18week hatchling won't eat

[Joshua Donlen]

I know it's been asked and I have read previous threads without any success so any constructive advice is greatly appreciated.

Albino darwin,
18 weeks,
Shed+fed prior to pick up on 01/12/18,
Cage: 8.3L tub (approved size from breeder), only one side can be seen through which is covered by a towel 24/7,
Temp: On 24/7, sits at the 33.5°C, and around 55% humidity,

Recieved snake: 01/12/18
8 weeks old
Uninterested in food, smells and turns away.

13 weeks 07/01/19
Weekly unsuccessful feeds. Breeder unable to get snake to feed, failed multiple assist feeds, force fed x3 very small pinkie mice.

16 weeks 28/01/19
Tried feeding small pinkie mice. Snake struck muiltiple times but no feed.

18 weeks 05/02/19
Failed feeding, x2 failed assist feeding.

Cage is in spare room alone. Only foot traffic is me ironing my uniform. No loud sounds/games/music. Snake offered food at night. Frozen/thawed mice offered are 35°C+ confirmed with infrared thermometer. Mice have been wet/dry/moist/brained/scented. Long tongs used and only food visible (i stand off to side). Food left in hide (with snake in) and not taken. Snake not handled for almost 6 weeks. No shed since been with me. Picked up live mice and awaiting successful breeding (Approx. 21day gestation period) and will offer live pinkie.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[Herpetology]

Recieved snake: 01/12/18
8 weeks old
Uninterested in food, smells and turns away.

13 weeks 07/01/19
Weekly unsuccessful feeds. Breeder unable to get snake to feed, failed multiple assist feeds, force fed x3 very small pinkie mice

You force fed it after a month of not eating?
At 18mths it should be on ATLEAST adult mice, force feeding pinkies is not only useless, but dangerous to the snakes health (in my opinion force feeding should be a last resort as there could be a reason it’s not eating, and doesn’t want to waste energy on it, but you force it to anyway)

 

[Joshua Donlen]

You force fed it after a month of not eating?
At 18mths it should be on ATLEAST adult mice, force feeding pinkies is not only useless, but dangerous to the snakes health (in my opinion force feeding should be a last resort as there could be a reason it’s not eating, and doesn’t want to waste energy on it, but you force it to anyway)

The snake is 18weeks not months as mentioned above. It had been 7 weeks without a feed prior to the breeder having to force feed as the last resort. Multiple other techniques/changes used prior to force feeding.

 

[Herpetology]

The snake is 18weeks not months as mentioned above. It had been 7 weeks without a feed prior to the breeder having to force feed as the last resort. Multiple other techniques/changes used prior to force feeding.

My bad - was the snake eating fine before you received it?

My point still stands however that pinkies are useless for carpet pythons and they can start on hoppers from the day they hatch? Have u tried a hopper?

 

[Joshua Donlen]

All good,
The breeder said it had eaten and shed prior to my pick-up.
A hopper for sure? Would say the snake is max a $2 coin size (if that), not too big for it? Prior to me getting it was told was eating pinkies

 

[Wokka]

I would feed it a hopper mouse followed by a fuzzy rat whilst it is in a 'feeding frenzy'. It is expensive feeding morellia on mice only!

 

[Joshua Donlen]

I would feed it a hopper mouse followed by a fuzzy rat whilst it is in a 'feeding frenzy'. It is expensive feeding morellia on mice only!

Okay thanks, I'll try that.
Any particular reason you cn think of why it started on pinkies but refuses them now?

 

[Yellowtail]

I don't know how experienced the breeder is but as has been covered here feeding pinkies to a hatchling carpet is not a good idea, there is almost zero nutritional content in a pinky and importantly no skeleton, developed organs, skin and fur necessary for the food to pass through the digestive tract, the hatchling does not develop an attraction to the scent and probably finds pinkies unattractive and sickening to eat. Force feeding pinkies will only further turn the python off food that remotely smells or tastes like a pinky. A baby python will not grow and develop very well on a diet of pinkies even if it can be trained to eat them.
Is the tub a uniform 33.5c or is there a cool end?

 

[Pauls_Pythons]

Another thing you could try is day old quail.
I have good success with these when dealing with 'difficult' Diamonds.

 

[Sdaji]

I don't think pink mice are as nutritionally poor as some people say. They're probably not as good as older rodents but snakes still grow when eating them, so they have a lot more than zero nutritional value. In any case, Carpets do hatch too large for pink mice to be worth giving to them, and they do usually prefer to eat larger mice. If the snake was previously happily eating mice and is now refusing them, the problem is likely to be something about the environment it's in, or it's just not happy about the move. If the snake went from happily feeding to refusing, something has changed, and if the type of feed offered is the same it must be something else. Make sure everything about the environment, especially temperatures, is good. Sometimes it can just be that the snake didn't like being moved to a new place and will settle in time but it's now over a month so that doesn't seem likely, or a more enticing type of feed can encourage it to eat even if the environment isn't perfect. You've already tried a few scent tricks (not sure what you have scented with) so that's probably not likely to be the issue. Live might work, sometimes the problem is the method of presentation. This is a skill which just needs to be learned, and some snakes are more fearful of the presence of a large human than others. Even if you stand out of view, I'm sure you're opening the tub or cage and the snake is seeing a giant animal there immediately before the feed arrives, and some snakes react badly to this. Live feeding does deal with this problem, but most people prefer to persevere with other options.

Good luck!

 

[Stompsy]

I had 4 hatchy albino darwins last year who refused to eat pre-killed mice as they had only been fed on live ones. It took me 6 months to get all 4 eating consistently but I found the best way was to just drop the mice in the tub and walk away. I never handled them and only disturbed them for enclosure clean outs... eventually they all ate every feed and I have since moved them on.

Good luck! They can be stubborn little buggers!

 

[Herpetology]

Can someone explain the difference between live feeding and wiggling thawed food around the enclosure? I notice I get an amazing feed response if I drag a food item around the enclosure rather than just dropping it in or holding it in front of snakes face( usually get a lazy snake who doesn’t bother constricting or if it does it’s half arsed)

 

[Sdaji]

Can someone explain the difference between live feeding and wiggling thawed food around the enclosure? I notice I get an amazing feed response if I drag a food item around the enclosure rather than just dropping it in or holding it in front of snakes face( usually get a lazy snake who doesn’t bother constricting or if it does it’s half arsed)

There's an art to 'wiggling thawed food around'. To the untrained eye it may not look any different, but a talented snake feeder can often get a snake to immediately grab the feed even though an inexperienced or less talented keeper may spend a long time unable to get any response. Live animals obviously tend to move like live animals so generally trigger the natural feeding response. One thing which is difficult even for talented keepers to fully get around is the fact that if you're wiggling the dead rodent around, it's attached to forceps which are attached to a giant animal which can scare the snake and make it think it's a dangerous time to eat. There are various ways to be less conspicuous or threatening to the snake but it's difficult to completely eliminate. It's also possible to leave live prey in the dark, but wiggling a dead rodent around in the dark is generally difficult/impossible for a human.

 

[Joshua Donlen]

Still no feeding success, tried poultry without taking. Any other ideas or else I'm getting rid of it