Heat tape malfunction. Hoping our girl isn't fried..

long story short because i'm on lunch break at work.. and worried.

half our collection is kept at my father's house. half at mine. i have racks with bigger tubs so the bigger animals stay with me. i go out to my dad's house once a week or so to check on the critters, usually on sunday. dad doesn't have a temperature gun, just an acurite thermometer with the probe taped to the center of the heat tape on the middle shelf so he can get a second reading on the temps. he always checks the temps on that, but not each individual shelf.

anyway, i went out there sunday to see them all and when i went to pull out our female queenspin i noticed she was REALLY warm and not acting right. her body was kinda limp and her motor skills were way off. she never showed very much of the spider wobble but now she's corkscrewing like crazy and if you look at her head close enough it seems to be twitching, or more so kind of vibrating sometimes. all the other shelves seemed to be fine, so i ran home real quick to grab my temperature gun. when i got back and checked the temperatures of the heat tape all the shelves seemed just about normal, but the bottom one was up to 120 degrees in some spots, then 2 inches over it would be 80 degrees. :( not sure how long she had been sittin that hot, but it could've been for a couple days seeing as my dad doesn't pull the snakes out every day, just pulls out the tubs to make sure they're all still alive.

i couldn't find too much information on snakes overheating via google or the search function here, granted i'm on my phone and couldn't search too hard. i've seen that overheating can cause "the wobble" in non spider animals and that's about it.. nobody says if this is permanent or not.. as of right now she doesn't even look like she would be coordinated enough to eat. :(i feel so bad. basically, does anyone know if this neurological damage from overheating is permanent or if she'll eventually get better..? or god forbid.. she might not make it..? :tears:

i have some video on my phone of me shooting the drastic temperature variance with the temp gun and some of her head "vibrating" and her horrible wobble now.. if i can figure out how to get it uploaded to the internet when i get home i'll try posting it.
i just hope she's gonna be ok.. :please:

bump for my girl. anyone..?

Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry! That sounds like a nightmare. Your poor girl. I know how awful that would be on just a normal animal, let alone such a valuable one...I have no experience with this kind of thing, but I would get her to a reptile specialist. Hopefully someone can chime in and be more informative...

Snakes overheating can cause brain/neurological damage....especially if they were overheated for long periods of time....as for its duration...my understanding is that it all depends on just how hot it actually got for the animal and the length of time that that particular temp was held at.

Heat Tape or Flexwatt? I was concerned about this after the switch was made and people started using the Heat Tape that is not UL listed. It sounds like neurological issues and my limited understanding is that you are going to have to get her safe with stable temps. With neuro issues, you are going to have to give her time, probably 1-6 months to fully recover to see if the damage is going to be permanent. With humans I usually give 6-12 months recommendation. Hopefully someone with more direct experience and advice will chime in soon.

That would be terrible to find. It is never easy when a pet gets injured. I hope that she will make a complete recovery, but unfortunately I don't have any experience with these sorts of things. Hoping for the best.

I have some experience with this. I had two different wicked temp spikes in my incubator. It caused birth defects in one clutch that had not hatched, and neurological symptoms in a second clutch that had all hatched.

The second clutch is the one that pertains more to this issue. There were 5 babies in the clutch, 2 pieds and three hets. All showed various amounts of neuro damage. From very minor to super extreme. Four of the five gradually lost their symptoms over the course of a few weeks. The fifth did not. He was the most severely affected, and his damage is permanent. His neurological damage is so extreme, he wobbles worse than 90% of spiders and will actually tie himself into knots which I have to untie physically as he cannot once he gets that way. I had to assist feed him at first, striking and coiling food was totally impossible for him, his nerves and muscles simply would not function to allow such coordinated movement, however as he got older he got stronger and adapted to his improperly functioning body and can now eat just fine on his own, though it can take him up to an hour to get enough control to strike and coil his prey.

Your girl may or may not be permanently damaged. Only time will tell. Once the heat is corrected, just give her time and as much peace and quiet as you can. But do try and move her where she can be visually inspected at least daily. In my experience, she will begin to improve slowly right away if she is going to improve. It will take a long time for her to recover, perhaps as long as a few months. For your sake I hope she does come back from it. But if she doesn't take comfort in the fact that she can still be a good pet if you help her along.

Gale

Gosh I hope your poor girl is alright.. I actually lost a het pied to a similar situation as yours, but the heat tape got so hot it actually caught on fire and smoked her :(

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Originally Posted by OsirisRa32

Snakes overheating can cause brain/neurological damage....especially if they were overheated for long periods of time....as for its duration...my understanding is that it all depends on just how hot it actually got for the animal and the length of time that that particular temp was held at.

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i know neurological damage was done. you can tell that just by looking at her. that was the first thing that came to mind. i've read horror stories of peoples thermostats failing and it frying their whole collection.. and some of the snakes that survived passed a few days later.. i was more so wondering if anyone had had experience with this and if their animal had gotten better over time. pretty much just looking for someone to give me hope. lol :/ doesn't look good though.. she's still alive as of tonight though.

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Originally Posted by angllady2

Your girl may or may not be permanently damaged. Only time will tell. Once the heat is corrected, just give her time and as much peace and quiet as you can. But do try and move her where she can be visually inspected at least daily. In my experience, she will begin to improve slowly right away if she is going to improve. It will take a long time for her to recover, perhaps as long as a few months. For your sake I hope she does come back from it. But if she doesn't take comfort in the fact that she can still be a good pet if you help her along.

Gale

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thank you SO much. this is exactly what i was hoping to hear. just some sort of good news i guess. or hope. seeing her like that is awful.. just another reason it's so important to check temps daily..

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Originally Posted by ewaldrep

Heat Tape or Flexwatt? I was concerned about this after the switch was made and people started using the Heat Tape that is not UL listed. It sounds like neurological issues and my limited understanding is that you are going to have to get her safe with stable temps. With neuro issues, you are going to have to give her time, probably 1-6 months to fully recover to see if the damage is going to be permanent. With humans I usually give 6-12 months recommendation. Hopefully someone with more direct experience and advice will chime in soon.

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flexwatt..

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Originally Posted by creepin

i know neurological damage was done. you can tell that just by looking at her. that was the first thing that came to mind. i've read horror stories of peoples thermostats failing and it frying their whole collection.. and some of the snakes that survived passed a few days later.. i was more so wondering if anyone had had experience with this and if their animal had gotten better over time. pretty much just looking for someone to give me hope. lol :/ doesn't look good though.. she's still alive as of tonight though.

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LOL sorry...I tend to be quite literal in my thought patterns and responses....no reason not to hope though Creepin...only time will tell...and if possible I would move her to your place for daily observation...If there is one thing I've learned with all my varying pets over the years...animals are incredibly resilient and able to overcome quite a bit with the TLC of their owners (had a Norwich Terrier survive a literally mauling by two 'coons).

well here is the video of her if anyone is interested in seeing how she's acting.. 1080p and full screen and you can see her head vibrating or "twitch" better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ftD-JPzkeA


as for a little update.. dad called and said when he checked on her this morning he found her laying completely upside down. :( he thought she was dead at first. maaan i'm hopin she gets better. i feel terrible for her..



and a little venting.. i went out to my dad's house on monday to double check the temps and check on our girl while he was at work. dad had gotten this rack through boaphile (it was one of the "rhinoraxx"). while i was out there, dad wanted me to give jeff at boaphile a call and ask him about the heat tape. i knew it wasn't jeff's fault our heat tape had malfunctioned, as we've had this rack for almost a year with no problems. i was just going to give him a shout and let him know what was going on and see if he had heard of this before.

as soon as i started trying to explain to him what was going on with the temperature variances he kept cutting me off and wouldn't let me talk. he asked me where the thermostat probe was and i told him it was taped on the heat tape on the middle shelf. he told me it needed to be on the bottom shelf, taped directly on the heat tape. he kept repeating over and over it needed to be DIRECTLY on the heat tape (i guess he was too busy interrupting me to hear i told him it WAS directly on the heat tape on the middle shelf). i started to try explaining to him that with my rack at home, friends racks i've helped with, and the recommendations of everyone on here, the middle shelf was the optimal place for a thermostat probe, and regardless of whether the probe was on the middle shelf or the bottom, that was no reason to cause a 30 degree temperature change from spot to spot on different shelves. i got about two words out and he interrupted me again with "just humor me. place the thermostat probe DIRECTLY on the heat tape on the bottom shelf right next to where the heat tape starts and call me back in 30 minutes."

i'm sorry, but when i have a $2,000 animal that has just been fried, i am in NO mood to humor you. i let you speak. show me the same respect and let me speak in return. i began the conversation completely friendly, but after being interrupted multiple times and talked down to as if i was ignorant, i'm sure a little bit of my frustration began to show through in my voice. we were always quite happy with our boaphile rack. it's nice and sturdy and has gotten the job done. but needless to say, after this little experience, we will not be returning customers. if there's one thing i've learned in sales, you kiss your customer's ass, or at the very least show them respect, especially if the products you're selling are hundreds of dollars. ali at animal plastics has always been overly friendly to me with any questions i've had, and that's the main reason i returned to her when i needed another cage, not that AP's products are necessarily far superior than others, but how you treat your customers goes a long way.

thanks for letting me vent. i feel much better now. ;)

it says "this video is private"

i forgot to mention in the video, this was after i had unplugged the heat tape and let it cool off and then plugged it back up and fooled around with thermostat placements for a few hours. i believe the heat tape had gotten much hotter throughout the bottom at some point when it had been running constantly.

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Originally Posted by NormanSnake

it says "this video is private"

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should be fixed now. first time uploading a video to youtube.

Poor girl...:( hope she makes a full recovery for you. She sure is pretty.

Hey man, sorry about your girl hope she'll be ok.

As for a somewhat similar incident, when I got my new boa at some point during shipping the heat pack fell off, so when I unboxed the heat pack was laying directly on top of him (he was in a bag) his tounge flicks were slow and he seemed a little off. When he was in his tub he would basically star gaze for a couple minutes at a time. He would do this off and on, I'm not sure how long it took until he quit doing it (got him in Feb.) but I know I haven't seen anything like it in a while and he seems completely normal now.

Of course some of his behaviors could've been from shipping, but as far as the star gazing I think it may have been neurological.

Good luck with your girl.

Did you try moving the probe?
Have other people heard of that? Where the probe should be closer to the end where the connections are?



Sorry this happened to you but maybe there is an important learning element for others.

I watched the video and from what I saw it looks like spider wobble, I have seen much worse on animals that lived long lives without issue. In my experience the wobble can increase with stress or excitability. What I would do is not use the space with the temperature spike. I know some folks who purposely won't use the bottom or top spots of their rack because of temp variations. The high temps may have stressed her a bit and exaggerated her wobble but I wouldn't say nuero damage. Once again I have seen much worse. I have also seen animals get burns from excessive heat without any nuero damage. What I saw was spider wobble, nothing else and I have seen several hundred spiders in my time.

Also as far as laying upside down, I have seen several spiders do this as well.

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Originally Posted by West Coast Jungle

I watched the video and from what I saw it looks like spider wobble, I have seen much worse on animals that lived long lives without issue. In my experience the wobble can increase with stress or excitability. What I would do is not use the space with the temperature spike. I know some folks who purposely won't use the bottom or top spots of their rack because of temp variations. The high temps may have stressed her a bit and exaggerated her wobble but I wouldn't say nuero damage. Once again I have seen much worse. I have also seen animals get burns from excessive heat without any nuero damage. What I saw was spider wobble, nothing else and I have seen several hundred spiders in my time.

Also as far as laying upside down, I have seen several spiders do this as well.

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i've caught my bee laying a little inverted before.. i see the spider wobble as well in her, but from what i could find online, overheating can cause the exact same symptoms as the spider wobble even in animals without spider in them..? i know spiders wobble can get worse or better after time, but she went from barely showing any wobble at all (except a little while feeding) to this in less than a week.. i wouldn't say i've seen several hundred in my time, just the three in my collection and the ones i've seen at shows and a couple friends'.. but none of them had the head "twitch" she has. is that common with spiders with bad wobbles?

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Originally Posted by MrLang

Did you try moving the probe?
Have other people heard of that? Where the probe should be closer to the end where the connections are?



Sorry this happened to you but maybe there is an important learning element for others.

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i did move the probe. tried it at several difference spots. ended up leaving it on the bottom shelf since that was the one that got so hot. temperatures seem to be holding much better now. we did order some new flexwatt just in case and have been monitoring the temperatures religiously. but no, i have not heard of other people saying to place the probe right next to the flexwatt connections, but that's what i was told to do. since the thermostat probes are directly on the shelf that spiked the temperatures seem to be more consistent.

I hope you and your snake make a full recovery. It takes a lot for you to relax again after an accident.

I would make a couple of proactive suggestions, for your piece of mind. I would suggest a fail safe thermostat. I always use one on a rack as it is so easy to move a probe. It would help in any case. I would place the failsafe probe in a different location. I use the top as it runs warmer than the rest. I have it set below a critical temp Personally mine is set to 100ºF as my room is cool anyway. Heat tape at 100º in my case produces 95º or so. This should prevent any reoccurrence.

Oh, she is absolutely gorgeous. Please keep us updated. This is going to sound crazy weird... But my snakesitter did a google search (are snakes ticklish) and came upon some stuff about massaging snakes. I haven't read any of it, but apparently stroking from behind the head to the tail with long firm strokes is good for them and they like it. I know massage really helps with discoordinate nerve firing in humans, I wonder if it might help with all that agonizing-to-watch body posturing.
Good luck, she really is a beautiful girl.

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Originally Posted by UltraViolet

Oh, she is absolutely gorgeous. Please keep us updated. This is going to sound crazy weird... But my snakesitter did a google search (are snakes ticklish) and came upon some stuff about massaging snakes. I haven't read any of it, but apparently stroking from behind the head to the tail with long firm strokes is good for them and they like it. I know massage really helps with discoordinate nerve firing in humans, I wonder if it might help with all that agonizing-to-watch body posturing.
Good luck, she really is a beautiful girl.

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Did someone let Mike know about this??? I didnt know you could massage ur snake either...

sent from my incubator

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Originally Posted by creepin

i've caught my bee laying a little inverted before.. i see the spider wobble as well in her, but from what i could find online, overheating can cause the exact same symptoms as the spider wobble even in animals without spider in them..? i know spiders wobble can get worse or better after time, but she went from barely showing any wobble at all (except a little while feeding) to this in less than a week.. i wouldn't say i've seen several hundred in my time, just the three in my collection and the ones i've seen at shows and a couple friends'.. but none of them had the head "twitch" she has. is that common with spiders with bad wobbles?

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While it's possible that it's extra spider wobble from stress, the only thing that would cause her to be stressed is the heat spike (doesn't look like anything else in her routine changed). And the abruptness of the change in behavior is alarming. IMO you're looking at neurological damage from heat spike, and she should be treated as such.

Good call on ordering new tape, looks like yours was defective which is very unfortunate, but I'm glad you caught it in time before it killed all of your snakes or burned down your dad's house.

Forgot to add: My bee likes to randomly flip onto his back about once a month and play dead, I think sometimes our snakes enjoy scaring the bejeezus out of us.

Any updates? How is she doing? I hope she's ok. :(

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Originally Posted by DooLittle

Any updates? How is she doing? I hope she's ok. :(

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still alive. according to my dad, he THINKS she looks a little better. my dad talked to one of his friends that's a vet that works with exotics and he said that usually when this happens, if the snake survives 48 hours they usually make it. she pooped yesterday so that's a good sign. refused her last feeding but that wasn't a surprise. just gonna be patient and hope she slowly returns to her normal self, or at least starts eatin on her own. i'll be goin out there tomorrow to pick up some rats and check on her so hopefully i'll be able to see a little improvement.

The video shows almost identical symptoms to my het pied boy, but where it is just her head and neck, his whole body is like that. That is, at least to my knowledge and experience, heat related damage, just like my het pied has. The good news is, her's is not so extreme that she should not be able to function normally given some time. If the damage is permanent, and it will take time before you know, once she adjust to how her body now functions, she should be just fine. There is even the possibility she may be able to breed eventually.

As best I can tell, with my admittedly limited experience, this is way harder for us to deal with than it is them. My Aries, the little het pied who is so badly damaged, is very strong willed. Even though his poor body won't obey him, he doesn't let it slow him down. The older he gets, the more he learns to adjust for the way his body works and the easier it becomes for him to do things. Granted, he never does anything that looks even remotely like something a "normal" ball python does, I firmly believe he does not see himself as handicapped. His fighting spirit and determination are so amazing to see. I know many people would put him down because he is so badly damaged, but how can i when he fights so hard?

Perhaps I can get my husband to take a little video of him, so you can see what I mean. Your girl has some brain damage, of that I am sure, but I don't think it will affect her much at all. Given a little time, she will overcome most of it, even if the symptoms don't improve on their own. Aries is testimony to that.

Gale

And this week? She still doing alright (all things considered)?

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Originally Posted by TheSnakeGeek

i wouldn't say i've seen several hundred in my time, just the three in my collection and the ones i've seen at shows and a couple friends'.. but none of them had the head "twitch" she has. is that common with spiders with bad wobbles?

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I got a spider in a trade recently who has no wobble at all but his head does do the "twitch" or "vibrating" that I saw in your video when it's feeding time and he's about to strike his meal so I would say it's probably common with the spider gene. Not saying that's what's wrong with your girl but the vibrating in and of itself for spider seems pretty normal.

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Originally Posted by Anya

And this week? She still doing alright (all things considered)?

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she's still alive. still hasn't eaten for us. her corkscrewing is still pretty bad, but it SEEMS the head "twitching" may be getting a little better (although it could just be me being overly hopeful too).

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Originally Posted by angllady2

As best I can tell, with my admittedly limited experience, this is way harder for us to deal with than it is them. My Aries, the little het pied who is so badly damaged, is very strong willed. Even though his poor body won't obey him, he doesn't let it slow him down. The older he gets, the more he learns to adjust for the way his body works and the easier it becomes for him to do things.

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do you feed live or f/t? she's always gotten live, but with her new disorientation i'm curious if she'd even be able to snag a live one. she still hasn't eaten for us yet when we've offered live. we've been offering her pretty small, slower rats. we'll try again when sunday comes around like we have been. this time if she doesn't take we might try the pre-kill route (as much as i hate doing it) and leaving it in with her over night.

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Originally Posted by angllady2

Perhaps I can get my husband to take a little video of him, so you can see what I mean. Your girl has some brain damage, of that I am sure, but I don't think it will affect her much at all. Given a little time, she will overcome most of it, even if the symptoms don't improve on their own. Aries is testimony to that.

Gale

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that would be awesome! thank you so much for the info. i knew someone here would have some (unfortunate) experience with something like this.

My Aries gets live. He's on mice right now, mostly because of convenience. Sometimes he's all over that mouse the second it hits the tub. Sometimes he'll miss four or five, even six times. He'll get disgusted and cranky, then he takes his time, get's his body the way he needs it to be, makes sure of his mark, and then bam! no more mouse.

It will undoubtedly take her some time to get adjusted to how her body works now, but don't give up on her. You may even try skipping this weeks offering, and then maybe next week she'll be in a better position to try again.

My husband said he'll try and help me get a video tonight when he gets home.

Gale

just an update. she shed last night! which is a good thing it feels like.. she still hasn't eaten for us yet, but she hasn't really lost any weight. still waiting..

I'm glad she's at least not worse! How's her behavior?

still uncoordinated and corkscrewing, but some people i've talked to have said they've seen spiders with worse corkscrewing than her that went on to live healthy lives and grew up fine, so i'm hopeful.