weird feeding

[CantBeatALBINOS]

Hey all as you know when i first got my albino i had trouble gettin her to eat yes? Well cause she was in the enclosure i put her into her click-clack(right temps, right humidity, freash water and everything was mint!) But she wouldnt eat for two weeks in there so i put back into her enclosure and she just wouldnt strike the pinky mouse, like she showed heaps of intrest like flickering her tounge headbutting it but nothing so i left the pinkie in her enclosure right next to her and it was gone so waited day then fed another pinky, she did the same thing like no strike but ate overnight again when covered up. She's done this the last 5 times ive tried(hopefully 6 tomrrow night) except the time i tryed a velvet, she just left that but yeah i tried a pinky the next night and again gone by morning
My questions are, is she just a shy snake or do i just have to get used to feeding her like this? Is there a reason to her doing this? And is two pinkies a sufficent enough meal every 7 days for 5 and a half month old hatchy?
cheers in advance

 

[pythonmum]

She may be a shy feeder. I would give her larger food items. I start my albinos on fuzzy mice when they are newly hatched. By this time they are on hopper or weaner mice. The good news is that she is eating, so she will get there. If she wants to eat in private, let her!

 

[Marzzy]

Sounds like you may be stressing it by moving it all the time..... Some of my pythons take the food so gently from the ground or tongs not all strike. My hatchy jungle will almost eat in my hand not giving it that option though.

What's the temps ?
Makes it easier to tell what the problem might be. I've heard of albino Darwins not eating at 32 but bumping it up to 34 and eating anything and everything.

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

Sounds like you may be stressing it by moving it all the time.....

Ive only moved her twice.. She's been in the enclosure for a month and abit now untoched

and to pythonmum she wont eat velvets/fuzzies at all aye): the guy i got her off said he was feeding her them though..?
I do let her eat in peace though! I dont try to watch i just show her and place it next to her then cover it up

 

[Marzzy]

Ive only moved her twice.. She's been in the enclosure for a month and abit now untoched

and to pythonmum she wont eat velvets/fuzzies at all aye): the guy i got her off said he was feeding her them though..?
I do let her eat in peace though! I dont try to watch i just show her and place it next to her then cover it up

Awk sorry was hard to follow at work ATM on iPhone. What temps you got ? Cold and hot end ? Got a picture of the click clack ?

 

[pythonmum]

I usually give buyers some mice from the current batch that the snake is eating so that they can see the size and so there is no big difference for the snake. Having the food at the right temp (hot water thaw) is important. Sometimes cross scenting from other items in the bucket can change things for the hatchling, too. When my babies are young, everything is cross-scented with rat because I am feeding adults, too. This time of year the adults are not eating, so it's only mouse scent. Use the same thawing container all of the time and just rinse it out - no soap. This will help preserve the scents. If she was eating fuzzies for the breeder, give her some extra time to think about it (2 weeks won't hurt) and offer a fuzzy mouse at night. Sometimes they just have to get hungry. Is she coming up to a shed? That will put them off their food, too. Sloughing can occur every 4-6 weeks in rapidly growing youngsters.

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

I usually give buyers some mice from the current batch that the snake is eating so that they can see the size and so there is no big difference for the snake. Having the food at the right temp (hot water thaw) is important. Sometimes cross scenting from other items in the bucket can change things for the hatchling, too. When my babies are young, everything is cross-scented with rat because I am feeding adults, too. This time of year the adults are not eating, so it's only mouse scent. Use the same thawing container all of the time and just rinse it out - no soap. This will help preserve the scents. If she was eating fuzzies for the breeder, give her some extra time to think about it (2 weeks won't hurt) and offer a fuzzy mouse at night. Sometimes they just have to get hungry. Is she coming up to a shed? That will put them off their food, too. Sloughing can occur every 4-6 weeks in rapidly growing youngsters.

Well she's my only snake so im not feeding any others at the same time(just yet) but yeah sorry as i was reply my phone went flat, the temps are 33.5 oC at the hotspot and around the enclosure its 31-32 at the hot end and a min of 24 oC and the cold end and she shed on the 8th so it couldnt be that):
I think she is just fussy, i got told she was before i brought her but she's so beautiful i dont care if this is how she eats everytime i feed her!

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

And she's not in a click-clack, she was in one for two weeks and still wouldnt eat, even overnight covered up so i put her in the enclosure and she ate the first night back in that?/:

 

[Marzzy]

I'm out of ideas just might be a shy snake.

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

Thanks anyways marzzy

 

[Shay-Nik]

I have a hatchie, same age as yours and same breed. He eats hopper mice but after we move we are going to upgrade to weiners.

 

[wildthings]

Sounds like you may be stressing it by moving it all the time..... Some of my pythons take the food so gently from the ground or tongs not all strike. My hatchy jungle will almost eat in my hand not giving it that option though.

What's the temps ?
Makes it easier to tell what the problem might be. I've heard of albino Darwins not eating at 32 but bumping it up to 34 and eating anything and everything.

when I feed my jungle I bump up the temp two degrees 48 hours before feeding, I learnt this from a chap who owned a croc farm in WA.. a really long time ago now, but I've always done it and never really had any feeding problems

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

I have a hatchie, same age as yours and same breed. He eats hopper mice but after we move we are going to upgrade to weiners.

Hey shay mine wont eat anything bigger then a pinkie aye):
she is fairly big though, she was getting skinny as she didnt eat for about a month or more but now she is she's getting bigger my mate has a 10 or so month old bredli which is actaul smaller then mine/: so thats why i give her two pinkies but wait a full day before giving the second, is that good or does she need a bigger prey item as i think she should be eating?
Also if the mouse gets the tinyest bit wet she wont eat it, even if dried left in overnight and a pinkie/:

 

[ronhalling]

The trouble with Pinkies is they are really just a big puss sack with not very much nutritional value, they are a great starter food but the sooner you get your nackie onto bigger food items the sooner all it needs are met, fuzzies and weeners have bigger bone structure and more developed livers for Calcium and Vitamin D uptake even the fur is an aid to digestion, my 2 spotty juviniles took quite awhile to get eating pinkies and did not like being changed over to fuzzy mice and like you i tried everything in the beginning so in the end i did as pythonmum suggested and left it 2 weeks without food on both occasions, it worked like a charm both times, 2 weeks is nothing in the life of a snake (who can go months without eating) So try and do what pythonmum says, you have nothing to lose .......................................Ron

 

[alex92]

well as long as the snake is healthy and eating right? my baby coastals i think are pushing 5-6 months old, still very small snakes and when i got them they liked to be really fussy with the pinky mice and just stare at it, i did find that warming them up to something a bit hotter helped since it was normally the second mouse that had problems so it would have been a bit cooler. however i've bumped them up to pinky rats, honestly looked huge in comparison, i was questioning whether the little guys could even take it (figured if they can't they won't since in the wild they'd be confronted with all sizes and varieties to know what they can manage) anyway to cut long story short it was the best feeding response i've ever gotten from them, they snapped it up in seconds. i've read somewhere sometimes pythons in particular are greedy and prefer larger food items, i feel content with the upsized meals though and they've had no problems with it so far, within 2-3 days of feeding i can't even see a lump from the meal. not too sure about the comments on temperature, i live in cairns though it is getting fairly cool here and thought they'd need heat but i only occasionally catch them relaxing around the heat pad, they spend the rest of their time hiding in the boxes at the other end

 

[wildthings]

well as long as the snake is healthy and eating right? my baby coastals i think are pushing 5-6 months old, still very small snakes and when i got them they liked to be really fussy with the pinky mice and just stare at it, i did find that warming them up to something a bit hotter helped since it was normally the second mouse that had problems so it would have been a bit cooler. however i've bumped them up to pinky rats, honestly looked huge in comparison, i was questioning whether the little guys could even take it (figured if they can't they won't since in the wild they'd be confronted with all sizes and varieties to know what they can manage) anyway to cut long story short it was the best feeding response i've ever gotten from them, they snapped it up in seconds. i've read somewhere sometimes pythons in particular are greedy and prefer larger food items, i feel content with the upsized meals though and they've had no problems with it so far, within 2-3 days of feeding i can't even see a lump from the meal. not too sure about the comments on temperature, i live in cairns though it is getting fairly cool here and thought they'd need heat but i only occasionally catch them relaxing around the heat pad, they spend the rest of their time hiding in the boxes at the other end

Jeez my fat snake is the opposite, he hardly spends anytime in his box

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

The trouble with Pinkies is they are really just a big puss sack with not very much nutritional value, they are a great starter food but the sooner you get your nackie onto bigger food items the sooner all it needs are met, fuzzies and weeners have bigger bone structure and more developed livers for Calcium and Vitamin D uptake even the fur is an aid to digestion, my 2 spotty juviniles took quite awhile to get eating pinkies and did not like being changed over to fuzzy mice and like you i tried everything in the beginning so in the end i did as pythonmum suggested and left it 2 weeks without food on both occasions, it worked like a charm both times, 2 weeks is nothing in the life of a snake (who can go months without eating) So try and do what pythonmum says, you have nothing to lose .......................................Ron

Okay ron thanks heaps!
I will feed her her pinkie shes due for tonight and after that i'll wait to weeks and try to go up in meal size
As alex said should i try a pinkie rat or will that be that same with the nutriotion and i need to have something thats more mature and bigger at the same time? if that makes sence?


And thanks too alex, all help is appreciated!

 

[alex92]

i'd say a pinky rat is just a large pinky mouse as far as nutrition goes haha but like i mentioned before, came across something in the past mentioning that pythons have big eyes as far as meal size, if your snake hasn't been striking the food does that mean you've never had it go for a bite at you? mine become MODERATED as soon as they smell food, i pretty much move them to feeding tubs before even thawing the food so getting them out for feeding isn't a hassle haha. also wildthings i guess you're lucky if yours don't hide much haha, the only time i ever catch them out is when there's no light, guessing they're normally nocturnal or the young ones just have that nature when they're still small, if anything if they keep this up i'm thinking they won't end up with a bigger tank since they spend most their time all curled up haha, got them a nice glass one measuring 80x45x45 hoping they can live in it for a few years, might be more than a few years if they never move around haha since i've seen breeders keeping them in tiny tiny boxes

 

[CantBeatALBINOS]

i'd say a pinky rat is just a large pinky mouse as far as nutrition goes haha but like i mentioned before, came across something in the past mentioning that pythons have big eyes as far as meal size, if your snake hasn't been striking the food does that mean you've never had it go for a bite at you? mine become MODERATED as soon as they smell food, i pretty much move them to feeding tubs before even thawing the food so getting them out for feeding isn't a hassle haha. also wildthings i guess you're lucky if yours don't hide much haha, the only time i ever catch them out is when there's no light, guessing they're normally nocturnal or the young ones just have that nature when they're still small, if anything if they keep this up i'm thinking they won't end up with a bigger tank since they spend most their time all curled up haha, got them a nice glass one measuring 80x45x45 hoping they can live in it for a few years, might be more than a few years if they never move around haha since i've seen breeders keeping them in tiny tiny boxes

Yeah since she's been eating i have been handling regurlerly (three days after fed and maybe for 10 mins 3 hours before she's fed on feeding day) and never bitten me or went to or even like gone in.the strike pose, she is really placid and bitten me the day i got her before i put her in her home for settling and yeah thats it
And kapreece is in a 60x45x45cm enclosure and has three hides but i only ever see her in the hides the morning after she's eaten, other then that she moves round all day moving from side to side up the top haha then again my bedroom light has been off since she's been in her enclosure the second time so about a month and abit.. Haha is that okay? Like she gets abit of light from the window but the certains are never open fully cause i dont want her sunburned and i also dont want my bedroom light on just yet cause its fair bright.and i want her eating properly first if i can get her eating properly

 

[alex92]

i don't know what to think of the whole people say the sun is good for them thing, honestly i gave mine direct sunlight for a while when i first got them and i never saw them leave the hide, to this day the only time i ever see them moving around is night time, even if i have my room dark during the day they don't even seem to want to come out until night time, it's like they want the night time, not just darkness, then i've read recommendations on basking spots, they have a basking lamp and never expressed interest in that at all, even the warm spot above the heat mat is only used occasionally when i catch them out and about at night, they're interesting but i'm starting to think a lot of info i've found is kinda more from people that have snakes that take advantage of those things or bubblewrap their pets and believe those things to be necessary for the snakes survival, i don't know. although i could be wrong maybe and they're just happy as they are since cairns may naturally just give them the temperatures and humidities they like without the need for extras, i just got the heat mat to help them digest their food when the temperature drops