whats wrong!?

I was holding Cupid, and I looked at his mouth, and on the right side it looks like his gum is exposed, its like a little pink, as if his lip doesn't cover his mouth completely. But it isn't on the other side. What is this? Oh, and if it makes a difference he ate on thursday.

please! im scared!

aand i just now looked at his underbelly, and 5 inches below his head, and another like 2 inches below his head, and they are small little pink slashes, about half a centemeter long....what are they!???

maybe burns?does he go to the warm side alot?

See if maybe he could have cut himself on the cage anywhere?

to be on the safe side, thoughaly clean everything in the cage and the cage itself. Change your substrate tyo papertowles, or printless newsprint. If tey are cuts he needs to be in as sterile a home as possible while they heal. If they are cuts start allpying plain neospirin to them

From just reading your first post.. I'd say make sure his jaws are aligned. Sometimes when they yawn or eat, they close their mouth a little crooked and it looks funny..

But then from your third post.. I'd double check your temps, make sure your heat pad doesn't have a hotspot. And definitely disinfect everything. If you could post pics that'd help.

I can't post pictures, i don't have a digi cam. He has repti-carpet, so it isn't from the substrate, the only thing I can think of is he either burned him slef onthe heat lamp durng the night (sometimes he tries to get out at night) or he got a papercut from the paper towel tube. The paper towel tube is gone now. And the heating pad isn't too hot.
I think he just doesn't have his jaws aligned....since he just ate, Do you think he'll yawn to make it aligned?

It'd be pretty hard to get a paper cut from something so thick as a cardboard tube..

He'll probably yawn if he even notices. lol sometimes they don't seem to know their jaws aren't set right.

That still doesn't explain the other marks though..

I think the other marks migt be from him touching his heat lamp at night, what can I do to prevent that? because nothing in his cage is sharp, and if his whole belly were red I would be worried about scale rot, but its just those two little marks.

Someone else from here just had that happen, don't ask me who :), I've slept since then. But their snake's tummy had scratches on it too, but I think I remember him/her saying it was just from the log in the tank.

If the tank is nearby something that you can clamp the lamp onto, or find a standing lamp that will hold the wattage bulb you're using, maybe that would work. Is it sitting on the screen lid?

yea, its on the screen lid.

Does the lamp you have have a clamp that came with it? Usually the lamp being on the screen doesn't pose a problem, but maybe he just sat against the screen a little too long and didn't realize it, poor little guy.

If you don't have a clamp, you can find maybe a standing lamp, or bendable desk lamp that you might be able to use. Try a couple of things, see what works best. :)

I have a clamp, I should have 3, but I think I threw some of them out. I'll check and see....wait...i have one...but the parts are all shuffled up...I dont know what goes to what...

The bigger half circle pieces go around the base of the lamp, if it's ceramic or whatnot, and then the smaller half circle pieces go around metal ball on the end of the clamp. It should have a little screw in the middle that you can twist to make the half circle pieces tighten around what they are holding. Hope that helps.

yea, it does....but I think im missing a peice. Anwho, im off to the petshop for mealworms.

You really should consider getting rid of the heat lamp entirely and just using a heatpad for warmth. Aside from being safer, it uses less electricity. Most importantly, belly heat is much better than overhead heat for ball pythons.

I have a heat pad, but the problem is it is shared with my leopard geckos tank. I'll explain.

So, my ball python is on the right, and my leopard gecko is on the left, I have a backdrop between them, the rainforest side is on cupids side, the desert side is on teco and gidgets side. See how that works? And the heat pad is in the middle, so half the heatpad is on techo, half is on cupid. But I do have a heater in my closet (my closet is HUGE,it has chairs and fridgerators in it, thats where they are)so my closet stays around 80-85*F all the time. What should I do?

I think you could probably ditch the lamp since your closet never goes below 80 anyway. You should be good to go. :)

Yeah, lamps always make me nervous. Not to mention, if you rely on them being your only heat source and they burn out, your herps have no heat for the day until you return.
I think the heatpad underneath the tank should suffice.

Does your closet have natural light that makes for day/night cycles?