| Care Sheet |
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Life Span: If cared for properly, a Ball Python can live up to 40 years. It’s like a cat, if you don’t care for it right (not get it fixed, let it outside in traffic, etc.) it might live for 5 years if you’re lucky. But if you keep it indoors, feed it correctly, give it good comfort, etc, then it could live for 17 years. This page covers care, so read on! Size: When a Ball Python hatches, it is about 10-17 inches long. It will grow by how much and how often you feed it. Adults get around 3.5-5 feet long, and about as thick as a coke can. They’re short and fat. When it comes to size, they’re the perfect snakes to get into the larger species. They’re like the smallest of the big snakes. Temperament: By nature, Ball Pythons are non-aggressive/passive. When scared, they curl up in a ‘ball’ rather than attack, hence their namesake. Usually they’re very docile and slow moving. There are the occasional ones that get aggressive when scared. Snakes get more aggressive as time goes on without handling. Generally, the more you handle a snake, the tamer it will be. When purchasing a Ball Python, look for a captive-bred specimen. Look for how they react when you’re picking out the one you want. Buy a tame newborn and raise it yourself if you want a life-long tame python. Ball Pythons are probably the best pythons for temperament. Feeding: Yes you have to feed snakes other animals… choke on it PETA, you can’t feed snakes salad. Generally the appropriate size animal to feed a snake is an animal that’s the same size as the thickest part of the snake. The more you feed it, the faster it will grow. A steady feeding would be once every 5-7 days, and as it gets older, every 2-3 weeks. Mice and rats are the cheapest and most common things to feed a Ball Python. If you’re a breeder and you hatch babies, try a live pinky or fuzzy mouse after the first shed. Once the snake starts eating, try to get it to eat from your fingers/tongs. Then try to feed it a frozen/thawed one from your fingers/tongs. If you buy an older Ball Python from a pet store or breeder, go backwards. Try a frozen/thawed from tongs, then a live from tongs, then a live in the cage at night (not more than an hour). Always try to get your snake feeding off of frozen/thawed. It lessens the risk of injury to your snake. Yes, as ‘scary’ and ‘lethal’ as snakes are, a puny rat can bite or kill your snake… have you seen their teeth? I’ve had a rat bite through a Burmese Python’s head, from the inside of his mouth to the top of the head. He lived, luckily. So, train your snake! Also, train yourself. Use tongs. Your snake will mistake your hand for food, guaranteed. Use gloves too if your snake has a good striking reach. Feeding is best at night; Ball Pythons are nocturnal. Also, no fast movements. You don’t want a distracted snake. Switch from feeding it mice to pinky rats as soon as possible. Rats are more heavily bodied and provide more food than fur. Caging: This will vary of course with the size of the snake, and whether you want your python to be a display snake or a breeder. When a snake is a baby, I don’t recommend that it be a display snake just yet. Start with a LOCKABLE 20-gallon aquarium tank with a heat pad under one third of the cage (Don’t use heat rocks; they will burn or kill your snake). Keep the temperatures about 85-90 on one side and 80-85 on the other. If it’s a screen top, tape tin foil or plastic wrap over it with little holes on each side (helps keep humidity and heat in). This cage will suit a Ball Python for quite some time. When it’s a baby, keep it in a shoebox sized Tupperware container (ventilated) and place it in the tank, one third of it over the heat pad. Use newspaper or newspaper mulch (it’s sterile) as bedding. Aspen is the best wood bedding in that it has no oils or scent than can harm a snake - cedar and pine should be avoided. Add a hide box as well, something easy and cheap like cutting up the cardboard box granola bars come in. Ball Pythons love to hide. Also, put in a little water dish. A small living space when your snake is a baby helps it feel secure and also makes it easier for the snake to begin feeding. It won’t have to go far or look around a big cage for food. Spray water inside the cage every day or every other day for humidity, just make sure there isn’t water condensing inside; mold will occur. Take out any poop or wet pee spots whenever you see it. Pythons are generally clean, so constant cage maintenance isn’t necessary. Once your snake is eating and growing, maybe put it in a larger Tupperware container or let it roam the 20-gallon. When the time is ready for the 20-gallon, you can put in a branch and other hide boxes. I use those recycled paper tree potters you can get at places like Home Depot (they look like tree bark, good for natural settings, and are also sterile). Add a water dish. Some people will say get a dish big enough for a snake to soak in, for fun or shedding, but I’ve noticed that snakes only soak if they have a mite problem or the humidity isn’t good enough. For humidity, just sprits the cage every now and then. For mites… well unfortunately this is a little harder to take care of. Most snakes from pet stores are going to have mites. Mites are like tiny black ticks. The best way to deal with mites is when you first buy your snake, soak it in warm water and try to pick off as many as you can. You’ll see them as raised scales. Also, spray your cages and Tupperware with Provent-a-Mite spray you can get at proproduts.com. Use only newspaper for now and yes, get a water dish big enough for your snake to soak in. Spray the cages every week, and change the newspaper often. I’ve had a lot of luck with this, although some people have pulled out all their leg hairs one by one trying to think of a way to deal with mites. After your snake is mite free, spray your cages once a month or so to prevent any new mite infestation. Once your snake is too big for the 20-gallon, get any cage you think will be big enough, be it a 4’ long X 1’ deep X 1.5’ tall, or 2’ x 2’ x 1’, or whatever you think will be enough. Now, if you’re just doing this for breeding and you’re going to have a lot of snakes around, buying $60-$100 display cages is a little insane. I suggest building or buying a shelving system first, and then buying appropriate sized Tupperware containers from Wal-Mart or the Dollar Store. Use heat tape you can get at a local reptile supply store, some assembly required. Again, same principles apply, heat on 1/3 of the cage, average 85 degrees, spray humidity, spray for mites, water dish, hide box, branch optional (Ball Pythons are terrestrial anyway). The heat tape should be hooked up to a dimmer switch to control the temperature. Light could just be a room’s light, 12 hours on 12 hours off. Individual lights could be added inside the cages on a timer, but sometimes pythons aren’t too bright and will wrap around it long enough to burn themselves. You can house 20 snakes for less than a hundred dollars. Go Tupperware! Handling: Do not handle after feeding. Chances are they’ll try to bite you if you try to reach in. They will still be in predator mode. Also, it will upset their newly expanded stomachs and make them regurgitate. Give them a day or two. After that, they can be handled whenever you want. Do not let them wrap around your neck. When they get bigger they might be able to strangle you. Do not pet and do not touch head. Snakes aren’t like normal pets. Snakes are meant to be held, not pet. Always support their body weight. Pythons are primitive and instinctual, living on two things: Can I eat it, or can it eat me? Once they know you don’t want to eat them, they will be ok to handle. When taking them out, don’t just open the cage and reach in. Open it, and let them see you. You can usually tell a snake’s temperament. You might want to use a snake hook. Also, constant handling will train the snake to not be afraid of you. Do not take them out and leave them alone in a room or in a hallway. When they’re out, always be there handling them in one way or another. The reason for this is that they will be comfortable once you leave, and if you return, they will see a creature looming over them and they will get scared and might strike at you out of fear or just be scared always. Snakes have bad eyesight, and won’t know it’s ‘you’. Also, Ball Pythons as with most snakes want to hide and will take any chance to get away. If a Ball Python gets loose and wedges itself somewhere, good luck getting them out. So, don’t ever let them out unattended. Always wash hands with soap before and after handling a snake. If you smell like another animal like one with hair, they will think you’re that food source and try to ‘eat’ you. Snakes might have bad eyesight but their sense of smell is awesome. Do not let your snake outside. Do not let your snake go on the grass or on outside ground whatsoever. Once bugs or parasites get on them, it’s very hard to get them off. Also, no fast movements. Snakes spook easily. In case of bite or constriction, run hot water over its face and it will let go immediately. Shedding: The shed cycle lasts about a week. You’ll see their eyes go cloudy and their color get dark. In this time, they can’t see which will scare them and might cause them to strike. The best thing to do in this time is leave them alone. Increase humidity in the cage or try to soak them in warm water for 20 minutes near the end of the cycle. Do not try to feed until after the shed. After they shed, if the skin doesn’t come off, soak them in warm water and help the skin off from head to tail. Make sure all the skin is removed, especially at the tip of the tail and the face. Try baby oil if the warm water doesn’t work. Breeding: Now, I haven’t gotten into this yet, so the most I’ll say is what I have planned. Breeding has as much to do with size as time. If you power-feed a male Ball Python, like two to three meals a week when he’s young, you can have it breeding size (750 gm) in 18 months. He might breed, then again he might not. At least he’s big enough to. Females on the other hand need to be about twice that weight and average won’t breed for 3 years… could be 2 years, could be 4 years. Make sure all are good and fat for winter, then lower the temperatures (68-78) and stop feeding them. Let them have a few weeks of cooling and not eating, then introduce them to each other. It’s best to keep them in for a few days, then away for a few days. Do this until you see them actively breeding. You’ll see them wrapping their tails around each other. After a couple months, put them back in their own cages and wait. And wait. Start warming them up but don’t feed the female. You should start seeing the female getting thicker and basking on the heat areas or under lights if you have them in the cage. Once she lays her eggs, try to remove them from her (she might get vicious at this time) and get them in 50/50 water/vermiculite Tupperware container with small air holes (pencil size). Do not turn eggs, even when taking them from the female. You’ll kill the egg. Build your own or buy an incubator and keep the temperatures at about 90 degrees with high humidity (not enough to make the eggs burst or water condensation). In about 60 days they’ll hatch. Truth be told though, I’d read other pages about breeding techniques. There’s a lot of information out there and a lot of breeders with different ideas. Take the general information, which is what I’m doing, and go with what sounds best. Diseases: I’ve only been involved with a few diseases that inflict my snakes. I already told you about my success with mites. Another is respiratory infection. You’ll hear the snake wheezing and mucus coming out its nose. If you want to treat it yourself, increase the heat to 85-90 degrees all over the cage and increase the humidity (not so much that it condenses on the inside) by spraying the cage often. Keep it this way for a long time. Respiratory infections can kill your snake. I’ve also had ‘fun’ with blister disease. This is when a cage gets too dirty and the belly of the snake develops long blisters on each scale. Now just for your information, the cages I have my snakes in are immaculately clean, so I was confused to why this happened. I was only using newspaper and this particular snake was only eating live rats. I put one in there and before the snake killed and ate it, the rat peed on the newspaper right over the heat pad and I didn’t know it. After eating the rat, the snake curled up over unsanitary condition and developed the blisters. Now, getting rid of the blisters takes someone who’s not squeamish. You might also need another person to help you. You’ll need peroxide, iodine, a small needle, and paper towels. You have to deal with each blister individually, and this can take a while when there’s twenty blisters. Wipe down the belly with the paper towel and iodine. Fill a small cup with peroxide. Dip the needle in the peroxide and prick a blister. Using a clean paper towel, squeeze and soak up the liquid. Dip the needle back in the peroxide and put it as far as you can in the hole without stabbing the snake. You want to get the peroxide in the blister. Squeeze what’s left in there out and move on to the next blister. Once you’ve done all the blisters, wipe down the belly with the iodine again and clean up. You might have to do this a few times. Turn off all under-cage heat but turn up any other kind of heat source, like a light, to 85-90 degrees. Keep the cage completely clean. The next time the snake sheds it should be cured. I did this with an adult snake. Babies will no doubt be harder and I recommend a vet. Blister disease and respiratory infections may need antibiotics. Now, these are situations I’ve dealt with. The best thing to always do is go to a vet. Have a vet ready before you ever get a snake. You should know, though, that most vets don’t do reptiles. Call around and find one before something bad happens so when that bad thing happens you’re ready. Also, call a reptile-specific pet store and ask questions. Search online for other information. Research, research, research! |
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