The quarantine process

[Mochelem]

Im just curious what everybody's quarantine process is when you aquire new snakes. And how long do you keep them in QT?

[jglass38]

1. Separate room in a different area of the facility
2. Separate supplies including tongs, spray bottles, paper, etc.
3. 3 months quarantine. If there are animals in quarantine and I bring in new animals, the 3 months restart.
4. I treat the tubs for all new snakes with Provent A Mite and check each snake over thoroughly before putting them in.
5. If a live rat/mouse is uneaten by a quarantine animal it stays in the room to be offered again to the same animal. If a FT rat/mouse is refused, it is thrown out.

[rabernet]

To add to Jamie's procedures - I also work with the QT animals last. Established colony first, QT last. Once I've worked with QT animals, I don't go back to the established colony unless I have showered and changed clothes, but preferably not at all on the same day.

[Shadera]

I'm doing what's being done in the posts above, though I don't have a separate part of the facility, only a separate part of the house. I have 3 different Q areas, all cut off from the main house air supply system as best I can so that air isn't shared. Unfortunately, there's no such thing as a true quarantine when you're in a house, you just do the best you can. I take care of the established animals first, then move on down the line to the newest ones, changing clothes in between and scrubbing up any exposed skin both before and after. "Dirty" clothes go into plastic bags and straight to the washing machine. Quarantine period is 60 days here. I wouldn't hesitate to do 90 if the animal came from a questionable background or an iffy source. Physical and fecal exams will be done as soon as is possible, and before the animal is released into the main collection room.

I also do something similar when going to any place that has reptiles, such as a pet store or show, etc. All clothes go straight to the washer and I go right to the shower before getting near any of my animals. I also have a separate pair of shoes just for things like that, they're never brought into the house.

[frankykeno]

Im just curious what everybody's quarantine process is when you aquire new snakes. And how long do you keep them in QT?

What perfect timing! The staff was just discussing how we'd like to start this discussion, gather input from the experienced membership and then develop a sticky on quarantine procedures for the home hobbyist/small breeder. Thanks so much Mochelem for posting these questions and starting the ball rolling.

Here's what my family does as far as QT. We do have special considerations here because we do take in snakes to board/foster, do the occasional rescue, etc. We also keep a mixed collection of boas, pythons and colubrids which adds it's own issues in due to disease transmission with different snake species.

1. Established ball python collection first
2. Established boas and colubrid next
3. Snakes in QT last
4. Sit down, pour a coffee and wonder why in heck you have this many snakes!

Our QT is on another floor of the house, the snakes there have all their own equipment (big deal really...some tongs...prey containers...hand sanitizer, etc.). I store all their supplies (clean tubs ready for use, etc.) in a big walk-in upstairs not in our BP room downstairs. We don't share prey between QT and established collection snakes.

Nobody visiting gets to see or touch the snakes in QT, we don't even really encourage our children to go near those snakes - it's not like we don't have enough snakes they can mess with LOL. If you visit and want to see a snake currently in QT, you're welcome to return and visit once it leaves QT.

If another snake enters QT, then we reset the QT "clock" back to day 1 for every snake in there.

Every snake goes to QT first. I don't care if you are God and you breed ball pythons for fun and profit, your snake is going into QT.

All snakes in QT, no matter how many weeks they are there, do not leave QT until they are healthy and have eaten at least 4 consecutive times without any issues or problems. Even if they've reached the number of days in QT, if they aren't eating, they stay put till they are.

Once we learned of more about health issues with boas and pythons in mixed collections we permanently seperated them so they now exist in different rooms, on different levels in our home and are on different day handling times. We've been doing that seperation of species for a couple of years now.

We have a some basic rules in this house and if you want to handle a snake, you follow them to the letter. You touch the snakes, you go scrub well afterwards. If you own snakes, and any of your snakes are currently ill, you are welcome to visit but can't enter the BP room or handle any of our snakes.

If we visit a snake show or a pet store, we change and wash when we get home before handling anything in our collection. I carry gel hand sanitizer in my purse at every show to use between handling snakes from different tables (most tables offer it but I bring my own anyways).

Tubs/hides/water dishes aren't reused even between snakes in the same collection until they are soaked in 10% bleach water then scrubbed and rinsed.

For me QT isn't just about bringing a snake in, it's about a day to day routine really and for all it seems a lot when it's typed out, it really isn't. I'm a busy wife and mom with other pets and just under 50 snakes to manage. If it took huge chunks of time or required a degree in microbiology, I couldn't manage it. It doesn't and it's something anyone can do in a home situation. If you can't or won't bother, then perhaps it's time to rethink continuing to add snakes to your collection.

[kid_mustango02]

Wow, reading all of this makes me re-think my QT process. I'm surprised I have any snakes alive at all anymore!!!

Excellent info

[Mochelem]

I have done most of these things for my QT process, just not to the extent that was talked about above. I never thought about the feeding tongs that I use, I guess I need to pick some of those up!! Also I wash and disinfect my hands between QT but I never thought about my clothes!

Luckily Ive never had any problems, Ive been lucky enough to never have bought a sick snake, I have 2 new additions coming in the mail tommorrow and I just wanted to make sure Im doing enough to QT them..

Thx for all the input!!

[frankykeno]

Wow, reading all of this makes me re-think my QT process. I'm surprised I have any snakes alive at all anymore!!!

Excellent info

The thing with QT is sort of like me getting my kid's immunized. The likelihood that they will ever get exposed to a certain germ isn't great but the needles they get make sure that if they do, they are protected to the best of my ability. Same with QT. The risk of a specific germ might not be high, but if you have a good QT procedure or rules about how your collection is exposed to the potential of disease and parasites - the chances are more in your favor you'll never have to face any major issues. It's like preventative care really when you think about it.

I can tell you this, and people that know me and my husband, can attest to it. We have almost 50 snakes, we have taken in rescues, we have taken in snakes to board for other people - we have not had one vet visit for any of our snakes related to them getting sick while under our care, we have never one mite outbreak here, we have never had a snake die other than two very young captive hatched hatchlings under QT that were in bad shape when they came in.

I'm not tooting my own horn. I know tons of people on this forum with the same type of home hobbyist/breeder situation and the same healthy collections. It's just about routines (most of them very simple ones) and cutting down on risk factors so that the snakes stay healthy and you aren't dealing with sick snakes, huge vet bills and people scared to buy a snake from you.

[frankykeno]

I have done most of these things for my QT process, just not to the extent that was talked about above. I never thought about the feeding tongs that I use, I guess I need to pick some of those up!! Also I wash and disinfect my hands between QT but I never thought about my clothes!

Luckily Ive never had any problems, Ive been lucky enough to never have bought a sick snake, I have 2 new additions coming in the mail tommorrow and I just wanted to make sure Im doing enough to QT them..

Thx for all the input!!

Please never depend on luck. Eventually it will catch up with you and as seen far too often, the snakes will pay the ultimate and final price.

[West Coast Jungle]

Here are a couple of pics of a quarrantine setup I have going for 2 new arrivals. I have several Vision cages that used to be for my first few snakes, now that I have racks I use these cages for quarrantines in another room(my Office). I have the snakes in tubs in the Vision cage as you can see. What you cant see is a radiant heat panel in the ceiling of cage connected to a Ranco to keep ambient temps from getting to low in the Vision cage. The tubs are place on folded sheet metal thingys with heat tape for the hot spot(made by Freedom Breeder). In this setup there are two of those, only the rear one is controled by another Ranco for the hot spot and the front one is there just to keep it level. These are actually extra heating elements from my Freedom Breeder rack. The tubs and Vision cage have been treated with PAM so if one mite was to survive and escape the tub it would still get zapped in the cage. I like usung the Vison cages because I can control the enviroment perfect in the cage no matter how the rest of the room may flucuate.



Here is a close up inside the cage, you can see the metal heat strips on the bottom.


I am very anal about temps and humidity as you can see thats why I use several thermometers to double check accuracy of my T-Stats and the thermometers themselves. These new arrivals are still pretty small thus the smaller tubs. If they were larger animals the would be in larger tubs and/or separate Vision cages. They arrived together so thats why they are quarantined together(although in different tubs). These little guys are not gonna be breeding for a long time so there is no hurry to move them into the snake room until I am 100% sure they are clear of any yuckyness

As others mentioned these guys are only cleaned or fed after I have handled the main collection or on days I am not handling the main collection at all. Hand sanitizer is always used before and after touching quarrantines.