Morzan and Homura - BRBs

Hi there,
Maybe a slight dehydration issue is keeping his weight from ticking upwards? As you know, BRB's need a high-humidity setup to keep them healthy. I see that you have moss in there, which looks nice, and definitely helps with humidity, but creates mold and a mess in the tank. A couple of suggestions I made to another poster last week can be found here:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...15#post2457415

Until I changed over to this method many years ago, it was hard to keep my BRB's and CRB's happy and healthy. I never once saw, or had a mold issue when using this method and it stays moist for many days. I would literally soak the moss, throw it in there, add some more water every few days. A $4 piece of Tupperware makes all the difference. Hoping for a healthier RB when you next post an update. Peace.

I am not sure how far you read into the thread, but he no longer has any moss in his tub. He's definitely not dehydrated, his body and excrements show no sign of dehydration, and he sheds quite well.

He's on a mixture of EcoEarth and mulch right now, and I just dump a small amount of water and mix it up. I feel the humidity is high enough in the tub he probably doesn't need a humid hide, but I can try it later. I have had mold issues with humid hides before, or they dried out within a day or two, so I try to keep the whole enclosure at a nice level instead.


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As an update, I attempted to feed Morzan at the beginning of a shed cycle, as I was worried 2+ weeks without food would be too long with the weight he's losing. Unfortunately, it looks like he wasn't able to maintain both a shed cycle and digestion, and regurged a few hours later. I waited to feed him a 3 gram fuzzy until after he shed, and he's kept it down, and it's been almost a week now. So, no more feeding while in shed however much I'm worried. I haven't weighed him again yet, either, to give him time after the most recent regurge.

I may be seeing things, but I swear he's grown some in length since getting him, too. Could just be the angles but he looks slightly bigger. Dave told me just to go slow with his feedings and feed him what he can get down, and once he puts some size on he may improve. So for now I'll feed him 3 gram fuzzies to help with the regurge and move him up slowly to see what size is the biggest he'll reliably keep down. He says he believes he should still get about adult size, maybe on the small end, but we'll see. It will take a lot longer than usual of course, and I will definitely not ever be breeding him if I ever consider breeding rainbows.

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Homura continues to do well, and she's due for another weighing soon. She should be getting ready to move up to medium adult mice soon, just need to get my latest litter up to size (I missexed a few mice and had a surprise litter).

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First, the good news. Homura is growing nicely, and her last weight came in at 189 grams vs her 123 grams back when I got her in March. I've also moved her up to small medium adult mice (in the 18-20 gram range), and I've decided to extend her feedings to every 10-12 days now instead of waiting for her to be put on jumbos. She's growing extremely fast and remains a nice girth, so I doubt she'll be hurt by the extra time.

These photos were taken about half a week ago, the last photo was the same month I got her.

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Now onto the bad news...

Morzan has been appearing to go downhill for a couple months now. He started out not regurging at all until I tried to move him up to hoppers too quickly. From there, I started him on 2 gram fuzzies for about 4-5 feedings, and moved him onto 3 gram fuzzies for abut 6-7 feedings. Then he regurged again on a shed cycle, and kept the next several meals down (3 gram fuzzies). I gave him a 4 gram fuzzy right after he kept 2 or 3 fuzzies down, thinking that maybe he's regurging in shed now because he doesn't have the energy to doth both in an attempt to get some more food in him. That ended up being right before his next shed cycle and he regurged again, 6-7 days after eating his 4 gram fuzzy. I offered him a 3 gram fuzzy once he shed and he regurged, too. So now we're at present day, where I'm waiting until the 21st to give him another 3 gram fuzzy mouse and see if he starts keeping meals down again. Once he sheds again, I will be offering another 4 gram fuzzy, assuming he keeps his meals down. I have also bumped his heat tape from 80F to 85F to see if maybe he's too cold, I've been told some individuals regurge if kept at normal temps. So, for now it's a waiting game to see if he recovers.

He also had a weird scale issue that cleared up once he shed, at the time it was hard to tell if it was a fungal infection or dehydration, or something else. I still have no clue what happened, he appeared (and still does) fully hydrated both physically and when he pooped. It did clear up after he shed so I'm hoping it was just a fluke. His scales looked like normal scales, just without the pigment. Only a couple at the far right of the affected area were a bit messed up and slightly discolored.

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(Normal poop with normal urates - if not a large urate.)

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Some better photos with a fluorescent light to help sharpen the image vs just using flash.

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He still comes out to explore at night and is still alive so I'm hoping for the best. When he last regurged, I was really worried because I picked him up and flipped him over to test his activity level and responsiveness, and it took several long moments to lift and turn his head to look at me. He never flipped over onto his belly. It really freaked me out, but since he's acting mostly normal since, I'm hoping once/if I start getting some food in him he'll perk back up. I'm unsure if I should attempt 5 gram fuzzies once/if he's keeping 4 grams down or remain with the 4 grams...I'll have to play it by ear. If he starts gaining back some weight, or even exceeding his original weight, I'll probably keep him on 4 grams, but I'm definitely not going to 6 grams for a long time. He came to me at 55 grams and is holding at about 50-51 grams.

I love how orange Homura is, i just love the colorations on brbs. Thats really distressing about Morzan, i was reading back in your thread and it said the breeder you got him from mentioned he had a feeding issue? But since you've had him for several months he has not gained any weight but may have lost a few grams?

Yeah when I was making payments on him the breeder told me about the regurge issues. I probably should have asked for a different snake but I really like the look of Picassos and didn't realize the severity of the issues at the time. I was also heartbroken over the death of his sister and wanted a sibling to replace her. I thought he'd be a little behind in growth and I'd just have to go slow with him. He was nearly half the size of Homura and required even smaller males than I thought.

I've had him over half a year now, and he was maintaining weight the first half or so of the time I've had him, up until I was worried about him not gaining even a gram in weight over several months. I tried to move him to hoppers but went too fast and he regurged, since then he's been getting miniscule meals of 2 and 3 gram fuzzy mice and with a life of eating small meals it seems to be weakening him. The next two meals he regurged were when he went into shed so I thought just don't feed him in shed and he'd be fine but then he regurged again.

Over 3-4 months of eating 2 and 3 gram fuzzies he lost 4-5 grams but is currently holding steady. I'm hoping if he starts holding meals down again and gets onto 4 gram fuzzies he will at least go back up to regular weight. Then I'll be giving him a looong time before I attempt 5 gram fuzzies. I don't think he'll be able to take 6 gram fuzzies for awhile.

I've had several people now tell me they've had issues with their Picassos too so I'm probably going to avoid the morph altogether in the future.


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As an update on Morzan, I waited the 2 weeks to feed him a 3 gram fuzzy, and he kept it down and pooped it out. Unfortunately, he's lost even more weight. Just over the 2 week period, he went from 51 grams to 44 grams. :( I've given him another fuzzy mouse and he's kept it down thus far. He should poop it out any time now, and then go into shed soon after if he's still going to be shedding once a month. For now, it's still just a waiting game and hopefully once he's on 4 gram fuzzies reliably he'll start improving rather than maintaining or declining.

Homura, on the other hand, continues to do well and weighed in at 193 grams last week. Her feeding day is a few days late as I've been sick over the weekend, but I plan on feeding her tonight.

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Homura looks great, she is really gorgeous, I love brb but tbh had always been a bit leery because I'd heard they were sort of touchy with feeding and humidity when they are young. I do hope Morzan turns around for you, crossing my fingers! Don't know anything about the morphs or issues with them but it does seem like this snake could have underlying issues causing a failure to thrive. I'm sure he is causing you a lot of worry, I would be a wreck in this situation. I have a hognose who was picky about eating when tiny and it caused me a lot of stress. She's a huge food pounding monster now though.

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Originally Posted by GoingPostal

Homura looks great, she is really gorgeous, I love brb but tbh had always been a bit leery because I'd heard they were sort of touchy with feeding and humidity when they are young. I do hope Morzan turns around for you, crossing my fingers! Don't know anything about the morphs or issues with them but it does seem like this snake could have underlying issues causing a failure to thrive. I'm sure he is causing you a lot of worry, I would be a wreck in this situation. I have a hognose who was picky about eating when tiny and it caused me a lot of stress. She's a huge food pounding monster now though.

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Yeah I had two people tell me they had problems with their Picasso stripe and a third person they knew did as well. I'm really starting to think it's just a problem with the morph. Whether it's inherent like a spider wobble or an inbreeding issue idk. For now I'm just going to avoid them in the future.

He seems to be the most extreme case I've ever seen. He's roughly 1.5 years old and currently about 1/4 the weight of Homura, who is only a month older at most. I'm hoping if he made it this far he has a chance to get better but it's really hard to tell. He definitely has me way worried than my ball python ever has.

The others aren't really all that bad. If you have experience maintaining high humidity (60-70%) it's just a small step up from that to get BRBs right. Feeding generally isn't more of a problem than any other snake, get their husbandry right and they feed rather reliably. None of my rainbows have ever refused food.


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Some more of Homura, no recent measurements, but she gets bigger by the day. Still in her gangly teenager phase, but once she's on jumbo mice/weaned rats she should put on girth if Sanji is anything to go off of.


I've been trying to get some sunlight shots by the windows, but the sky is always so dark from all the smoke lately all I have are these crummy flash photos, and they do not compliment her in the slightest. Just look at the flash vs sunlight photos throughout the thread. Gonna have to wait until spring. *sigh* In the meantime, we're all going to have to wish for rain because these fires are just ridiculous. They'd be easier to contain if everything wasn't so dry.


Some photos with light vs dark background to try to pinpoint her colors to no avail. At least in the second one you can still somewhat tell she's a nice vibrant hypo. lol


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