Accident with duct tape

This morning I woke up to a horrific sight. Arnie was stuck to the duct tape that had fallen down from the inside of the top. I now know vegtable oil would have removed the tape easier and prevented his skin from peeling away.
He seems fine thank God as I thought he was dead when I found the poor little guy. He has a section about a half inch long where his skin peeled off. I soaked him in some water and made sure there was no repti-bark in his wound. I was told of a sulfate cream that is used for burn victims to aid skin re generation and prevent infection I hope to get some today.
I have removed the repti-bark from his tank and am using newspaper for now.
I imagine injuries like this can happen in the wild from predators, however I am wondering if anyone has any suggestions on what to do for him. I hope he doesn't scar. When you look at the wound it looks like someone took a razor blade and sliced him open cleanly. I can see the muscle underneith.

I am so pissed at myself for not removing the tape from the inside after reading a post about someone's corn snake getting stuck to duct tape.
Going forward I am keeping duct tape on the outside of the screen top only, none on the inside.

Suggestions please on how to help him heal.

Can you post a pic of the wound? That might help people better understand how to help you

If the muscle is exposed, I'd think a trip to the vet might be in order. Failing that, a gauze wrapping to keep medicine applied to it in place, but I'd be hesitant to apply either the sulfate cream or the commonly used Neosporin directly to muscle tissue without consulting with a vet first.

I am at work and he is resting at home. I did call my vet who said this creme called sylvadene will help him so I will be getting some today.
She said to apply it twice a day after flushing the wound with warm water.

Here is a link with info on it http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/d...di/202521.html

I would put some neosporin to prevent infections and clean the wound daily with medical saline. Its very unfortunate that had to happen. Sometimes the humidity will cause the adhesive to break down.

But some neosporin would work great. Also clean and disinfect his cage before you put him back in there or clean it the first chance you get.

And take him to the vet right away or ASAP to get him some internal antibiotic.

This is exactly the reason why i use a combo of duct tape and plastic wrap to cover the top of the cage. All of these materials go on the outside of the screen as well, so theres no chance that amber comes into contact with any adhesive surfaces.

I'm glad you were able to intervene in time and I'm sure you'll take care of arnie's wounds.

I have no idea how long he was stuck, could have been all night. It was stuck to his jaw and side. I was able to remove the tape from his jaw without any damage but the skin on the side tore off.
I feel horrible and just want him to be ok.

I'm pretty sure he will be ok, I trip o the vet and proper care and he should live.

ConTac isn't that visciously sticky either and you can roll out a single piece no seams - cover the inside to prevent nose-rubs against the screen. Or if it has turned you off of adhesive completely you could either cut a form fittin glid from the (panacaea) plastic pegboard or just go for the tupperware approach.

Man I am sorry to hear that - I know how it must make you feel

I may get a specially cut piece of plexi glass to fit over the area, leaving room for the heat lamp. My vet thinks he will be fine based on my description of the wound. She thinks this anti-biotic creme will do the trick in healing the wound. I will take him there in a couple hours.
He was lucky as he could have died. No more adhesive inside of his cage ever.

I'm getting a rubbermaid setup, so I want have ot worry about adhesive.

I'd still take him to the Vet to be looked at just to make sure...better safe than sorry! Hope he gets better quickly!!

I will be leaving work soon to take him to the vet. He was lucky and I am so mad at myself for putting him through it all.
I will post some pics soon.

Do you think he will scar? I am hoping after a few sheds it won't be visable as it is a nice clean tear which hopefully will heal together smoothly.

Don't beat yourself over it but consider it a lesson for yourself and others. Thanks for sharing and I hope everything turns out alright.

That stinks that it happened to you but thank you for sharing so we all could learn from it! :)

one of my friends had this happen to his. i dont exactly know how it happened or how he solved it, but i know that when he peeled it off the scales came with it...

when i was using duct tape to cover my lid, i put aluminom foil under it to prevent this. but i have since then switced to using damp towels. i hope hes ok, im sure he will be. dont be to hardon yourself, things like this will happen. it sounds like your doing a good job of keeping the wound clean. just keep up the good work!

i hope

I hate screen lids. I have seen too many pet-shops who have lizards with scraped-open noses from rubbing on the screen.
I would strongly recommend cutting a sheet of plexiglass to fit into the notches snugly at the top of the tank. You can then use bungee cords to secure it. I do this with my male BP who lives in a 30-g long tank, and it works great for me.
When the scales peel off, showing muscle underneath, they will not grow back. A scar is always left. I had this happen when one of my bps shed and mysteriously, a few of his scales came off with he shed and now he has these two tiny places where scales were, that are just scaleless. Funny that happened too, because my humidity was high and the rest of the shed went great. :/

I'm so sorry to hear that. :( Poor little guy.

I took Arnie to the vet on Friday and it looks as though he will be fine. I am applying the anti-biotic creme twice a day and replaced the repti bark substrate with paper towls. My vet thinks he will heal just fine and after a few sheds should be good as new. I asked her if there would be any problems with scars and such and she said she has seen much worse and he will heal fine.
The scales were torn off exposing the flesh or muscle but I have been told he will heal. I hope what you are saying is not true in that there will be a lack of scales and regular looking snake skin. I will trust my vet and wait and see. I also asked a reptile expert in town who is the head of a reptile rescue and he said injuries like this happen all the time in the wild and he will heal just fine, especially with the aid of anti-biotics and skin re generation creme.

I am going to look into building a snake enclosure out of wood laminate.

I have learned a lot from this and am fortunate he did not die.

Or you could switch to a rubbermaid or sterilite enclosure. I am relieved that arnie is going to be ok. I have seen snakes with really bad wounds heal completely.

I hope so Gozetec, thanks for your kind words.
If I switch to the rubbermaid setup for now, I am wondering how a heatlamp works with this type of setup? I would like to see a picture of a setup with a heatlamp. I would think the lamp would melt the plastic.

The Do-It-Yourself Rubbermaid Housing has pictures of hat I believe. Very good ones in fact, and step-by-step instructions. :)

It has been a few days now since Arnie's "sticky" incident. he seems fine and moves about as he normally would. I have limited handling sessions to applying the antibiotic creme twice a day and that is it.
Two questions are on my mind.
1) Should I still feed him this Wednesday?
2) What can I expect when he heals fully? Will there be a major scar down his side where his skin was torn off or will things come back as they were? I have had so many different responses on this it is driving me nuts :roll:

I'm glad to hear he seems to be feeling better. I honestly don't think anyone can predict whether he'll have a scar or not. We're not vets and we haven't even seen a picture of how extensive the wound is. Chances are it will scar some...but that's just a guess on my part. And I would also guess that the scar will fade over time and multiple sheds.

As for feeding him on Wednesday....what did the vet say? Again, without having a real understanding of how the wound actually looks, it's hard to say if feeding him will hurt him or not. I suppose you could try and if he's not ready to eat, hopefully he'll just refuse it and no harm done. If you're feeding live though, I would NOT feed him because he'll be extra vulnerable to injury right now.

I will snap a few pics tonight after work and post them. I have switched him back to frozen - thawed so I will try this week and see if he is up to it.
I am going to make one of those Sterilte enclosures that was posted on here. When he gets much larger I will make a nice wood laminate style enclosure for better astetics.

I keep my duct tape on the outside/top of my screen lid. At first I put it on I put it inside, and then a coule of minutes later I saw a piece starting to hang down. I'm glad it happened because I then immediately moved the tape to the top. If it hadn't have happened I might have ended up with the same problem - it just didn't occur to me that the tape might come undone.

Best of luck to you and your BP!

I'm so sorry to hear that, but it seems he will heal just fine. Many people here seem to be ok with duct tape, so don't blame yourself. I had my corn snake get stuck to duct tape about a year ago, it took me three hours to get it off him (with warm water, didn't know about the vegetable oil me neither). He lost one scale only and it didn't even leave a scar. It was nevertheless a traumatic experience both for him and me, and I haven't used duct tape inside my snake enclosures ever since...

Didn't have a chance to take pics last night. I will do so this evening. I was so freaked out when I found him stuck that I didn't take as much time as I should have to free him. All I could think of is he must have been stuck for hours, all night perhaps. I wanted to free him quickly so I spent about 20 minutes removing the tape. He also was moving about a lot and he kept getting other sections of his body caught. It was very stressful getting him loose. I was successful at removing his lower jaw from the tape but one side took scales and skin with it.
I know he will recover just fine, but I will have to wait to see how he recovers cosmetically in the injured location.
Tomorrow I will feed him his weekly frozen-thawed mouse. I hope he eats it like usual.