Make sure your animal is healthy! ... The overall health of your animal should be your primary concern if your snake is not eating. A sick animal will not eat. A check up by a veterinarian experienced in working with reptiles will ensure that your animal does not have a respiratory infection, worms, or other parasites that would cause him/her to refuse food. This is one of the most common reasons that a normal captive bred animal will not eat.

Eliminate stress! ... In my experience the number one reason that a captive bred ball python will not eat in captivity is stress. Stress in captive collections primarily comes from one of two sources ... incorrect temperatures or lack of adequate hides. Correct temperatures are soooo important for your ball python ... there is nothing more important to their well being. Make sure that your temps are where they are supposed to be and that you are using an accurate tool to measure them. Also, make sure that they are consistent ... temps that swing wildly throughout the day aren't good either even if they are for the most part spot on. A quality digital thermostat is an invaluable tool for providing your snake with the temps that it needs and every ball python owner should seriously consider investing in one.

Security (not the video surveillance kind) is the second thing that you can do to make sure your animal has what it needs to be stress free and eating. Small tight hides placed on both ends of the enclosure make the perfect places for your snake to hide out and feel safe. The hides should be small so that your animal can cram their body inside and feel something touch it's skin all over. The rule I like to use is that if you can fit your snake and a dime inside the hide together, the hide is probably too big ... toss the giant hides and give your snake someplace tiny and see if that makes a difference.

A couple of other things that I've learned over the years that help are to keep handling to a minimum. (once they're back on track, handlings fine ... but one thing at  a time) ... Also, a routine seems to be a very important aspect of ball python feeding ... feeding at the same time and day on a consistent and regular basis will help teach your animal how feeding "works" in his or her new home. Since ball pythons spend most of their time in a half asleep/ half awake "haze", just jamming a rodent in it's face when you feel like it isn't the most appealing thing in the world to them ... but if your snake is taught a regular routine (like every Tuesday at 9:00pm is feeding day), they will learn that that is the time to expect food and be ready for it. Now, I'm certainly not saying that your snake knows what  a "Tuesday" is or how to tell time, but they certainly have a sense of routine and the "rhythm" of life. Also, you might have to try different food items ... sometimes it takes a mouse if you're offering rats ... sometimes it might take a frozen thawed rodent if you're feeding pre-killed ... sometimes it might take a black rodent if you're feeding white ... don't be afraid to try different things and do what it takes to get your animal to eat.

This is certainly not a magic bullet for getting your animal to eat ... but in my opinion it's a good start and mostly common sense stuff that people don't think about when they're upset that their snake is not eating. There are probably a lot of other pieces of advice that work well too ... so use the internet, read books, and research ... you and your snake will get there!