Advice for my BEL and her RI

So this poor snake is going through hell now. Her RI hasn't changed much after starting the TMS, but she seems to be having a reaction to the medication. She started out developing some black spots about the size of a pea all over her body that have now developed into swollen hives. The only explanation seems to be a reaction the the TMS so I'm taking her off it to see if the hives go away. She is still moving around, but looks miserable like the hives are causing her pain. If they don't start clearing up tomorrow my vet advised to give some Benadryl or to bring her back in.

Meanwhile, my other snake Tweak who I got at the same time as Wintre appears to have come down with the same RI. He's now on broad spectrum antibiotics as well. My T8 has become the snake infirmary.

Thankfully, all my other snakes are doing well and I'm making sure to keep the sick ones isolated and to not touch anything they come in contact with before working with my healthy ones. Hopefully things will start looking better for Wintre and Tweak.

That's odd. I've heard of Baytril causing reactions at the injection sites, but you said the TMS is administered orally, yes?

Yeah, she's had about 8 doses orally.

Bumping this thread back up since I never updated it.

So I stopped the TMS administration after her allergic reaction started and it went away on its own over the next week or two along with her wheezing and popping (just kept her temps up that whole time).

It's now been 6 months and she is acting normal and healthy (just found her wrapped around the water bowl even), but she still will drool a little bit clear fluid if her head gets below her body while being handled. I don't hear any popping and her breathing isn't labored at all. Is this normal? Should I be concerned? I was thinking of pairing her for breeding, but I'm worried that her drool will contain that bacteria that caused such a bad infection for her before. I'm thinking I want to go have that cultured one more time just to see.

Any input would be appreciated.

i'm glad she's doing better but that drool is a concern. is the drool watery? or does it have some viscosity? get the culture done. i think she should still be in QT until it's all sorted out and shes 100% strong.

Yeah, it's a light, watery drool. I opened her mouth and didn't notice any excessive mucus or anything. I was not so happy with my last vet, so I'm trying to find a new one who can take a look at her.

u live in the Bay? the famous Brian Gundy of For Goodness Snakes is in the South Bay and posts on the forum randomly and mostly likely knows a good herp vet. AbsoluteApril also lives in the area and would know. she's an Mod over at Fauna and posts here too.

good luck, keep us posted. i hope lil white noodles are in her future. :)

I got her an appointment to see a specialist Monday at UC Davis. Hopefully they can figure out what's going on.

So just an update on Wintre. We went to UC Davis Exotics clinic and she was examined and they did a cytology test of the fluid coming from her mouth.

Their initial observations are that her trachea seems clear and the fluid is coming from behind it; possibly from the esophagus. Since she is behaving and eating normally, it seems like RI is low on their suspicion scale. The issue is it's still a decent amount of fluid that's constantly in her mouth and is most likely the result of some sort of inflammation.

The next steps for the vet are to do blood work and x-rays to try and get a better idea of what's going on. This of course is going to cost another $500 and my fear is they will do it all it will all look normal. So far I've spent about $500 on Wintre at the vet and this will up it to $1000 overall, which is considerable if I don't get any results.

Otherwise, she is acting normally and has shed, pooped and eaten all within the last week. She also has been wrapping her water bowl recently when I have checked on her.

I'm about to make the appointment for the extra tests, but I'm very nervous I may just be wasting money.

Here's poor Wintre after a day of being shuttled around and harassed at the vet. Still pretty as ever:


https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/...2013.29.01.jpg