologists and some very serious herpetoculturists who have done the bulk of the work for us, but this hobby is young! We are still on the cutting edge and our experiences help define what is "normal".

All that aside, when I walk into the snake room after the auto lights go out and flip on the switch, I can see about 60% of my snakes moving about their tubs. They most likely would go somewhere- a short jaunt no doubt- until they found a suitable dark hole and settled in.

As a scientific question, it's well accepted that wild animals are unlikely to breed in captivity if they are stressed. Successful breeding indicates either a lack of stress or a corresponding tolerance to stress brought about by generations being raised in captivity from birth.

As an ethical question, the answer has to be settled on an individual basis. By using rack systems I have struck a balance between physical well being, security, safety, and ease of management. I have taken from them their ability to travel and co-mingle at will and I have sacrificed my ability to admire them through the glass of a fancy vivarium. It's not a perfect world, but it's tidy. : )

Oh, and one of the most successful methods I've implemented to get an off-feed snake to resume feeding is put it in a way-too-small cage for a couple weeks. And some of my balls *like* it cold. 80-82 degrees or they go off feed. Go figure.

Kassandra Royer

~np!

Personally, even if people are raising the snakes to eat them, I couldnt really care less, as long as the are not wasting the food. I am about as far from a P.I.T.A. wacko- tree hugger as you can get. I just think its hypocritical when people make the "snake like small places" blanket statement to make it seem all nice and tidy and easy to stomach.

If you have struck a workable balance with your animals - I say great for you and your snakes!

Take dogs for instance. If you look at the life of a sled dog in Alaska, compared to an apartment dog in NYC, or a farm dog in Kansas, what person can say what is the most fruitfull and well balanced life for those animals?

I dont want to beat this to death....good luck and breed them well!!

~Alan