Hello from Panama city beach Florida

[bulldog herp]

Hello everyone i have been creeping this forum for sometime and have gotten a lot of great ideas and advice. Here is a little bit about me i am 40 yrs old originally from Brooklyn Ny but traveled the west as a chef now i work for Sysco foods. when i was in high school i started breeding columbian boas and really enjoyed it i was learning from my biology teacher. Well after high school i really didn't have much time to breed or keep reptiles and i sort of forgot about it until about 4 months ago. since August i have accumulated 30 ball pythons a lot cam from kick balls some from bhp some from tsk. I really enjoy the prospect of having a few clutches in the summer. the reason i have decided to join the forum tonight is because i am about to loose my mind and i am getting very very frustrated. in 4 months i lost 2 snakes due to what i thought was respiratory infection. The first snake i was trying to cure it using home remedies well that didn't go to well. So here is the story of the second death and on. 4 snakes developed RI symptoms clicking, mucous elevated head while breathing took them right to the vet. My vet is an ex zoo owner and has a lot of experience with exotics. he said we will first try and treat this with Amakacin every three days, so every three days i brought them in $$$. On the last visit he said they look ok getting better i said yea they are improving the vet said when you get back from vacation bring them back and if the infection is not gone i will culture i said ok that is fair. 3 of the snakes did improve but my breeder female pastel passed away. Tomorrow would have been my last follow up visit. Ok so i check my other snakes and noticed that 3 or 4 more are coming down with the some thing so we are going to the vet tomorrow for immediate culture. I am going to list the things that are driving me crazy and i need to find what is happening i will also list my set up

ambiant temp 84 degrees
heat tape 88 degrees
herpstat 4
sanitizing solution f10
substrate aspen or paper towel
humidity about 44 percent
vision racks and tubs
feed comes from perfect prey

Ok now the craziness
The sick snakes get sick right after a shed all sick animals shed then got sick
all the snakes shed during medication treatment
the newest set of animals are not having breathing issues just mucous and stringy mouth no clicking. could this be because i found these early
sick animals are quarintiened
all sick snakes are water bowl soakers i use the water trays from vision so they are not truly soaking in water

Thanks guys and gals please let me know if you guys can help. I love this hobby but i don't want to kill animals needlesly

[Ax01]

oh man, how terrible.

have u separated your currently sick BP's from the ones that are fine? u might never know, it might not be too late to quarantine the sick.

also your 88 degree on the heat tape. is that on the heat tape, what your Herpstat probe reads or hot spot temp from inside the tub?

[bulldog herp]

yes the sick snakes are seperated and its the probe reading 88 degrees. I keep ambient temp at 84 degrees although i did boost ambient temp to 90 degrees. so i guess the heat tape is not really doing anything at this point. I am keeping it at 90 degrees for a few days. I checked one of the snakes a 400 gram mojave i believe i have been dealing with mouth rot and potentially not an RI. I have a culture scheduled for tomorrow my dilemma is do i culture all the sick or just one, i believe they all have the same thing

[AllThatInThemGenes]

you need to be able to accurately track both the hot spot (inside the tub over the heat supply) and the tstat prob. if they do have RI's raising the ambient temp is probably a good thing but 90 is too high IMO. Shoot for 92-93 hot spot and like 84-85 ambient. Good luck at the vet, keep us posted. Sorry to hear about your loss, I wish the best for you and your animals

[bulldog herp]

Today i brought in to the vet 3 of the 4 origanal snakes that where being treated with amakaycin the 4th one is the one that passed. I also brought in 2 new cases. Here is the good and bad

Of the 3 remaining snakes of the originals they are doing better, they where given one more shot of amakaycin, 1 of those 3 has developed a slight case of mouth rot i am fitting that with peroxide rinse and silverdine swab 1 of them ate a live rat pup and one is MEH but looks better.

The 2 new snakes i brought in i did 2 cultures $170 each culture and started them on amakaycin until the culture is done. i had an extra live rat pup so i tried to feed 1 of those 2 and she ate so that was good

dos anyone know if antibiotics will effect this female egg laying capabilities or kill sperm from the male, she locked up with 1 of my males 3 times 3 weeks ago

Thank you to the people who took time to answer i appreciate it. I will post the results of the culture on Friday

[Ax01]

is there a way u could determine where the sickness came from? u got 30 BP's over a relatively quick period of time. were there any patterns? do u think they came from any specific breeder, shipment, rack, etc?

if i were u, i would like to know the source of the illness as i'm sure this was alotta time and money invested.

[bulldog herp]

i believe the sick snake was brought in by underground reptiles it was a male black pastel. i received that snake thru fedex and when i opened the box the snake pooped in the bag and had a respiratory infection underground reptiles asked me to hold it for three days so i did but it was segregated. I will never buy from them again this was the second animal i bought from them that had issues. i should have just sent it back that day i may have touched that snake then others

[John1982]

Well after high school i really didn't have much time to breed or keep reptiles and i sort of forgot about it until about 4 months ago. since August i have accumulated 30 ball pythons a lot cam from kick balls some from bhp some from tsk. I really enjoy the prospect of having a few clutches in the summer. the reason i have decided to join the forum tonight is because i am about to loose my mind and i am getting very very frustrated. in 4 months i lost 2 snakes due to what i thought was respiratory infection.

That's a lot of snakes, in a short period of time, from several sources. I know you haven't been in the hobby for a while so you should look up proper quarantine practices. I'm not sure how you'd swing it with that many animals coming in so quickly - maybe a different zone for each source of your snakes.

dos anyone know if antibiotics will effect this female egg laying capabilities or kill sperm from the male, she locked up with 1 of my males 3 times 3 weeks ago

I would worry about getting the collection 100% healthy and problem free before breeding. Most folks wouldn't be interested in picking up anything from you if they knew you were having these issues. Might as well multiply that by 1000 until you determine the cause of these RIs, which are just as likely an underlying condition for something nastier.

[bulldog herp]

If i never sold an animal i really wouldn't care, i am committed to the hobby not the business end. But if i where to sell animals i would think that people would respect me as a reptile keeping committed to giving my animals the care they need, i just spent $1100 diagnosing and treating my pet snakes. 3 of the snakes where $75

[John1982]

If i never sold an animal i really wouldn't care, i am committed to the hobby not the business end. But if i where to sell animals i would think that people would respect me as a reptile keeping committed to giving my animals the care they need, i just spent $1100 diagnosing and treating my pet snakes. 3 of the snakes where $75

They would, and I definitely do, respect your spending the time and effort as any responsible pet owner should - though sadly few do. It's just common courtesy, whether a hobbyist or business oriented keeper, to put your collection on lockdown if there's a sickness running through. I'd personally treat it the same as a quarantine, nothing leaves until at least 3 months after a clean bill of health from the last sick serpent.