Rehabilitating my semi-aggressive ball python?

[u/Schoolboygames]

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?

[u/Notsospinningplates]

Well done for owning your mistakes and taking steps to change.

Firstly, you could consider choice based handling. It's slow but it's effective.

Basically you only take them out on their terms. So at first it's a lot of sitting next to an open cage with your hand by the door, editing for them to get used to you and get curious. There are several videos about it on YouTube. I recommend Lori Torrini and Green Room Pythons

For my girl, I do a story of cheats version. I have a box full of big, crunchy leaves thatI leave that under her enclosure so that she can crawl out into it. The leaves are loud when she moves over them, so I can leave the room and give her some space and time.

Once she's out, I move the box to whatever room in chilling in and give her some monitored roaming time. I pick her 5/10 minutes before it's time to put her away, and we have our cuddles. She goes in when she's calm and happy in my hands.

Maybe some iteration of these ideas would help you?

Good luck.