HELP with my new BP

First of all hello everyone.


10 days ago me and my wifey bought another BP. This time high white piebald male. It's not the first snake but it is the first one I'm experiencing problems with.


The first thing that bothers me, it seems like he's not interested or just has no idea on how to shed. He shedded like a week from when he was bought. It was a totally bad shed. Most of the old skin is/was still left on him. Only on belly it was removed by slithering around his terrarium. I have no idea why he was like that. My other snake are vicious when it comes to rubbing their old skin, but not this one, like he wasn't even interested or bothered with shedding itself. We soaked him in a lukewarm water and managed to gently rub out most of the bad shed, except around his head that we didn't have will to molest him any more. He has some bad shed stuck on his left side over one eye top half of head and some neck. The temperatures and humidity was about right the whole time. 90-92F hotspot and 70-74% of humidity. That always worked with other snakes. Mainly no bad sheds. Is it possible that snake doesn't know how to shed? Can I do something about that? I've helped him as much it was possible and I was allowed but still that's not a way to go.


And now for the biggest problem I have with my new addition. There are some weird black spots under his scales. I just can't describe it. It doesn't seem to be ticks or mites, nothing was found on paper towels. I hope the attached pictures will be some help to you and it can be diagnosed. At the sale he was supposed to be healthy. He is in a quarantine of course. There's not may of them. Roughly i would say 3-5 spots like this.

http://shrani.si/f/1o/uJ/4Dr9PxhU/timg3072.jpg

http://shrani.si/f/1g/W6/4CnVfl1F/timg3073.jpg

http://shrani.si/f/a/Ku/5BNzcyL/timg3075.jpg

http://shrani.si/f/z/lj/3xaj1WMG/timg3078.jpg

http://shrani.si/f/1s/96/1VTTzevZ/timg3079.jpg

http://shrani.si/f/32/yj/2mXrLQM4/timg3080.jpg


I hope anyone can help me with him, and primarily that he will be OK and a happy snake like the other are. He's a cute snake, afraid of everything but is nosy and likes to check on things and happenings around him ;)

Best regards to everyone and thanks for any possible help :D

Sometimes bad sheds happen - I would get a reliable humidity gauge if it says 70% and he had a bad shed. That is not likely to be accurate.

For the black spots, Pieds get that sometimes but from the pictures it does look like a dead scale or a little scab. Maybe it's a small scab from the bad shed, pulling off skin from scales that are still sensitive. I'd give those a week or two and see if there is change before worrying.

I dont know if this may sound crazy or not but in my eyes that looks like a possible mite??? I know in the post you stated it does not look like it but sometimes they are still hatching mites and they can be that small i had the same issue at work with an albino it looked kinda like a freckle and after a few soakings they were gone. So in my opinion not sure if it will help or not soak her in some warm water and see if it works or not?

I've had two gauges and they are both digital. It seems. One was from a other snake in which im confident since he had complete sheds. And even if it's wrong I've used technics to raise humidity with bigger bowl, damp towels etc. If it could be wrong the actual humidity would be higher not lower. But i must say this again he didn't look interested to shed. My other python does whatnot to remove skin this one hardly shower any interest...

Skin was not pulled from him. What he didn't remove by himself we only rubbed it gently off with a damp towel after some soaking . Hardly any pressure was a used.

These black spots seem more like something is under the scale rather than the scale itself?

He was soaked yesterday while trying to help him with removing stuck shed. Haven't found nothing in the towel or in the water.

So you think I should soak him again? Should i also use a bought solution in a spray for removing mites?

I would say yes buy prevent-a-mite not that expensive and it works and even if its not a mite its always good to have it just in case. Another yes to the soaking try to soak the snake for about 10 minutes just make sure that water stays warm i usually use a little container with a lid and some holes and it works. I honestly believe those black "dots" has nothing to do with shed, the sheds issues are usually scale rot or stuck shed etc and that spot is not missing any scales the spot/issue is under the scale. Therefore don't worry about the shed that spot is something different. Once again my guess is mite.

What substrate do you use? and do you feed live or F/T?

Those are snake ticks, not mites, they look identical to tick, and they burry there head under the scale. IT would be recomonded to do the Nix or PAM treatment, and keep him ont he paper towel, aswell spray around your other snakes, not inside there housing but around/outside

You can especially see in first picture, Where its round butt full of the snakes blood, dont pull them off, they are extremly hard to pull out, and there head can sometimes stay stuck under the skin, Just use a treatment as said. These could be casuing his "lazyness" as you've said OR simply because he is a pied, i have found most of them are a little more lazy then the other morphs.

They look like mites to me - which also burrow under the scales of a snake.

Those do look like ticks. I'm as certain as I can be without seeing the animal in person.

Well I can't see no legs or anything beside black dot under the scale of him. And getting prevent-a-mite will be a problem for me. Here in Slovenia there's hardly anything for snakes.

I only got this and I hope it helps till PAM is delivered from Germany/UK or possibly US:
http://www.petco.com/product/105902/...-Mite-Off.aspx
Is spraying this Mite Off over their heads OK? It says it can be applied directly to the snake. Not sure if it will help with ticks. And did spray all over enclosure of my other snake.

Yesterday he actually ate for the first time with me, so I'll stress him a by handling him for this. Should I wait a day or two or just do it ASAP? Will soaking in water help with ticks also? How often should he be sprayed and his enclosure?

He's on wood shedding right now, and I will replace it with paper towels will also remove everything from his enclosure. Should I also remove glass water bowl and plastic hide? I'm also thinking I'll go buy a plastic container for him to live in while I try to deal with this. I'm also thinking of moving him to a different house for the time being.

Yesterday it looked like blood on him or just some red discoloration i haven't noticed before on him so I had to take him outside on the sun to take a better pictures, since lightning in my apartment is very poor

http://shrani.si/f/3Z/DA/40OZuFTo/img20140605190809.jpg

All my snakes are on frozen, it's just easier for everyone. This one was on live tho before I got him. But as I've said yesterday was feeding day for snakes, and all ate frozen ones.

So to sum it all up. Spray with mite off, clean enclosure, remove everything beside what's needed, use paper towels, soak and possibly quarantine him to a totally different location. Did I miss anything? Oh order PAM ;)

Should I first try your suggestions and then take take apart a piggy bank to him to the vet if anything is not better. Or should I visit vet immediately?

If you cant find Prevent a Mite go with the Nix solution its basically 100% the same, but can be picked up at any pharmacy store for head lice, and i find "safer"

http://www.ssnakess.com/forums/gener...ake-mites.html


This give you instructions on how to make the solution and use it.

Do this for 30-45 days, if they are still there, go to vet.... As for leggs they are under scales aswell. The ticks are pretty much walking heads with a balloon to hold blood.

As for the red, with white snakes, sometimes its "irritation spots" other times its just like us when we get red marks from skin folding/leaning on. they show much more blushing even prior to shed there entire white can go pinkish

Don't know if I can get Nix solution in a pharmacy here, but would any lice removing remedy they have be sufficient?

Seems like Nix is available around here !

NIX is everywhere! just make sure to fallow instruction with water/nix ratio as you dont want to over due to! best of luck =)

Managed to obtain Nix ;)

And no it's not that easy :) Had to call 4 pharmacies before 5th one had few left in old stock. Everyone explained that Nix is going out of distribution here and it's going to get replaced with some "all natural" solution against lice. Now I have 2 of them just in case ;) Is the expiry date pose a problem? It's only useful till September 2014. Was wanting to stock some more on it since it is going out of distribution.


As I've said here in Slovenia it's hard to get anything that's not flour, milk, eggs and veggies ;) But we ofcoz have McDonalds and CocaCola like everywhere in the world. For interwebz we use Carrier Pigeons.

I guess today and tomorrow it will be house disinfecting time !

How do you feed snakes with mites and everything is sprayed by PAM/NIX which is basically poison if digested? Moving snake temporary to another container for feeding purposes and then back?

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Originally Posted by jxl

How do you feed snakes with mites and everything is sprayed by PAM/NIX which is basically poison if digested? Moving snake temporary to another container for feeding purposes and then back?

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Well you spray snake/enclsure on paper towel bedding... after its dried it should be fine, you can feed in separate enclosure, if youd like or even place a paper tower over top of current 1. Once its dried its harder for them to "Eat it" just makre sure when spraying to take out the water dish, and if u notice him in it. remove it aswell (usually keep out for atleast 24/h)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jxl

Now I have 2 of them just in case ;) Is the expiry date pose a problem? It's only useful till September 2014. Was wanting to stock some more on it since it is going out .....of !

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I was in the pharmaceutical business for 20 years. I asked this same question to many physicians, pharmacists, and company officials. The answers I got were that MOST expired drugs retained their effacacy from anywhere from 3 to 7 years after expiration.

In other words, some said 3 yrs, some said 4, some said 5,......

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Reinz

I was in the pharmaceutical business for 20 years. I asked this same question to many physicians, pharmacists, and company officials. The answers I got were that MOST expired drugs retained their effacacy from anywhere from 3 to 7 years after expiration.

In other words, some said 3 yrs, some said 4, some said 5,......

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So what are you thinking of treating an animal, snake in this case with permethrin? Im not talking about vivs and cages or tubs but animal directly?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jxl

So what are you thinking of treating an animal, snake in this case with permethrin? Im not talking about vivs and cages or tubs but animal directly?

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Dilute it as the link i sent you said, IF you look at prevent a mite, its got the .5% or .05% permethrin.

But its pre diluted, this is why you need to add that tube or w.e it comes in into a 1-2 Gallon of Distilled water.

You can then put mixture into spray bottle and lightly mist snake with it, dont drench him though. others will dampen a cloth and rub the snake, either way works.

I really hope you did and do continue with a proper quarantine for that snake! Don't want any ticks going to your other babes :(
Hope all is well now! Otherwise, very beautiful snake it looks like :)

It wasn't as great quarantine as I thought. Seems the other's are OK for now but am expecting an outburst and cleaning everything.

And it's not ticks but mites. Soon after this posts they developed and crawled over my baby :(

I've done soakings, replacing viv with tubs, cleaning using permethrin and same for furniture, room, walls and everything, so now I can see them mites dead all over paper towels.

Haven't seen crawling/live ones since the start of treatment but hey :) When I don't see nothing moving around for at least 3 weeks then I'll consider it going well.

Today is again swimming day for them snakes, and another cleaning, disinfecting.

Any ideas on how to lower the humidity in a tub? I'm having problems getting humidity under 70%? Beside that all snakes are jolly and eating. At least something :rolleye2:

I got a dremel and drilled a lot of holes in my tubs till I got the right humidity.

Sent from my 4.2.2 using Tapatalk

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jxl

And it's not ticks but mites. Soon after this posts they developed and crawled over my baby :(

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I would have never guessed those were mites and not ticks. The pictures must make them look bigger than they really are. :confusd: