Ball Python temperature and humidity

Question: "I am planning to buy a ball python at a reptile show next month. I think I have everything squared away, as far as the ball python habitat goes. I have the temperatures right, humidity and all of that stuff. My question pertains to handling the snake. How often I handle my ball python without stretching it out too much?"

That's a great question, and I'm glad you asked. When you first bring the snake home, your number-one priority is to let it settle in. I'm assuming you're going to put the snake in a car and drive it home with you. Think about how stressful this is for the ball python. It was transferred from the breeder's location to the reptile show. It was then put on display for hundreds of people to look at. Then it was put into your car and transported home, after which it was introduced to a completely new environment.

This can put a lot of stress on any reptile, and ball pythons in particular. These are shy and secretive snakes. So that kind of exposure can really disturb them. The trouble is, we can't really measure stress in reptiles. You can see the side effects of it, but you can't see the stress itself. So you have to be cautious and follow certain guidelines for handling.

The good news is that a healthy ball python will quickly recover from all of this travel and disruption. Which brings us to the question at hand. How often can I handle my ball python? I recommend that you wait until the snake eats its first meal before trying to handle it. After you bring it home, make sure it has fresh drinking water and appropriate cage temperatures. Then just leave it alone for a few days.

After a few days have passed, you can offer the snake its first meal. If it eats, you're in good shape. Then you can handle the ball python after it's had a couple of days to digest the meal. But if the snake doesn't eat the first meal you offer, it could mean one of two things. Either the snake is fasting, which ball pythons will sometimes do in the winter. Or it is still stressed out and hasn't adjusted to its environment. In either case, the best thing you can do is to make sure it has a proper habitat, and then offer another meal in a few days.

Remember, your first priority is to make sure the snake will eat in its new captive environment. Once you've accomplished that goal, you can begin to handle the snake on a regular basis.

So, how often can you handle a ball python without ill effect? Personally, I don't see any reason to handle a ball python more than once a week - or any other snake, for that matter. But I know some people just can't keep their hands off their pet snakes. So let's come up with a compromise. When your ball python is a hatchling or juvenile, you probably shouldn't handle it more than once a week.

When you think about how often you're going to feed the snake (and the fact that it needs a couple of days for digestion before handling), you can see that weekly handling is a good guideline. I don't see how you could handle the snake more than once a week, while still giving it a couple of days to digest each meal.