Vet Visit

We took Suki and Neph for their first check-ups on Saturday. Good news - they're both healthy animals except that they have worms. Administering the medication should be interesting. New news - Suki, who we thought was a female, is a male. Neph, who I thought was a male and Smulkin thought was a female, is in fact female. So I stink at determining gender in reptiles.

The vet is supposed to be experienced in reptile care, but he said a few things that confounded Smulkin and I. First - when he was examining Suki, he said his lung sounded good. I've read that BPs actually have two lungs. Second - he said that both snakes require UV lighting. All of my reading has said that BPs do not require UV lighting because they get all the calcium and vitamin D they require from their food. Is this an old way of thinking or a new one? Third - he suggested heating the enclosures from the outside using a regular space heater with a thermostat spliced into it and attached to the inside of the tank. Do any of you use this method?

I'd especially like to hear from some of you that have kept snakes for years and raised them to full maturity.

Your vet is an idiot. They all claim to be experienced in the field, pfft. But in reality they are trained for snakes, in general, and know little of the species.

First of all, your vet doesn't know boids very well. Boids are the most primative of all snakes, and thus have two lungs as opposed to one. The left is significantly smaller then the right, but still functions fully. Two, sorta.

Lizards such as anoles that are out during the day need UVB, and snakes and nocturnal lizards and geckos do not. I know there are a couple snakes that use UVB, but can't think of them off the top of my head.

As far as heating goes: who you gonna trust, a vet who knows next to nothing about your herp, or the peeps here who've kept them for years?

I had a vert tell me my male would get bigger then a female. Made me wonder...

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Originally Posted by The_Godfather

Your vet is an idiot.

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LOL - The lung remark tipped me off. Smulkin was convinced he didn't know what he was talking about right off the bat. Then when he started telling us how the enclosures should be heated, he lost Smulkin completely. Everything we've read in the past few months (The Ball Python Manual, Barron's book on Pythons, Reptiles Magazine [including an article on lighting], and everything we could find online) went against this guy's husbandry advice. The visit wasn't cheap, either, but at least we got some deworming medicine and found out whether we have males or females.

You can count it a lesson learned and look for another vet if possible. I hope he at least sexed them properly and calculated the parasite meds correctly.

:( That's it, Marla, give me something else to worry about. :wink:

He seemed to know what he was doing during the exam (other than the "lung" comment). It was his husbandry suggestions that made me wonder.

Damn, now I'm starting to wonder if my vet sexed Bongo correctly. He popped the hemipenes and pointed out two tiny greyish horn things that didn't look anything like what I've seen in books and on the net. No red whatsoever. He also said that the snake would probably reach 6 feet, which I know is rare in BPs, especially for a male. Who knows. I guess it pays to shop around for a truely knowledgeable BP vet.

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He also said that the snake would probably reach 6 feet, which I know is rare in BPs, especially for a male.
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WoW thats gonna be some monster Aaron! LOL :lol:

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Damn, now I'm starting to wonder if my vet sexed Bongo correctly. He popped the hemipenes

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Did he probe your animal or actually use the popping method. The most exact way to do it would be to probe. A herp DVM would and should always probe instead of pop.
Just a tip for everyone
Thanks
Rusty

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Originally Posted by beaglegod

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He also said that the snake would probably reach 6 feet, which I know is rare in BPs, especially for a male.
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WoW thats gonna be some monster Aaron! LOL :lol:

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LOL...yeah...a monster! But just think...you could start a new morph of Big Balls! Everyone is into breeding dwarf retics and burms....how about some Giant Balls?? :P

How hard is it to sex your bp? Do you really need a vet to do it? It would be cool to have a short video clip of a sexing that those who felt comfortable enough could learn the technique and not injure the animal. Nothing against vets, but it seems to be a fairly simple procedure and I'm one of those "what one man can do so can another" types. LOL, not that I'm saying we could all be freelance brainsurgeons.
Thoughts?

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Originally Posted by Smynx

:( That's it, Marla, give me something else to worry about. :wink:

He seemed to know what he was doing during the exam (other than the "lung" comment). It was his husbandry suggestions that made me wonder.

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Yeah, I just wouldn't necessarily count on his knowing the correct scale depth or using the correct probe size or popping the genitalia all the way out if he doesn't know enough about the species to know they have two lungs and don't need sunlight. If there's a herp group in your area you might be able to find someone else to double-check what he said.

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Originally Posted by Aaron

Damn, now I'm starting to wonder if my vet sexed Bongo correctly. He popped the hemipenes and pointed out two tiny greyish horn things that didn't look anything like what I've seen in books and on the net. No red whatsoever. He also said that the snake would probably reach 6 feet, which I know is rare in BPs, especially for a male. Who knows. I guess it pays to shop around for a truely knowledgeable BP vet.

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If you didn't see two reddish bulbs at the ends, then he either incompletely popped the snake or you have a girl. A good vet is definitely something we should all have, but unfortunately sometimes there's just no access to one close enough to be worthwhile.

I dunno man i have decent dexterity with my hands and fingers and all - I certainly think I could do it.

I just don't want my snakes remembering me as the guy who wanted to see how deep he could jam a metal rod into their gonads ;)

We gave our two bigger snakes the worm medicine last night - went off a lot easier than I had expected though 'Suki was really not too thrilled about having her head held and mouth opened for the syringe heh - a strong snake can be damn adamant about things like that. No more feeders from the crackhouse pet shop for us.

They can be quite adamant, can't they? Some will choose to be reluctantly compliant and some will just continue to fight for all they're worth.

Neph was reluctantly compliant, but Suki fought us. He's so strong! Smulkin had to hold him with both hands while I opened his mouth and administered the medication. But afterwards he calmed down immediately and let us hold him for a while, so I guess he wasn't too mad at us. :)

Once he figured out you didn't intend to eat him, I guess! :) Snyder tends to be reluctantly compliant, whereas Seymour tends to fight for all he's worth. I don't know about the rest yet.