Ongoing health issues within BP collection

[Josleggett]

Hi, I have mainly joined the forum to reach out for help with an ongoing health issue I have with my ball python collection. If anyone has similar past experience with the symptoms described in this summary, I would be grateful to receive any advice. Further detail, photos, vets notes are available.
Thank you, Jos.

• In 2019 one of my ball pythons convulsed making a flatulent noise. This was followed by it firing a mess out of its rear end. The faeces had an obnoxious smell and were diarrheal, loose with clear mucus mixed with other bodily fluids. Any food matter was undigested and in the fur of the prey was undigested. Then another showed similar symptoms, and another, affecting 3/30 animals with symptoms sometimes including regurgitation as well as discharge, (from both ends).
• My initial thought was that I may have spiked their temperatures as I had to set the temp before leaving for work and there had been large variances during the day.
• I separated the affected animals and sought veterinary advice. The convulsions and discharge episodes persisted over a period of a few months and randomly occured every fortnight or so. Eventually, it seemed to calm down and the worst of the symptoms ceased.
• I am in my sixth season, all my husbandry parameters are spot on (temps, humidity) and I am stringent with hygiene procedures. They have their own room with a stable ambient temp of 24 degrees and housed in LP3 rack systems.
• I have invested much time, effort and money in seeking vetinary help but to little advantage. Advice often seems based on speculation without able to diagnose whether it be a bacterial infection, virus or any other disease. I had cultures taken, pooled and individual faecal samples sent off to the labs, I even had one snake euthanized and a post mortem conducted for the greater good of the collection.
• The history of faecal samples that have been sent off to the lab have all come back negative for all bacterial disease and viruses. A floatation done with a faecal sample back in 2019 showed up some nematode eggs. I treated this with metronidazole and fenbendazole. Around the same time a high level of yeast showed up in one of the animals. I used nystan to treat the individual. Other than that no other clear diagnoses have come from the vets.
• After the recent post mortem on one of my animals, the only thing identified was a complicated strain of Salmonella. I ran seven courses of antibiotics for the whole collection. However, though there may have been a slight improvement, I’m still seeing poo that’s pale in colour slightly loose and the tail end of the logs containing mostly undigested fur from its food source. History seems to show a pattern of a time gap of dormancy followed by flaring up again On the whole they all look great, 100% healthy and are all smashing their food. However whatever the sinister issue is has now taken over my entire collection. I know something still remains within the collection as none of their faeces look quite right
• Could it be a coccidian species playing havoc within the gut of the animals??? Could it be from a bad batch of food? Cryptosporidium keeps coming up as negative. Could it be Emeria or another salmonella species? Most snakes carry a certain level of salmonella right? Is it a gram+ Gram- imbalance in the gut? Or could it be a virus of some description that has got inside the stomach? A virus of some description could be possible as in the way it has spread through my entire collection
• So this is a last call for help! I will continue to try and find the right diagnosis and treatment, but if anybody knows of any similar circumstances or outcomes (or if you know someone who might), then please get in touch.