Fresh Shed from Cleo the Cali King

Came home to a nice present last night. She (I’m guessing - got “her” as an adult and never had her sexed so I just went with it lol) always does really nice full sheds.

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And here she is looking all fresh and shiny. She didn’t want her face in the photo I guess haha.

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Nice looking king!

Love those sharp, contrasting colors!

Beautiful how long ? I can’t see in the pic

Very attractive snakes...I like how their pattern shows up on their sheds too.

Oh how I love classic Cal Kings!!!! She's beautiful, and if I'm reading that tape correctly the shed is about 5 1/2 feet, so she must be about a 5 foot girl.
That is for sharing.

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Originally Posted by craigafrechette

Oh how I love classic Cal Kings!!!! She's beautiful, and if I'm reading that tape correctly the shed is about 5 1/2 feet, so she must be about a 5 foot girl.
That is for sharing.

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Here's mine .... so many are brown and white but when I posted photos of this I was advised that it is a Desert Phase Cali King ( black and white )

These pics show how much better bright coloured snakes are on dark bark .. imho

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Originally Posted by Phillydubs

Beautiful how long ? I can’t see in the pic

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She’s a little over 5 ft.


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Originally Posted by alittleFREE

She’s a little over 5 ft.


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That's a very nice sized king.

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Originally Posted by EL-Ziggy

That's a very nice sized king.

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Yeah! I wish I knew more about his/her
background. Someone randomly gave her to me a few years ago and they had gotten her from someone else just a few days prior and had 0 details. She’s very sweet, though, you can do anything to her and she doesn’t flinch. Plus a great eater. When she knows it’s feeding time, she’s in the zone. I swear she’d eat her rats frozen if I’d let her.


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Kings are one of the most ferocious eaters of any snakes I've seen. They go bonkers for food. :snake: :rolleye2:

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Originally Posted by alittleFREE

Plus a great eater. When she knows it’s feeding time, she’s in the zone. I swear she’d eat her rats frozen if I’d let her.


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Originally Posted by EL-Ziggy

Kings are one of the most ferocious eaters of any snakes I've seen. They go bonkers for food. :snake: :rolleye2:

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That's one of the things I love about Kings. It's like a switch is flipped as soon as they smell food in the air.
I often joke that Django would eat s slice of pizza if I dangled it off tongs, as long as it's meat lovers! :rofl:

I had a Cali King a few years ago that when I left the thawed mouse in his viv he lunged forward , grabbed his stainless steel water dish and waved it around his head !!


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Got Cleo on the scale today. 840 grams.


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Wow she's perfect. Thanks for sharing. what a beautiful little gal! How big is she?


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Originally Posted by Zuri Indigo

Wow she's perfect. Thanks for sharing. what a beautiful little gal! How big is she?


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Between 5-5.5 ft (hard to get an accurate length) and 840 grams.


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Beautiful! Such great color contrast. The wild Eastern kings around here have much narrower white/pale yellow bands.

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Originally Posted by Zuri Indigo

Wow she's perfect. Thanks for sharing. what a beautiful little gal! How big is she?


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Between 5-5.5 ft (hard to get an accurate length) and 840 grams.


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Originally Posted by alittleFREE

Between 5-5.5 ft (hard to get an accurate length) and 840 grams.


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Cool super cool [emoji1474][emoji3]


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Here's my guy .... I was recently told he was a Desert Phase Banded Cali King ..... he's Black and white like the one above -apparently the more common ones are more brown than black ?!?
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Awesome pics!!!! Thanks for sharing!!

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Cleo shed last night and the weather was nice, so I took her out for a little photo op.

I know she’s about as basic as they come as far as common snakes go.... but I absolutely love the way she looks. It helps that she’s a total sweetheart.


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Great pics!!!

Okay first of all that is SO COOL that the shed has stripes on it!! Secondly she is much bigger than I imagined a kingsnake would ever be. My science teacher had one and it was only about 2 feet long.

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Originally Posted by FollowTheSun

Okay first of all that is SO COOL that the shed has stripes on it!! Secondly she is much bigger than I imagined a kingsnake would ever be. My science teacher had one and it was only about 2 feet long.

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She’s fairly large for a cal king, about the max of their average size range. She’s pushing 6 ft. I don’t actually know she’s a she - I need to probe her but since she’s just a pet I’ve never gotten around to it lol.




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Originally Posted by FollowTheSun

Okay first of all that is SO COOL that the shed has stripes on it!! Secondly she is much bigger than I imagined a kingsnake would ever be. My science teacher had one and it was only about 2 feet long.

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Interesting... my Mexican Blacks sheds were always kinda light charcoal grey :)


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What a beautiful & healthy-looking Cal-king! I like how their pattern shows on their sheds too. Incidentally, you can see their patterns in the shed when rattlesnakes
"undress" also. :snake: It's funny how some snakes just have lots more pigment in the sheds than others do.

Unfortunately, I have some bad news to share about Cleo.


It seems she’s developed an RI. Last night I happened to look over and I saw her out drinking, so I paused to watch her. Then she started rubbing her face on things and proceeded to cough up water. I thought that was weird, so I took her out. For about 5 minutes I held her and looked her over and everything seemed normal, so I thought maybe I startled her mid-drink and she just had some water in her mouth. If only. Right as I was about to put her up, she made a very loud gargling noise and spit up more water. That’s when I knew something was up. For the next 10 minutes or so (I’m estimating, it may have been shorter, but it felt like a long time) she kept doing this off and on, with the liquid coming out becoming more viscous than plain water. She also periodically would have bubbles coming out of her nose. I could feel the rumbling when she would spit up the water.

Obviously I knew this was not good and signs of an RI - and a progressed one, at that. Luckily I had a spare enclosure, so I quickly put together a quarantine setup and got her in that. As this was late last night, all the vets were closed, so I called first thing this morning. Unfortunately, the soonest they can see me due to the reptile specialist’s work hours is Thursday. In the meantime, I have bumped her temps up and will be watching her closely. I’ve called another vet to see if they can get me in sooner but haven’t heard back.

The sliver of good news is that despite these rather concerning symptoms, she is still physically strong and her tongue is flicking and all of that. She has been eating and otherwise behaving normally. The only thing that, in hindsight, was a clue was that she has been hanging out in her warm hide a lot the past week or so. She does that when she’s going into shed so that’s what I assumed it was.... but now I believe she had been trying to boost her metabolism and fight off the infection.

I’m baffled as to how it progressed to this without me realizing; she’s in my living room, so I’m looking at her constantly and I get her out very frequently. As I’ve had her for years and never had an issue, I think the culprit is probably the bedding.... I switched from paper to Coco Husk a few months ago because I wanted her to be able to burrow. When I cleaned out her tank last night after this debacle I noticed it was fairly dusty. Ugh. I should have been keeping it more moist, I guess, but I didn’t want crazy humidity in there because kings don’t need it. I was worried about scale rot from wet bedding. Regardless, it’s 100% my fault, which sucks.

Send her good vibes please. I love her to pieces and would never want to lose her.

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Unfortunately, I have some bad news to share about Cleo.


It seems she’s developed an RI. Last night I happened to look over and I saw her out drinking, so I paused to watch her. Then she started rubbing her face on things and proceeded to cough up water. I thought that was weird, so I took her out. For about 5 minutes I held her and looked her over and everything seemed normal, so I thought maybe I startled her mid-drink and she just had some water in her mouth. If only. Right as I was about to put her up, she made a very loud gargling noise and spit up more water. That’s when I knew something was up. For the next 10 minutes or so (I’m estimating, it may have been shorter, but it felt like a long time) she kept doing this off and on, with the liquid coming out becoming more viscous than plain water. She also periodically would have bubbles coming out of her nose. I could feel the rumbling when she would spit up the water.

Obviously I knew this was not good and signs of an RI - and a progressed one, at that. Luckily I had a spare enclosure, so I quickly put together a quarantine setup and got her in that. As this was late last night, all the vets were closed, so I called first thing this morning. Unfortunately, the soonest they can see me due to the reptile specialist’s work hours is Thursday. In the meantime, I have bumped her temps up and will be watching her closely. I’ve called another vet to see if they can get me in sooner but haven’t heard back.

The sliver of good news is that despite these rather concerning symptoms, she is still physically strong and her tongue is flicking and all of that. She has been eating and otherwise behaving normally. The only thing that, in hindsight, was a clue was that she has been hanging out in her warm hide a lot the past week or so. She does that when she’s going into shed so that’s what I assumed it was.... but now I believe she had been trying to boost her metabolism and fight off the infection.

I’m baffled as to how it progressed to this without me realizing; she’s in my living room, so I’m looking at her constantly and I get her out very frequently. As I’ve had her for years and never had an issue, I think the culprit is probably the bedding.... I switched from paper to Coco Husk a few months ago because I wanted her to be able to burrow. When I cleaned out her tank last night after this debacle I noticed it was fairly dusty. Ugh. I should have been keeping it more moist, I guess, but I didn’t want crazy humidity in there because kings don’t need it. I was worried about scale rot from wet bedding. Regardless, it’s 100% my fault, which sucks.

Send her good vibes please. I love her to pieces and would never want to lose her.

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That sucks. I wish the best for your king and hope everything turns out well

I don't think it sounds like "your fault" from what you've posted, at least not about the substrate. I'm not convinced she suddenly has an RI, either...

Those lovely photos of her on the ground...are you sure there are no chemicals applied anywhere she might have slithered, grass or flower beds? Personally,
I don't put any of my snakes on the ground, although I know there's no chemicals used on my property, there are other issues to consider, like parasites in the
grass (both internal & external types) or various germs (from stool etc. left by wild creatures) that she could touch or inhale & be infected by. I'm in a similarly
warm & humid state like yours, just a reminder that it's risky, no matter how irresistible & photogenic it is. I do hope she gets well soon.

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Originally Posted by Bogertophis

I don't think it sounds like "your fault" from what you've posted, at least not about the substrate. I'm not convinced she suddenly has an RI, either...

Those lovely photos of her on the ground...are you sure there are no chemicals applied anywhere she might have slithered, grass or flower beds? Personally,
I don't put any of my snakes on the ground, although I know there's no chemicals used on my property, there are other issues to consider, like parasites in the
grass (both internal & external types) or various germs (from stool etc. left by wild creatures) that she could touch or inhale & be infected by. I'm in a similarly
warm & humid state like yours, just a reminder that it's risky, no matter how irresistible & photogenic it is. I do hope she gets well soon.

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No, it’s my yard - there’s no chemicals. Of course there’s no way to know what invisible critters may be lurking, but I take my Beardie out there for multiple hours at a time almost every day during warm months.... If anyone were to get sick from being outside, I would think it would be her. The snakes get put down for like 20 seconds max while I take a pic.

I really think it’s the bedding. It’s not the first time I’ve had issues with a coco bedding.... thought the husk being chunkier wouldn’t have the same issues as the coco fiber / peat, though. [emoji30]


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Well, whatever it is, I hope she gets well soon. How old is she now?

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Originally Posted by Bogertophis

Well, whatever it is, I hope she gets well soon. How old is she now?

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No idea. A friend of my family got her from an acquaintance and asked no background info, then gave her to us. I’ve had her since 2016 and she was fully grown then. So she’s at least like 7.... but could be way older for all I know [emoji2370] When I take her into the vet I’m gonna ask if he can give any sort of rough estimate on her probable age, just for my records.

And thank you [emoji3590]


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There's no way to tell a snake's age unless you've had them since they hatch or were born. But a 6' king snake isn't young...she might easily be 20 years,
or even more. At least with horses & dogs, you can get an idea from their teeth...try that with a snake, ROFL. So much about a snake is secretive.

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Originally Posted by Bogertophis

There's no way to tell a snake's age unless you've had them since they hatch or were born. But a 6' king snake isn't young...she might easily be 20 years,
or even more. At least with horses & dogs, you can get an idea from their teeth...try that with a snake, ROFL. So much about a snake is secretive.

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Yeah. I know sometimes their eyes etc can give away advanced age. Not with any degree of certainty, obviously. But I was just hoping to pin down whether she’s a young adult or an old adult lol. Like is she geriatric... [emoji23]


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I hope your vet has some answers...actually, I hope she is better without even seeing him/her (that this is just some quirk that goes away?).
Also hope she bites you for laughing at her for possibly being "geriatric"...:D

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Originally Posted by alittleFREE

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Cleo shed last night and the weather was nice, so I took her out for a little photo op.

I know she’s about as basic as they come as far as common snakes go.... but I absolutely love the way she looks. It helps that she’s a total sweetheart.


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Love her markings! She is wonderful in her own right. Oreo being a high white morph doesn't have traditional markings. Love CKSes.

Sooo I just got back from the vet. The good news is, the vet says she seems perfectly healthy. Body condition is good, scale coloration is good. activity level is good, no wheezing, no mucus in her mouth....

The bad news is, I’m an idiot. He thinks she choked on water initially, and then when I took her out to examine her, the movement/stress caused her to regurgitate what she had just been drinking. Hence the drool and the bubbles.

He is having me keep her on upped temps and under a close watch for the next few days. If she eats this weekend and doesn’t exhibit any further symptoms, he thinks she will be fine. He didn’t feel comfortable prescribing antibiotics based on what he saw at the exam (although he acknowledged that the “incident” was bizarre). He’s going to call me on Tuesday to get an updated report.

[emoji2356]


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Great news! :gj: I'm glad he didn't just put her on antibiotics, they aren't without risks. And no, you're NOT an idiot. I know I've picked up a snake that had
just drank water (without my knowing it) & had them spit it up on me. At least you cared enough to get her checked out. Sounds like you have a good vet there.

(he didn't, by any chance, have a guess as to her age, did he?)

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Originally Posted by Bogertophis

Great news! :gj: I'm glad he didn't just put her on antibiotics, they aren't without risks. And no, you're NOT an idiot. I know I've picked up a snake that had
just drank water (without my knowing it) & had them spit it up on me. At least you cared enough to get her checked out. Sounds like you have a good vet there.

(he didn't, by any chance, have a guess as to her age, did he?)

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No.... but he did say she is probably a he. He didn’t want to probe her and stress her out even more but he said based on tail length that would be his guess.


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