found this on another site and thought i might aswell post it up!, its bloody long but makes good reading

Royal Python
python regius

Royal pythons are some of the most popular snakes in captivity (They are also referred to by some as ball pythons due to their nature of rolling up into a ball when scared). Some people believe it is simply because of their small size. I however believe that it is simply because of their shy unoffending nature. They are a relatively small python rarely reaching over 6ft in length and more often reaching about 4ft. they are shy and docile in nature and rarely bite (however, there are always the exceptions). They have been reported to live up to 47 years of age however this is rare and more likely is 20-30 years in captivity. The majority of royal pythons sold in Pet shops are still wild caught (captive farmed is not as it sounds and basically large numbers of gravid females are collected and released after laying their eggs back into the wild) mainly due to their cheap availability (a typical importer can get them very cheaply each and sell them for much more to pet shops who then often sell them as captive bred). However, captive bred royals are always the best option for a few reasons, 
if you do not wish to fall into the typical wild caught non-feeding royal python trap but we will talk about this a little later.
Also if we support the people who do captive breed there royals it encourages more people to breed them in captivity and thus the demand for wild caught or captive bred is less
captive bred royals can be a real joy to own they rarely bite and if purchased young from a respected seller feed well and are good handlers. There small size and calm nature makes them the firm favourite with first time python owners. 
They are found in Africa and inhabit mainly arid grasslands with small woodlands. Royal pythons are however rarely found in dense woodland. They love to squeeze themselves into tree stumps and burrows. There natural substrate is leaf litter grass and dirt/sand. They are often found in cleared woodland between rocks and under fallen trees or rotted tree stumps. Often they are found some ways underground and can take some digging out to retrieve in the wild. (This can be a dangerous Job s many other animals including Monitors and venomous snakes are often in these same holes)
They feed on small rodents Jerboa and mice being there food of choice and they are exceptionally partial to striped or zebra mice, as they are otherwise known. They have in very rare circumstances (only when the hunger takes over) been known to eat other snakes but this is very rare indeed. One of the main problems with Wild caught royals is getting them to recognise white mice as a food source as no white mice are found as food for them in Africa therefore many find a darker coloured rodent is more successful with problem feeders.
Captive Breed or Wild Caught?
Wild caught Royal pythons are far too common considering the availability of Quality captive breed animals these days. There are unfortunately far too many people that are more concerned about saving money and it is still far cheaper to ship in 100’s of Wild caught royal pythons that to breed quality captive breed specimens. Unfortunately Wild caught Royals come with a hole bundle of problems of their own normally parasite ridden and far less handle able than there captive breed counter parts they are far less suitable as your Pet. The main problem with Wild caught royal pythons is there feeding habits they often have imprinted in them there preferred food of which you are unlikely to obtain Outside of Africa. This leads to them refusing to feed often to the point of their own death but more often to the point of the snake finding its way into a rescue centre or worse still simply abandoned. The wild caught royal python will also normally fast for long periods of time each year of which there captive breed counterparts are less likely to do. These fasting periods are very unnerving for the novice keepers who are often the owners of the Royal pythons Due to their reputation in the trade as a good beginners snake. I would suggest that there are Snakes that are far more suitable for the novice keeper and would only suggest the novice keeper to choose the Royal python as their first snake if they have a far more knowledgeable royal keeper at their disposal (there are many clubs and society’s that can not only recommend but put you into contact with reputable breeders who will be of great help when you decide a royal is for you). Unfortunately by the time the Royal python has been through its many month ordeal of being caught and shipped to your country they are normally dehydrated and very traumatized and thus are in little mood to feed. By this time they are also lacking the necessary gut bacteria to digest there food and as such it sits in their stomach until it rots then they die of septicaemia or other bacterial infections. To stop this from happening it is necessary and wise to place a pro-biotic enzyme into their drinking water that will repopulate there gut with bacteria therefore allowing them to digest there food. This will also help in getting the snake to feed in the first place, for without the gut bacteria the snake does not feel hungry and therefore will be less likely to eat with the bacteria the snakes system will tell it that it needs food and encourages the snake to eat. It is for these reasons I would always suggest Captive breed animals to any keeper thinking of getting a Royal python. With the captive breed animal, it lessens the chance of experiencing these problems. The small premium you will pay for captive breed snakes will make the whole experience far more rewarding for both you and the animal. 

Captive Conditions
To keep your Royal Python happy you will need to provide it with many things. 
1- Firstly a suitably sized Vivarium (not a fish tank). 
2- Then it will need suitable shelter or hides
3- It will also require its new home to be heated to its desired temperature
4- Cleaning and feeding as and when is required
The tank should be a minimum of 12”-8”-12” for a hatchling. Although I would recommend 12”x12”x12” and for an adult of about 5ft a Vivarium of 4ftx2ftx2ft should suffice (although I would not use a huge vivarium as in my experience this has more often than not lead to feeling of insecurity which will likely cause non feeding). I would advise against the use of fish tanks in favour of a wooden vivarium with adequate ventilation to aid in the dispersal of ammonia from the passing of uric acid. The reasons I would not use fish tanks are, that they do not aid the feeling of security in the way wooden viv's do, and thus will not help to get the your new snake to settle in. Also they are poor for ventilation unless you remove the glass end's and replace them with Perspex and drill suitable ventilation holes in them even then they are still more prone to respiratory infections in glass tanks and as Royal pythons do not require high humidity then there should be no concern about using the wooden Viv's. 
In this new home, it should be provided with suitable hides something to emulate what it would be in the wild such as a cork bark tube or half a hollow log. I recommend a hide that allows the snake to squeeze into it thus creating a feeling of security. I find it is better to have a hide that it just fits into than one that it sits in one corner of. I have recently found a very suitable hide from a bird shop it is simply a hollowed out log with and entrance on the front of the log and a section on top that has been cut and hinged on so you may get your royal out should you need to at some point for inspection and cleaning.
I use no light in my royal tanks as they are nocturnal and the light that comes into the room is sufficient. There has also been some concern among keepers that the UV tubes we use to simply light are viv's for nocturnal species are over the long term possibly causing blindness and as such are therefore detrimental to the health and well being of the snake. I therefore use ceramic heaters for my royals as this seems to be the best way of achieving their heating requirements. Without endangering them by using heat mats that, seem to be prone to cause many problems such as shorting out and starting fires or burning the snakes. All my heaters are always guarded because snakes are not really that smart when it comes to heat they will happily wrap themselves around something that would cause you or me to flinch and pull away from. This unfortunately leads to them very often finding their way to the vets with horrific burns. I have my royals heated as follows hot spot 92 warm end 88-90 and cool end 80 this has worked well for me and goes some way to emulate the temperatures they would have in the wild.
people more often than not use bark chips I however prefer to use news paper partly because I do not have access to leaf litter that would emulate there natural environment and partly because it is cheap clean and easy to maintain with the added benefit that it does not lead to worries over impactation. However, another good substrate is the compressed dried coconut bedding that is, now available this works well in that it can hold moisture when desired and be dry when desired it is also good in that it is very suitable for spot cleaning.
I feed my royals mice and rats depending on what takes their fancy. I dream of having access to striped mice and gerbils to feed them on however, if I had them feeding on these treats they would unlikely easily go back to plain old rats and mice. I feed my adults once every 2 weeks but never in a countdown fashion to ensure they stay healthy, I allow the feeding day to vary by 2-3 days; this also is adjusted according to the condition of the snake. I feed hatchlings every week again, I vary it slightly too hopefully avoid problems that can be associated by establishing a set routine. The general rule is not to feed anything thicker than the thickest part of the snake.
I do not handle my royals very often other than to asses there conditions and to check there weight. I find this helps avoid the common problem of royals refusing to feed because they have been over handled. If however you wish to handle your royal I would suggest you do not for the first 2 months of obtaining it and keep it brief when you do to allow it to settle in and acclimatize to its new habitat

Poor or Non-Feeders
This is all to a common thing for royals in captivity and normally I find it is down to incorrect husbandry. However, it is worth noting that royals will fast at different times of the year and thus weighing them and keeping feeding charts is very useful in assessing if they are simply fasting or if there is something wrong with your snake. However this could be down to illness or insecurity it is all too common for a royal to come to its new home eat a couple of times and then never eat again. Unfortunately there is still a large number of Wild Caught Royal Pythons in the trade instead of Quality captive breed stock and what you have to remember is that these snakes have been plucked out of there world and transported to a strange land and picked up and passed around like a trading card before ending up with you. This unfortunately means they may have parasites and or some form of illness from the ordeal. If you buy a wild caught Royal python I recommend you take it to the vet upon purchase to be checked out for parasites dehydration and or illness in general this will help in making it happier in its new home and hopefully easing the transition for both you and the snake. 


part 2 (was too big for one post!)

Good Husbandry Practices
1- Avoid excessive handling of the snake as this may lead to non feeding
2- Avoid changing the viv or location of the viv as this may lead to non feeding 
3- Do not offer hard to obtain food items like gerbils or striped mice unless absolutely necessary as this may lead to refusal of the normal prey items
4- Keep feeding charts along with weight records of your python to allow you to see patterns in its feeding and fasting habits 
5- Keep your Royal python in a room that allows daylight into its tank during daylight hours to aid in keeping its internal clock in check
6- Keep your python in a quite part of the house where it will not be constantly disturbed.
7- Try not to over feed your snake remember in the wild there meals do not come along every 7th day and they do not get 1or 2 of a certain size prey item every time they feed in the wild. A leaner snake is a healthier snake than obese one, which will only lead to an early death.

Getting the non-Feeder to feed
Well having already read the last section I will not go into parasites and illness. In this section, I will suggest ways you may tempt your snake into feeding. The most successful method I have of feeding snakes is to take the de-frosted rodent place it into an airtight bag and pop it into some very hot but not boiling water for a few minutes to allow it to defrost and to raise the temperature of the prey item. Then offer it to the snake with tongs and dangle it in front of the snake about 1-2 cm away from its face (care should be taken to not approach the snake head on take the rodent from the back of the neck and move towards the snake and away from the snake sideways so as not to confront the snake but to lure the snake after a retreating item as this is when wait and ambush predators most often like to strike) to allow it to sense the heat with its heat sensitive pits. More often than not, this gets a strike and then it continues to feed on the prey item. However, this does not always work and thus the next way is to expose the brain of the rodent this smells very appetizing to a snake and should provoke some interest. You can also snip off the whiskers of the prey item; sometimes the snake backs of and loses interest when it runs into the whiskers. 
My favoured method of to get the most reluctant feeders to feed is to place a heat matt or cable under one-third/one-half of a dark plastic storage box. Blue or black seem to work best, and to put an upturned flowerpot at each end with a hole in the top or side of it for entrance purposes. Then to place the snake into this for a week or so and then offer a warm prey item at the entrance to the hide or to remove the snake for a check up and while it is out to place a prey item into the hide it was in then return the snake to the box. You can also try scenting mice or rats with gerbils or gerbil bedding or likewise with lizard skin or another snakeskin. The last resort method is to use the dehydration method by this I mean to remove the water from the snake’s enclosure for a week. Then offer it a warm and very wet prey item more often than not this will have the effect of the snake eating the item for the water content and once they have started to eat, they normally will then eat again when they next should. Another thing to consider and often a thing commonly overlooked problem is with the snake refusing to feed, is due to its gut flora dying off (a snake will slow its metabolism down so it can go longer without eating to do this it reduces the production of gut bacteria used to digest its food). As such, you will need to repopulate this if the snake is to be encouraged to feed and digest its food properly. This is done by adding a pro-biotic to its water and is the most successful and easiest way to get the pro-biotic into the snakes system other ways reptiles do this in the Wild is by eating the faeces of other healthy reptiles which contains the correct bacteria to restart their own body’s digestive system. Even when not feeding the snake will still in most cases drink water and as such you have the opportunity to get some vitamins and beneficial bacteria into your snake without the need to force feed or tube feed the snake, which is often unnecessary and very traumatic. It should be noted the Stress from such traumatic events almost negates any benefit the animal will receive from digesting its food. Many Reptiles have died from when weak and emancipated being fed whole food items the strain this puts on there already weak system can often lead to death. 
The main reason for Royal pythons refusing to feed in captivity is insecurity. With a safe well laid out viv and the correct temperatures the snake is far more likely to feed. Another method is the pillow case method. This involves putting the snake with its prey into a pillowcase and tying the top up so that it is in close proximity to the prey item. A variation on this is to put it into a small plastic container with air holes inside the viv. An equally successful method is to replace your substrate with a dry grass leaf mixture and to place the prey in a small upon a small collection of leaves covered by a few leaves and some grass. The snake will be more inclined to believe it is on the hunt and has found its prey hiding thus strike constrict and eat it. You can then remove some of the substrate and feed it again at the normal interval continuing to remove the substrate more and more until it has all gone.
One thing that is important to make clear is Royal pythons are generally shy and timid snakes thus there captive husbandry should focus on this and what many People or organisations don’t seem to understand when they complain about cruel cramped Vivaria or containers is this is for the benefit of the snake not the detriment. Most people would rather have their royals in a well-lit display viv, however there snakes often would not fare to well in this environment. Therefore, it must be down to the good of the snake as it always should be that they are housed in snug fitting homes with plenty of cover and hides. This ensures there health and well being not because of some desire to sling a snake into a box and hide it away somewhere for the sake of being to cheap to provide a good home or not caring enough to give it a larger home as it grows larger.

wow thats a wall of text.

Can you not just provide the link to the site? So long as its not a forum its ok i believe.

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it isnt actually text on a site ur gonna have to d/l the text anyway so thought id just save people the hassle of downloading it! lol

i was thinking more about the formatting and making it easier for people to read.
Thanks though

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sure sure! how u do tht?

I Had A Royal It Was 6 Months And It Died And It Had A Bright Red Belly

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Snakes:
1.0.0 male red tailed boa
0.0.1 everglades rat snake
0.0.1 albino cali king (smiler)
1.0.0 male royal python (monty)

Lizards:
0.1.0 Beardy (flop)
1.1.0 Leos