Adapt,...Improvise,...and Overcome.
Hey Vic,
Letting them get a bit hungry before you feed them, is sometimes a good insentive. Also keep cutting back on the amount of scent you apply. And you may need to rinse off the mouse scent too. If they refuse, just let'em sit with it, in the door of the hide, for an hour or two. Eventually they'll come around. Sometimes you can pull the old switcharoo with them, when feeding multiple prey items. Time, patience, and carefull attendance. At some point, they'll be ready to eat just about anything you poke in there. If the gold fish are a pain to get, and or keep, just freeze a couple in a bag. And as always, adapt to them and their needs, and they will thrive for you.
Flea was very picky to say the least. But I was way more stubborn, and or patient than he. Now he attacks anything that comes inside his cage, when hungry. I have to keep one hand on the door to keep him from shooting out of the cage! He's like a dawgawn land shark! When he first came to me, he did not eat at all for a little over a week.{{keep in mind that this was about May, and he was nearly a year old, and not in ecdysis.}} He had to be assist fed a goldfish, which he then swallowed on his own. Then the next goldfish he took on his own, when left alone, overnight with it. Then I got him to take from tongs, from inside his hide. Then he started taking them in the open from tongs. Then I started him on scented mouse pinks. Then after he graduated to unscented mouse fuzzies, I started him on mouse fuzzies, dipped in a mixture of egg, calcium supplement, B complex, and fish oil. All of which can be obtained at Wally-World. He is now growing at a phenomenal rate! Every time I show him to the wife, she thinks I've bought a new snake!!!
Hope this helps. Good to hear from you.
T.
