non-feeding solomon island ground boa

I have a minor problem with my lil girl.

My SI ground boa isnt feeding. I understand their metabolisms are somewhat slow and that they have the tendency to go off feed, however, my boa hasnt eatten since january, and it's now may.

I've offered a fuzzy mice and hopper rats to her once every 3 weeks without success. she has shown little to no interest.

She's currently in a rubbermaid "drawer" that has been converted nicely into an enclosure in my shelf rack. I'm using newspaper substrait for her, her temps are at about 83-85 deg over her uth (flexwatt) and about 80 in the cooler side. and her humidity holds at a nice 63%

Is there anything else I can do to get her feeding again other than resorting to force feeding? usually I have to throw mice n rats away after leaving them in her enclosure over night. Could it possibily be due to the fact that it's still cold in the mountainous region of ny that i live in? (the adirondacks to be exact)

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated. I have worked with this species before in the past but this is the first snake i have encountered that wont feed. She hasnt lost any weight or body mass.

Thanks!
Nora

Also i should add that she had a recent shed with no problems, about 3 weeks ago, and I have seen her soaking and drinking out of her water bowl on a regular basis. I am planning on taking her to see my doc soon and rule out any possibility of internal parasites.

Hey Nora. How old is she? If she's a newborn, she's not even big enough to take prey on her own. I had a baby back when I was about 9 and I still remember having to cut pinkie mice in half and force feed the pieces. You have to do this for awhile before they get big enough and catch on. They also commonly take anoles, but then you have to go through the whole switching over stage and scenting mice with dead anoles. Just skip that whole process and deal with the mouse guts for a few months. Let me know if you have any questions. Getting baby Solomons started is not something you ever forget, apparently Good luck. Ryan.

she's about 16 inches in length and close to 2 yrs old.

Her previous owner said she had eatten a week prior to my aquisition. n the nice pile of digested prey the following week was a good indication that she was eatting.. and she does relieve herself especially after i change her papers.

I cant get anoles anytime soon, but i do have a bottle of lizard scent, would that perhaps work?

Nora,
Is this an "established" animal...was it feeding for you prior to January? I am guessing that it is not a baby, from the food selections you mentioned - but there is a huge size discrepency between fuzzy mice and hopper rats (did you reverse things?). I will also guess that you are offering f/t, so back to the original thought - was it eating f/t before?

As Ryan mentioned, small lizards are often used to get these guys started - you can try scenting as an alternative (and decrease the likelihood of parasite transmission).

derr.. I did reverse it. make that hopper Mice & fuzzy rats.

When I got her back in january, her previous owner said she was eatting prekill every 21-28 days, but has been known to skip a meal or 2. (ok no big deal to me since I've had that same problem with ball pythons during the winter) I took her home and remember they guy saying she did eat the week before i bought her. So I gave her some time (about 10 days) to recooperate and get acclimated to her enclosure. and during that period she defecated. in her water no less. grrr.
i gave her a couple more days and offered a freshly killed hopper. no luck.. so i figured she's still "de-stressing" and gave her another week.. tried prekilled hopper again.. no bueno. Waited 2 weeks the 3rd time... tried a f/t fuzzy rat. she striked but let go and ignored the rat.now we're getting into february.. I called the owner again to let him know the deal and all he could say was that she was eatting fine, she's probably due for a shed. Low and behold, she was in shed. Ok so i let her do her thing, and gave her a few days after the shed came off and tried a pk fuzz rat. nothing again. now all this time she's still crusin around her tub, and drinkin n soaking in her water..

So since february ive been waiting every 1-2 weeks to attempt to feed her with no luck. being last week i offered her pinkie rats.

if your snake is 2 years old and only 16 inches long then it is probably a male for one thing . it probably has not been a regular eater for another . i have 2 males that are both 10 months old and they are 18 and 19 inches long . they are both just getting big enough to eat rat pinks as SI ground boas are a more slender snake . my female who is about 6 years old is about 3 1/2 feet long and eats small rats . females generally grow faster than males because they get much larger than them . a male will be full grown at between 2 1/2 and 3 feet . females can get to almost 5 feet . 16 inches would be very small even for a male at 2 feet .

this means that your snake is either an 06 that is under a year old , or if it's as old as you have been told , has only been eating enough to keep it alive . if it was eating regularly for 2 years it should be much larger than it is .

i would suggest trying a live mouse fuzzy . sometimes the movement of a live prey item will trigger the feeding response on these animals . put the snake and fuzzy in a box or deli cup that is small enough to keep them close to each other and leave them over night . if this doesnt work thentry scenting with the lizard maker but give it 4 or 5 days inbetween tries .

if it still wont eat , then you can either try force feeding or you could try an anole or a house gecko . i've found that they prefer house geckos to anoles . i had to start my males on house gecko tails when they were small and wean them to pinkies scented with house geckos and finally to plain pinkies . one of them i had to restart on house geckos and go thru the whole process again .

good luck on getting your critter going .

at the end of the first paragragh it should say small for a male at 2 years , not 2 feet .

the snake sexed female and she has no visible spurs vs the males ive seen.

when i get a chance tomorrow, i'll actually measure her. she could very well be longer than 16 inches if shes able to take hoppers. ive just never had to time to actually take a measuring tape out..

I have a trio of Solomon's and have had them from hatchlings. When my snakes go off of feed, I sometimes get a green tree frog, freeze it and use it for scenting mice. This has never failed to stimulate a feeding response.