Measure snake shed?

If you measure a fresh snake shed, how accurate/inaccurate of a measurement of your snakes length is it?

Ya, I wanna know too.

well someone do it and find out. Measure your shed and then measure your snake.

the shed comes off wet, then as it dries it shrinks. it will not give you a propper measurement of your snake.

I just got done watching Monty complete a full shed. It took him 30 minutes to complete. I immidiately took the shed out and measured it. It measured 45 inches. I will measure it again after it shrinks to see how much it shrinks. I will TRY to measure him tomorrow to see what his length is. The last couple of times I have tried to measure him he has been quite uncooperative.

Very interested to see what you find out Ironhead.

Well, my Mexican Black Kingsnake shed on Sunday. Immediately after he shed I measured it = 20 inches. I pulled it as straight as I could w/o tearing. Today (3 days later) I measured the shed again and it is the same length. I haven't gotten a chance to measure the snake to compare, but I'll try tomorrow.

Good to know. What were your results, Carl?

Measuring a snake's length by its shed is inaccurate. Skin shrinks when dry and expands when wet. I can easily stretch 6-8 inches more out of one of my ATB's sheds.

Measured his wet skin at 45 inches. Twenty four hours later it measures 42 and it is dry so I dont think it is going to shrink anymore. Now........How the heck do you measure a snake when it wont stay still? He is the most uncooperative snake I have ever dealt with. Monty and I played Red Light Green Light for a half hour last night while I tried to measure him. :lol: Needless to say, it never got done.

There's software that i believe is in the download area called snake measurer or something like that. Basically you get a digital photo of your snake from above with something of a known measurement in the pic (like a ruler). Then you open the pic in the program, draw a line on your known size item and tell the program how long it is, then draw a line down your snake, following the spine, and it will tell you how long the snake is. Obviously the photo needs to be as close as possible to directly above and must contain the entire snake.

Okay, my results are in. Immediately after shedding his skin was 20 inches stretched. 3 days later still measured 20 inches. I got a rough measurement of the snake today - 18 inches.

It would be interesting to see what results others come up with and if there is some kind of average difference between a shed and the actual measurement of the snake.

Definitely. If we could figure out a normal difference between full shed length and snake length, it will make good guesstimates of snake length so much easier to do. I've noticed sheds are more willing to cooperate than snakes.

I've used that program with the overhead picture. It's a good little program, but getting the exact right picture can be tricky if you've got an active (or really big!) snake on your hands. The next time Caesar sheds, I'll measure the shed and take a new overhead picture and compare the two numbers!

Use a string while handling, mark the string, measure string.

Unfortunately, the string method doesn't work so well for me. In fact, it doesn't work any better than a measuring tape, because the problem is more about getting the snake straight and starting the measuring (or ending it) at the nose instead of the neck. It's great in theory, though.

Sometimes you can use guestimate references. Like the other day, I was holding Caesar. I was sitting in a chair with my feet propped up on an ottoman, ankles crossed. He crawled along my crossed legs until he'd stretched out, his head went past my ankles and his tail was still up near my belt. After I put him back, I measured myself, from the belt to just past the ankles, trying to approximate where he'd been lying...and came up with 33". It's not exactly scientific...but I'll take what I can get with such a wiggly snake! LOL

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Smulkin

Use a string while handling, mark the string, measure string.

---

Thats what I do...takes a few times to get the hang of how to do it, but it is the easiest way in the long run...IMO anyway.

I've tried the string thing, but if your snake won't sit still, gets jumpy seeing the string or what lay out it's difficult. I've had the best luck (but it takes forever) with laying a towel on the floor, laying a tape measure down and let the snake crawl about. At least then he stretches out, but I have to be careful not to startle him moving the tape measure around (it's the kind seamstresses use - not the construction type). I was able to measure my Kingsnake this morning because he was slowly crawling about his rubbermaid tub and since I can see through it a bit I put the tape measure up to the tub as he was laid out. I think he knew I wanted a measurement and was proud to show me he's a growing boy!

Yep - since you don't have to try to get anything straight. I like the software too - cool stuff. We're still trying to get our mits on a digital scale to start tracking growth more accurately.

lay out 2 broomsticks, let the snake crawl between the 2
measure.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Wizill

lay out 2 broomsticks, let the snake crawl between the 2
measure.

---

This would probably work for smaller snakes....but if you have Burms you're outta luck LOL.

But my BP seems to know when I'm measuring him and won't crawl in anyway near a straight direction.

Tried the string method over and over again and failed every time. For some reason he thinks he has to coil around it.