Hello,

So my BP has just one scale that's weird. It's one of the larger scales next to his belly, but not on his belly. It's a light brown color and it has a chip in it; it's a little flimsier than the others next to it. It doesn't smell and I don't think it's scale rot. He's had it since his last shed, which came off in three pieces. I know the humidity wasn't high enough, but PA winters are pretty arid and I did my best. His last shed was about 3.5 weeks ago but I thought the scale would have healed by now.

I know people ask a lot of questions regarding the snake and the habitat so here's all of the additional (perhaps superfluous) information of which I can think.

BP Stats: He's currently about 26 inches and we've had him for 10 months. Up until now, he's been perfectly healthy and in most cases happily active. We handle him nearly every day except feeding day and the day after. He eats one frozen/thawed adult mouse on Sundays. He doesn't seem bothered by this strange scale as far as I can tell.

Terrarium Stats: 40 gallon terrarium heated by day bulb and red night bulb, both UV basking 100 watts using ceramic lamps. At that point he was on Aspen on the cool side and Cypress mulch on the wet side. The heat is usually 85-90 degrees F on the warm and 75-80 on the cool. His humidity at the time of his last shed was about 25-35%. Since then, we've switched over to coconut fiber substrate for the entire terrarium. The heat's been the same and the humidity on the cool side is around 40% and 50% on the warm. We have his water dish on the warm side and the under the tank heater is partially under the water dish to help put off a little extra humidity. He has two hides, one on each side, and a basking tree branch under the day bulb on the warm side. He also has a small water dish on the cool side and a basking rock (not heated) on the cool side. Some hanging plastic plants, four gauges, clean water. He doesn't use the dish as a bathroom but also doesn't soak in it very much. Since we handle him so much, we pretty much see as soon as he goes to the bathroom and the waste and surrounding substrate are removed ASAP.

Does anyone know why just this one scale is messed up? I don't want to make a mountain out of a mole hill, but I don't want this escalating into something worse. Could it have been from the bad shed or is something else going on? If anyone has any ideas, I would be super grateful.

Thanks!