RIP Victoria / Necropsy Photos

No issues that we knew of.
They were just giving us ideas over the phone without seeing her.

My phone is about to die. I'll reply to the PM here in a bit.

Thank you.

Sorry for the loss mate. Hope you never need the advice but in the future if you want to preserve an animal for a necropsy, you want to refrigerate but not freeze. Again sorry for your loss.

How long can you keep them cool before they start to get gross? It would have been days before we could have got her in somewhere.

Parasites would have made her sick, but not killed her so quickly without symptoms. IBD would have manifested with symptoms before the death. Boas are native carriers of the IBD virus, so they can hang on longer once symptoms begin. You would have seen stargazing, anorexia, body contortions, and a loss of strength and coordination before she passed.

An infection could possibly kill her in that time frame, as well as lead to the regurgitation and the intense pain that might prompt her to bite herself.

So I guess my first guess would be an infection, and it sounds like an infection of the ovaducts might be a good guess. But I would still get your other snake checked out.

My condolences. Beautiful snake. I hope your male continues to thrive. With your years of husbandry experience, you would have noticed something, or even had a hunch about a snake you know very well. I'm sure you gave her many years of health and vitality.

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Originally Posted by 3skulls

How long can you keep them cool before they start to get gross? It would have been days before we could have got her in somewhere.

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You can actually keep them well-preserved in a very cold fridge (not to the point of freezing) for quite a while. Not weeks, but the specimen should still be viable up to a week to 10 days or so. Not the most pleasant thing, but refridgeration won't damage cells like freezing will and the decomposition process is nearly halted for a short time at 35 degrees. Again, I am so sorry for your loss..... :(

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Originally Posted by meowmeowkazoo

Parasites would have made her sick, but not killed her so quickly without symptoms. IBD would have manifested with symptoms before the death. Boas are native carriers of the IBD virus, so they can hang on longer once symptoms begin. You would have seen stargazing, anorexia, body contortions, and a loss of strength and coordination before she passed.

An infection could possibly kill her in that time frame, as well as lead to the regurgitation and the intense pain that might prompt her to bite herself.

So I guess my first guess would be an infection, and it sounds like an infection of the ovaducts might be a good guess. But I would still get your other snake checked out.

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I should have got a better pic of the goo that came out of those lumps. To our untrained eyes, it didn't look healthy or like something that should have been there. Plus it was just on/in one of them.

I should have known better to freeze her. It was such a shock and we were running late for work. My first thought was to preserve her because I wouldn't have been able to get her anywhere that week.

We want to thank everyone again for the kind words and the help trying to figure something out.

If nothing else, I hope everyone here can gain some knowledge from her loss. I know I have.

Thanks everyone.

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Originally Posted by meowmeowkazoo

Parasites would have made her sick, but not killed her so quickly without symptoms. IBD would have manifested with symptoms before the death. Boas are native carriers of the IBD virus, so they can hang on longer once symptoms begin. You would have seen stargazing, anorexia, body contortions, and a loss of strength and coordination before she passed.

An infection could possibly kill her in that time frame, as well as lead to the regurgitation and the intense pain that might prompt her to bite herself.

So I guess my first guess would be an infection, and it sounds like an infection of the ovaducts might be a good guess. But I would still get your other snake checked out.

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they are increasingly thought of as being carriers or the natural reservoir (two different things) of IBD....they can also be asymptomatic as that is the criteria of being a carrier or reservoir of a pathogen. Therefore there is the chance that no symptoms of IBD would have shown themselves...

Not all parasites manifest with physical/outward symptoms....however more likely than not the necropsy and organs would show signs of parasites directly.

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Originally Posted by OsirisRa32

they are increasingly thought of as being carriers or the natural reservoir (two different things) of IBD....they can also be asymptomatic as that is the criteria of being a carrier or reservoir of a pathogen. Therefore there is the chance that no symptoms of IBD would have shown themselves...

Not all parasites manifest with physical/outward symptoms....however more likely than not the necropsy and organs would show signs of parasites directly.

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I can't think of any parasites that cause death without causing symptoms first, which ones were you thinking of?

And I've also never heard of IBD causing death without causing symptoms first. Boas can be asymptomatic, true, but they always present with symptoms before death.

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Originally Posted by meowmeowkazoo

I can't think of any parasites that cause death without causing symptoms first, which ones were you thinking of?

And I've also never heard of IBD causing death without causing symptoms first. Boas can be asymptomatic, true, but they always present with symptoms before death.

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Hmm...I have to check the lit on the symptoms before death...if the snake was previously asymptomatic.

Parasites are tricky...I'm more speaking about human pathogens and parasites... but a few that are known to cause no symptoms in humans are strongyloidosis, many species of whipworms and roundworms, and Entamoeba histolytica...Again sometimes even well known normally symptom triggering pathogens sometimes just don't cause external symptoms for the uncommon individual..human or otherwise. Some symptoms are so broad and general they are considered clinically insignificant...fever for instance.