Royal Pythons or Ball Pythons as they are more commonly known are members of the Boidae family and originate from Western Africa; they are the smallest of the African Pythons. Though they can attain a length of six feet, in reality they rarely measure over five feet, the female being the larger of the two sexes. They are a robust snake, and in comparison to the main girth of their body they have a slender neck with a well defined head. One of the more noticeable features of their head being the heat sensing pits along their top lip which are used to hunt and target prey. In the wild they would normally live on a diet of gerbil like rodents, and can go many months without feeding due to their slow metabolism. They can live for twenty or more years, and I believe that ages of thirty five have been recorded in captivity. There are many colour morphs available, and more new ones being created almost on a daily basis mainly in the USA and Canada.

These beautiful snakes are generally very calm and are not inclined to bite, though there are exceptions to the rule, generally captive bred specimens are very well behaved and are more inclined to hiss at you, but will soon back down when lifted out of their home. One of these exceptions is usually down to keeper error if you forget to wash your hands after handling rodents of any kind, the smell of the rodent mixed with the heat of your hand is more than any snake can ignore.

Their needs are fairly simple, and once setup in their new home and acclimatised their care becomes a matter of changing their water on a daily basis, keeping their ambient temperature at around 80*f and a hot spot for warming their bellies at 92*f with about a 10*f drop at the cooler end of their house and their ambient humidity at around 50%-60%. It is best to use a heavy ceramic dog or cat bowl for their water, as they are incredibly strong and heavy and can easily tip their bowl over. When they go ‘in to blue’ which is usually the first sign that they are going to shed, their eyes become cloudy with an almost blue sheen to them, hence the term ‘in blue’ and their skin colour fades slightly, it is a good idea to raise their ambient humidity level to around 80%, this can be achieved by moving their water bowl nearer to the hot end, and also by spraying lightly with tepid water daily, this should help them to shed in one complete piece. I always examine the shed skin to make sure that their eye caps have also shed, and check that their eyes are clear and bright. This is always the best time to photograph snakes as their new skin is always at its best at this time.

There are many ways to house Royal/Ball Pythons, and the choice is usually a personal one, and is also governed by the number of pythons that you already have or plan to keep. If you are only planning on having 1 then a wooden vivarium is always a good display method as it can be decorated with many things. The most important thing to consider is the size, generally a young python will not like having a two foot vivarium unless it has plenty of tight fitting spaces to hide in, and they do like to hide, especially during the day, it is always a good idea with a habitat of this sort to invest in a lock for the glass doors, as snakes are very good at opening glass doors, whether intentionally or accidentally. You should provide them with the very least 3 hides, 1 in the cool end, one in the middle region and 1 in the hot end, that way they can choose where they are most comfortable. Aspen is a very good substrate for pythons as it holds humidity well, but care should be taken when feeding snakes on this in case they accidentally ingest pieces with their meal, one safeguard is to ensure that the prey item is dry before feeding to your python. The other option, which is the one that I use, is to house them in RUB’s (Really Useful Boxes) on a rack system. For all my young snakes I keep them in 9 Litre RUB’s until they are around 600g-700g, although it is usually best to go by the individual snake, as they may be heavy, but could still be short and may not appreciate the extra space. A 9 Litre box may seem very cramped, but this is how they feel more secure. Most of mine do not have hides in the RUB’s as the rack gives them the security that they require, I do however have 1 youngster currently who does, and this is placed in the warm end. All my pythons are housed on either newspaper or kitchen roll, as this makes cleaning much easier, and there are no concerns about ingestion of substrate, it does however mean keeping a closer eye on their humidity levels. When large enough to move to a larger home, they are moved up to 19 Litre RUB’s, and then 50 Litre Rubs as adults, exceptionally large adults are housed in IKEA Komplement boxes which are much larger. I use heat mats to provide belly heat, the mat is positioned underneath the outside of the box at one end, and should cover no more than half of the bottom of the box, with a vivarium it is necessary to place the heat mat inside the enclosure and tape it down firmly with tape, duct tape is a good choice for this, and then cover it over with either aspen or a thin piece of slate etc. Snakes are more than capable of burning their bellies if their hotspot is too hot so a thermostat to control their heating and temperature is not just essential it is imperative. I use Pulse Proportional Thermostats which are slightly more expensive to buy but are cheaper to run as they use a steady pulse of electric to keep the temperature stable rather than turning the flow of electric on and off, I also find that these are more accurate, but it is usually personal preference from keeper to keeper.

All of my Pythons are fed frozen, defrosted then warmed rats of one size or another, and it is very important to get the rat hot, as they don’t appreciate a cold dinner any more than we do. I always warm the rats in hot water to get the body temperature up to around about 80*f, and then blast the heads with a very hot hairdryer to make sure that the snakes sense the heat of the head first, and so far, this method hasn’t let me down. Royal/Ball pythons are famous for their ‘not eating’ antics, and everyone not matter how experienced has problems with a snake at some point or another. In the case of a new snake, they take time to acclimatise to their new surrounding, so don’t panic if your new snake doesn’t eat for a couple of weeks. Avoid handling as much as possible initially and just enter their home when necessary to change water or clean out, this will help to build the trust bond that you entering doesn’t mean something nasty happening to them. If you find that they still won’t eat try checking that their temperatures are correct and that their humidity levels are right, sometime something as small as a temperature or humidity gradient can be enough to put them off their dinner. The breeder that you acquired your python from should be able to help you further with suggestions, and good breeders are more than happy to do so as they want you and your python to be happy together, and many breeders are pure Python addicts first and foremost.

All of my collection of Royal/Ball Pythons are Captive Bred (CB), none are Wild Caught (WC) Long Term Captive (LTC) or Captive Farmed (CF), and I will hopefully have hatchlings of various morphs available in 2009.

I hope that this has given you a brief insight into the keeping of Royal/Ball Pythons, or if you are an experienced keeper hasn’t bored you too much. I did not set out writing this with the aim of writing a care sheet, and this should not be taken as such, it is purely a brief explanation into the general care of Royal/Ball Pythons. There are many good books and a wealth of information that can be found on the internet, and also through the forums that I have listed in my links section, that I use frequently myself.

You are never too old to learn, and you can never know everything!

Breeding hopefully in 2008/2009.

Ball Python Gallery