Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Howdy, I hope you fine people might have some ideas for me. I have a 4-month old male San Filipe rosy boa, and up until about a month ago, he had been eating like a champ every week. I was so proud of him. Then he started refusing to eat all of a sudden - he'll put his nose up to the pinky, flick his tongue, hang out a bit, and then he'll just slither away from it. (I've been feeding him F/T pinkies.)

Now other than that, he seems fine - he's growing, he just had a healthy shed this past week, and he even comes out of his hiding spot from time to time. We just moved into a new house, and he also just shed, so maybe those two things are contributing?

I noticed a couple suggestions here to try boosting the temp in the cage, so I might try that. Any other ideas are most welcome! Maybe I just need to give him time to adjust again. If that's the case, how long can these little guys go before they need to be force-fed?

If you have not changed anything except your move, I would not worry. Under all circumstances, I would avoid force feeding. Too traumatic on the animal. He will eat when he is hungry.

If he is 4 months old and has been eating well, then you may try larger mice. Pinkies may be too small for him. Are you overfeeding him?

Hi, thanks for responding. I was hoping to avoid force-feeding, as I can certainly see how stressful that might be on the animal (as if moving isn't enough!). I don't believe I was overfeeding him - just going by what was recommended by his breeder, which was a pinky every 7 to 12 days.

So maybe he'd be more intreagued by a fuzzy by now? He has grown a little bit since I first got him.

Quite the opposite of my suggestion, a pinky every 7 to 12 days is quite low in my book. I would feed a young rosy two pinkies in that time frame. But, I do think that he will come around and eat when he wants to, just make sure the temperature is adequate at that you supply a gradiant choice from hot to cooler. You know that temperature is important for proper digestion.

Ah - I see. Well, I'm going to try a fuzzy next time and see if he's more intreagued with a slightly larger prey. I think I will give him a couple of days to feel more relaxed first so it's not like I'm 'nagging' him to eat every night. Yes, I know temp is important - I had a nice gradient going in there, but decided maybe he'd like it a bit warmer than it was.

Thanks! Yeah, I hope he starts up again - people seem to be telling me that this isn't something to worry about too much. But I just want to make sure I'm doing all I can for him.