new BP soaking in water for entire day.

hey there so I have this new BP (his name's Godric) that I adopted from what I now realize was extremely unfit conditions. he never had any humidity, his food was too small and not frequent enough, and his temperature was never high enough. despite all that he was always a well tempered snake in those days. So I've been paying attention to how he's been acting since aquiring him and changing his entire habitat. it often seems like he sticks to the cooler areas of his tank. I figured maybe he was used to cooler temps than what he was supposed to be getting so maybe that had something to do with it. either way he had the option to go to the other side where it's 90f. so anyway what I'm now concerned about is the fact that he's now spent about 20 hours soaking in his water. I looked it up and read that he might be about to shed. would staying in water this long be a possible sign of that?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rexfuzz

hey there so I have this new BP (his name's Godric) that I adopted from what I now realize was extremely unfit conditions. he never had any humidity, his food was too small and not frequent enough, and his temperature was never high enough. despite all that he was always a well tempered snake in those days. So I've been paying attention to how he's been acting since aquiring him and changing his entire habitat. it often seems like he sticks to the cooler areas of his tank. I figured maybe he was used to cooler temps than what he was supposed to be getting so maybe that had something to do with it. either way he had the option to go to the other side where it's 90f. so anyway what I'm now concerned about is the fact that he's now spent about 20 hours soaking in his water. I looked it up and read that he might be about to shed. would staying in water this long be a possible sign of that?

---

If he's soaking in the water it could be he's too hot or he may have mites. What are you using to measure heat? Do you have a thermostat on your heat source? What is the temperature on the cool side? I've never really heard of a ball python soaking itself before shed.
Good job on saving the little guy :)

Contrary to what most believe BP rarely soak and usually when they do there is reason and the only thing you can do is go by elimination.

They can soak for the following reasons

Mites, this is often the main reason.

Hides not providing enough security and using their water dish as hides.

To hot, the temperatures are not measure properly or measured where they should be and the animal is trying to escape the heat.

Too large of a meal, the animal soak to relief the pressure.

Some animal will soak when in shed but again it unusual.

Honestly I think it could be mites and humidity. Gonna get PaM ASAP and use as directed lol. also I'll be looking into a misting system.

Isn't there a little trick ... I saw somewhere that if you spray the snake with water then wipe it dry with some kitchen roll paper you can see little black dots / mites on the paper then if you crush them with a spoon or something you will see them burst into little red splatters.
That procedure only confirms they are present nothing else .

definitely worth giving it a try. thanks for the tip I'll look into that.

How and where in the cage are you measuring temperatures? How are you heating the cage and is it controlled by thermostat? If you're using an analog thermometer (instead of a indoor/outdoor digital with probe) and the heat source is unregulated, you're likely not getting correct readings and I would hazard a guess that your enclosure is way too hot. I personally think temperature is more likely the issue than mites, since the snake hadn't been soaking until recently and 20 hours is pretty prolonged.

I say turn the temps down a bit, just to be safe; too hot of temperatures will kill a reptile faster than too cool. If she leaves the water bowl after lowering the temps I think we know our problem. Do this and wait to see if she moves before putting her through the stress of mite treatment.