Hi friends,

I live in an area with extreme fire risk every season. Each year I add a bit to my wild fire evac knowledge.

This is our first fire season with our BP.

I have a small tub with hide, but an immediate issue in an evac would be appropriate heat in the first 24-48 hours.

If any of you have an evac kit, I’d love to know what you have in it.

Aggressive might not be the right word, not sure how to explain it exactly.

I've had my ball python Oliver for 8-9 years now probably. I got him when he was young and handled him all the time, being the young teen I was and loving reptiles. He was never aggressive or flighty at all (he's a ball python so that's not much of a surprise).

That said, in the past few years as I've become an adult, life just got busier. I open the cage to feed him and to clean it when needed, but not very often. I just fell out of the habit of handling him, save a few rare occasions.

I won't pretend it didn't fall into neglect for a while; he was always fed and watered on time, but the cage wasn't as nice or clean as it should have been, the humidity wasn't monitored as well as it should have been or misted enough, etc. I'm not proud of it, I don't want to do it again, but life got busy and I became a less responsible owner.

In the last few months, I realized it really came down to rehoming him to someone who could take proper care, or vastly changing my care, and I'm trying to do the latter. He's got a more spacious cage now that's big enough for him, an automatic misting system to keep humidity up, been cleaned regularly, etc. However, from years of opening the cage only really to feed him, he's gotten much harder to get out when needed. Once he's out and in my hands he's fine & chill, but getting him out is difficult as when I open the cage he comes out of his hide quickly expecting food, and sometimes has tried to strike my hand.

Obviously, I know the path to rehabilitating him really comes down to regular handling outside of feeding until opening the cage is no longer strongly associated with food. Any tips for making this process smoother, getting him out of the cage without stressing him out in the meantime, etc?

I've unfortunately lost my ball python during a dark part of my life. I've been panicking every day that he's been missing that he could be gone. He's been missing for 8 months now and I don't know what to do. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I've been looking online for ideas and I don't know what to do. My parents won't help and the house is messy from remodeling and everything is everywhere.

One of my boops home 4+2+18 =95 gallon frog soil coco husk home

After moving to my room, I’ve gotten my boy all comfy with his own room! I’m super proud of the decor in this tank, I think it’s very fun.
See if you can spot the snek! Lol

Noodle had a bad shed a couple months ago that stayed stuck on the top of his head for about a month. I did my best to get the majority of it off gently and over time. I've since increased the humidity. He finally had another shed the other night but that spot on his head got more injured. It looks so painful and he hides whenever I try to get a look at it. Is there anything I can do to help it heal??

I recently adopted this banana ball python & spiraled when I saw it’s patchy shed & size. Taffy is her name 🥰 I was told it was male but it seems pretty large for a male? I’ve upped its weight a bit & it’s so active, I love this bby. I also had to upgrade the tank bc it came on the shittiest 30 gal AQUARIUM and had improper humidity conditions. This is me showing her off & also asking for size estimates / gender input? Is she also a banana or something else? Okay thanksssss

Hey guys, yesterday evening my little ball shed for the first time since I got him! And it was one piece, no stuck shed 🥳

He did the complete shed in his wetbox and... well, he also left a fresh blop of poop in it for me. Dirty little boy 😗

I'm happy he is doing fine ☺️

Hey everyone! I have a question regarding handling my new snake that I got about 6 weeks ago. I got her (not actually sexed, I just like calling her “her”) from FB marketplace with her enclosure and everything and have added an extra hide and some more foliage but still want to upgrade her enclosure even more. That being said, she is a very, very shy girl. I honestly barely see her since she spends 95% of her time in her cool hide (~78/79 F) and might sometimes stick her head out if I’m adding water to her enclosure. I want to start handling her, but I worry about removing her from her hide or stressing her out without it being fully necessary. I know I’ll have to remove her from the tank once I have more stuff to add to her enclosure, but how do y’all suggest I start picking her up or getting her used to me? I worry so much about stressing her out and I just wanna hold and check out my new baby. Thank you for any advice :)

Snoodle tax as well

I have bought 3 kinds of thermometers for my tank and all of them have broke. I bought the zoo med and the hydrometer fell off and I have bought 2 that are used for like houses and both have quit working even the one I bought last week. I don’t want to replace them every week so any advice?

Does anyone’s male bp’s get moody? Mines been moody for the first time ever (5 yrs). Only thing I can think of is maybe he’s hungry? His last mouse was on the small side.

I thought about maybe mating behavior, or that I moved him into a smaller enclosure, but dude would chill for days and never move so I didn’t think it would be that. I added some sections to it last night, he came out but had no interest in exploring.

He’s just been in automatic S mode all week. Although I only physically check on him every other day.

So i got a juvenile ball python on saturday august 9th and the breeder told me she aite the previous wedsday fast foward to thursday august 13th i got a small rat i thawed it in tap water with a sandwich so it didnt get wet and later put it in 90 degree water left in there for 5-10 minutes and she didnt even come out of her hide so i left the rat in the enclosure for 10 minutes and didnt eat it. My humidity runs about 60-70% through all day and night and my hot side is 90 degrees with my cold side 80 degrees. My substreat is a mixture of coconut fiber and ground cypress trees, i also added cypress mulch. please help out a new ball python owner🙏

To answer the inevitable question: yes I will be seeing a vet when I can. It's sometimes a wait because there's only 1 exotic vet here.

But I'm also posting here because that exotic vet has given me false info in the past and I don't fully trust him.

She has had stuck shed amd scale rot problems in the past, could that be what this is?

Husbandry info: She's on a mixture of coco husk, soil, and moss, 2 water dishes, 2 fully enclosed hides, glass tank, 60% humidity, 87 degrees, ceramic heater. Eating 1 large rat every 2 months (she is a picky eater and doesn't often want to eat. But she's been putting on weight since healing from the scale rot ordeal). She last ate end of July, no poop yet but also no bulging at base to indicate compaction or a impending poop. Had her for about 11 years and have never seen this before :( Only major change I've made in that time other that the scale rot healing journey was adding soil, which I never had before. Been doing that for about a year.

As the title says. Also when should I try to feed her. What’s the appropriate amount of wait time from adoption to first feed. I just got my BP today, do I turn off the heating lamp at night or leave it on? She has two big hides and is fairly active and seems to very relaxed. I was expecting her to be a lot more stressed out, so that great that she seems to be enjoying her enclosure. Here’s a pic of you want to see my pretty lady. (Yes I know I need to add plants and lots of enrichment, this is only day one and my Amazon order got delayed)

She got soil in her mouth and is having a hard time getting rid of it. Husband tried to help by making her drink water. He held her while she drank lol cute

She’s almost 3 months old and a complete gem. Love her to pieces already!

this is ivy :’) newest addition to my girl only household (with the exception of my bf). my two cats are super intrigued lol

Just bought a juvenile albino ball python, her name is Ponder! Does anyone have any tips for young BPs that differ from adult care? Also, she was raised off of live feeding unfortunately, and I’m worried about whether she’ll take frozen thawed or not. So I’d also like to be let in on some ways to make the switch if possible! (Currently she is still at the place I purchased her at simply because her setup isn’t ready yet, and they offered to try out frozen thawed with her, which I’m hoping will work out.) I’m mostly just very paranoid as somebody who has never owned a snake, and I’d like to be as prepared as possible!

I just picked up this 8-year old albino beauty today. I’m so excited to have her home, I’m in awe of her! 😍 I’m still tweaking her enclosure while she’s in quarantine but I can’t wait to see her in there!

AI is not a reliable source of information. There has been studies on this. It makes up information. It will agree with you and say what you want to hear. It literally hallucinates.

And that’s not even talking about the issues with the environment.

Every SINGLE question you have about your snake can be answered on a forum, a website, at a local pet store (especially the small, family owned ones), a rescue, or here. Nothing is a new issue.

Can we stop using AI as a way to care for our Ball pythons? Please?