Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've had my dumeril's boa for about a year and until this past winter, she's been a great eater. She's only 800g or so but she was eating like a champ. around december, she slowed down a bit and i figured that it was because of the winter and whatnot. but its june now and she still hasn't eaten. she's really scared of the food. she spends all of her time in shavings and hides when i introduce food. she hasn't eat for 6 months now and i think she looks a bit skinny. is this normal? what could be wrong?

all help is greatly appreciated!

Omer

What were you feeding her to begin with? live or f/t? have enclosure conditions been consistant?

She was eating anythign (mice, rats, live, f/t). i took her off the aspen a while back, but she didn't seem to mind (kept eating). then when she didnt continue eating this spring, i put her back on aspen so she could bury. should i try taking her off again?

thanks
Omer

I think the aspen would give a better scence of security, id stay with that. also maby just try f/t and no live prey, I had ball pythons that got freaked out like that and fresh killed prey on forcepts worked better the chucking a mouse in the tank. temps and huimitiy been consistent?

yeah, everything is as it was. i was wondering if dumeril's just took longer to come out of dormancy
-----
2.4.0 Ball Python
0.2.0 Red tailed Boa
0.1.0 Dumeril's Boa
1.1.0 Jungle Carpet Python
1.2.0 Cornsnakes

ok, this exact thing happened to me this past year. my snake came out of brumation, din't breed, and then wouldn't eat for about 6 mo. first, i took her to the vet to check for parasites. everything came back normal, so i talked to a good friend of mine and he said to jack up the humidity and change the prey item. so i put a towel over the glass aquarium and put the humidity really high and fed her a chick instead of a rat. she ate. slowly over the next couple of months i weaned her back to half chicks and half rats and just a mist when she is fed.
-----
Passion, Enthusiasm, Conservation
ReptileGuy99

I can't tell you what is or is not normal for Dumeril's Boas' 'winter break.' One of my Ball Pythons was on a similarly long break, and refused countless mice, but ate the first rat I could offer him. Sometimes they just need a change. Sometimes not.

I can tell you that I have a lot of bad feelings about using aspen for the burrowing medium; a lot does depend upon how the aspen has been processed, but an awful lot of snakes manage to run into problems with splinters in their mouths or in their skin, and both can cause enough pain and stress to cause other problems such as refusal to feed or disease.

I keep my Dum on newspaper (for ease of cleaning) with some Spanish moss for him to hide and burrow in. I freeze the moss before use to kill any potential bugs it might harbor. The moss also looks nice, holds somed moisture, and smells pretty good too.

I hope this helps. Good luck!

~Rebecca
-----
1.0.0 Dumeril's Boa '04
1.1.1 Ball Pythons
[1.0.0 '05 Orange Hypo (Specter)]
[0.1.0 '05 Het Orange Hypo (Sylvia)]
[0.0.1 '03 Normal (Sue)]
0.2 American Pit Bull Terriers (40lb darling lap dogs:Brandy&Mara)

thanks for your help, i'll try that!