Force Feeding Ball Pythons

I just adopetd a ball python from a local pet shop who is severely malnourished from not eating. I would appreciate any help with the best ways to get him to eat on his own. Right now he was being fed only 1 fuzzy per week and is very skinny, so I know i can't increase his feeding too fast or it might overwhelm him. What works to get him to eat without adding too much stress?

I am a little curious in that you apparently have no concerns that force feeding (the topic of your thread) this snake will not unduly stress it or overwhelm it as you believe feeding it 'too fast' might do. Why do you believe it is necessary to force feed this snake? Even if it was only being force fed at the pet shop, it may well be willing to readily accept food items of the proper type, and size. I had a baby BP not eat in a six month period. It was eventually force fed about two or three fuzzies in that time in order to keep it alive. It remained very skinny, but otherwise in apparent good health. When it finally decided to eat. It readily took a small adult mouse despite being very skinny. One of the biggest problems I have experienced with people trying to feed baby BPs is that they try to feed them pinkies or fuzzies, and they show no or little inbterest in those food items, but would immediately take a small adult mouse or an older juvenile (about 3/4 adult size).

Also can you gan you give a detailed description of what you mean by extremely malnourished in the case of this particular BP? First you say that it is extremely malnourished then you say it is very skinny. While these conditions two can be complimentary they can also be contradictory to a good extent. Is the snake merely very skinny or is it actually extremely malnourished which possibly would be indicated by synptoms beyond just being skinny such as: extremely loose skin, areas with a sunken in appearance, listless behavior. Also, is it possible that this snake is dehydrated as well as undernourished?

He is extremely skinny, to the point where his back bone is very pronounced and you can just see the outline of his ribs. He is also not active at all and doesnot appear to have much strength. I do believe he is also dehydrated, and have been soaking him and making sure he has water to soak on his own if he wishes. I have also tried to get him to eat on his own in the short time I've had him. He does not even investigate a medium or small size mouse when offered one. I have 2 healthy ball pythons and this is deffinitely not a healthy one. I am simply looking for advice to get him to eventually eat on his own.

One thing that I do with SICK imports is to offer him food and if it does nto take it I leave it overnight. If it still refuses, I defrost a fresh fuzzy. With my hand I grip the two sides of his jaws and with my other hand I GENTLY push the fuzzy's head into the snakes mouth. I then move it around in there a bit. Sometimes while doing this the snake will close his jaw on it and begin to constrict/eat it on his own. IF this does not work I CAREFULLY place the head of the fuzzy into the throat of the snake and push the but until I can only see tips of the fuzzys arms out of the snakes neck. Keep im mind this is stressful and should only be done if the snake is not accepting food and WILL most likely die. If it is as week as you say it is, I would do this every two days until it gets some body weight, and consistently offer it food on its own. Also you might want to give the snake wormer in ONE of its fuzzys just in case. Please email me for further help at: sales@tripplehherps.com I would be more then glad to give you advice if needed.

I would try and rehydrated the little guy, that alone can lead to the demise of the animal. Some of the skelatel(sp) structure could be from lack of proper hydration in the animal also..

I have been soaking him twice a day, and trying to coax him to eat. So far it is going ok, but he still worries me.

Now that you have given some additional information, I would probably not hesitate to force feed this snake. You got some pretty decent advice from Triple H herps on this matter. One thing I would do differently with this particular snake from the info given by Triple H is that I would not feed this snake fuzzies. It sounds badly emaciated, and probably dehydrated. I would as you have offer it water, but then to force feed it, I would start with a slurry of mouse through a feeding tube. This would likely be easier for a snake in this shape to digest. If this is not feasible (I realize that pinky pumps and other tube feeding devices can be expensive) then try force feeding it pinkies at first. Give it one pinky and wait about 3 to 4 days, then give it another 2 or 3 pinkies. Then wait 4 to 5 days, then feed it a fuzzy in the manner described by Triple H Herps. Pinkies while smaller, are easier to digest for just that reason, and because they have no hair. I also somewhat disagree about waiting only 2 days between feedings for a snake in thie described condition, I think it better to wait longer to make sure the digestive process has been pretty much completed. Two days is not long enough to digest a fuzzy even in a healthy Ball Python, and forcing more food into the G/I system of such a sickly snake may cause further problems.

Furthermore be careful about giving such a weakened snake dewormer. I would probably do it myself, but you do need to consider certain things before doing so. Killing off any parasites can be beneficial as well as harmful in a weakened snake. Sure you do not want any parasites taking up most of the nutrients from the mice you feed to the snake, but nor do you want to kill off a large load of parasites that may themselves then begin to decay within the body tissues of such a weakened snake. Of course waiting longer could also cause more problems if it is a large parasite load. This is probably a good reason to call for a vet, since the snake in this poor a condition condition. I realize that calling a vet may not always be practical depending upon yur situation. If you cannot use a vet, I would recommend seeing if the snake is gaining weight after feeding it, before resorting to anti-parasitic meds. If it does not gain some weight after eating a couple of times, chances are it is parasite loaded (use a precise scale that can get down to 1 gram or smaller gradients). If that is the case you may want to try some anti parasite meds. If you do decide to use an anti-parasitic medication use one with as broad a spectrum as possible, and use one that can be tolerated well by the snake. Panacur is usualy a dewormer of my choice for many types of worms, and will kill off some other parasites. Of course this is just my non-veterinarinan lay person opinion; but you can get some good info from the book Understanding Reptile Parasites by Roger J. Klingenberg (pretty inexpensive book at that). The best thing to do before giving any anti-parasitic med is to get a fresh stool sample in for fecal float and fecal smear microscopic examinations.

As for rehydration, soaking the snake probably does little to rehydrate it. Drinking water and food items supplies most hydration for a snake. If the snake is not drinking it may need to be supplied with drinking water through a feeding tube.

I hope this was helpful and not too confusing since I somewhat disagree with Triple H Herps on this issue. In essence we do agree on the main point - getting nutrients into that snake as soon as possible.

Good luck.

Best regards,
GB

Once the snake is fairly filled out, I suggest to try feeding it a small adult live mouse - not a fuzzy or pinky.

Glenn you made some real good points that I did not think of until I read your post. I do agree on the hair issue with fuzzys, and the full digestion issue as well. Also the de-wormer I made sure to tell her in an email to make sure the snake actually has a parasite before loading him up with de-wormer. I also suggested something I thought might help. I said to inject the fuzzy/pinkie with warm unflavored pedialyte to help with hydrating the snake. Now this might not seem like much, however I thought that could possibly be a less stressful way of managing to partially hydrate the snake. Obviously not as efficient as the snake just drinking it or being tubed it. However im sure it would help with the digestion process if he had it in his system.
Thanks, for another perspective Glenn!

Thanks for all the advice. I do have an up date that is kindof encouraging. He did accept 2 rat pinkies that were only forced as far as the head entering the throat. He took them willingly from there. I cannot tell if he is drinking on his own, dince I have never seen him do this. I have no idea how to give him water through a tube, or ho much to give. What would I use to do this, and how do I tell when it is enough?

That is great that it ate. By the way that is called assist feeding, not force feeding, when the snake swallows it on its own after the food is placed into the mouth to the throat. Good job, better than force feeding any day.

As for giving it water, if it ate like this then it probably has had a drink on its own. If you are sure it has not had a drink, and I do mean you are sure, then in my opinion you can give it water through a tube. Again I am not a vet, just a hobbyist so take my advice for whatever you think it is worth. You would need a bird feeding/medicating syringe with a straight catheter that has an end that would fit over the conical end of the syringe. A cheap syringe can be had at a pet shop, they are made for feeding baby or ill birds, and they have an end (the so called needle end although there is no needle) that is a narrow cone shape. You snip off a bit of the end to open it, place the catheter over the end, and force water through it to the snake - first making sure all air is out of it and the syringe. The catheter tube is moistened and placed, rounded end first, down the throat of the snake to the stomach slowly and gently. Dispense the water with a steady gentle push on the syringe plunger. Once the plunger is depressed you can hold the catheter in place in the snake while removing it from the syringe. Hold the open end of the catheter up for a bit then slowly remove it from snake, and any left over water in the tube should go down into the snake. If you do not remove it from the syringe, before removing it from the snake, any water in tube will likely stay in the tube. This is a two person and very delicate job. One person needs to hold the snake the other to hold the catheter and syringe. This can be extremely dangerous for the animal if not done correctly (for instance if you place the catheter into the wind pipe by mistake, or if you force air into the snake, or if you use the wrong type of tube. It is best left to a vet or experienced herper if you have no experience with this method of hydration.

The amount of water depends upon size of the snake. Use just a little bit at first, what would amount to 1/2 a teaspoonful. Again I must point out this only should be done if you are absolutely certain the snake is extremely dehydrated and that the snake will not drink on its own. Since the snake ate the rat pups, I would suggest holding off on trying to rehydrate it, and I would be more careful in watching to see if it drinks on its own before trying this method. Take the water bowl out of the enclosure for about 2 or 3 days. Place it back; gently place the snake's snout into the water and see if it drinks. If so no need to try such an extreme method. Good luck.