Males' spurs are longer, and are used to stimulate the female during courtship. Ball pythons become sexually mature at about 5 years of age. Females breed every two to three years, after the cool season, usually December and January. Most shed their skins about a month before laying four to 10 eggs in a humid mammal burrow. The eggs' parchment-like shells stick together as they dry.
Most females eat little or nothing from the time they become gravid until their eggs hatch.
If incubation temperatures are too low, the young may die in the egg, or have birth defects or nongenetic color anomalies. They tend to fast and become inactive during the cool season when temperatures in their environment don't keep their bodies warm enough for food to digest. An Extra Sense Heat-seeking missiles of the natural world, ball pythons can easily hone in on prey in utter darkness. Along a ball python's upper jaws, several scales cup inward, each forming a deep pit containing nerves that sense infrared, or body heat. The snake can tell which direction warmth is coming from because the pits open at different angles, like an open fan of folded paper.