I'm not sure I should tell you guys this

But in the hopes it may in some way help others at some point and out of a sense of honesty here goes;

I've been a little concerned about the snake that laid my eggs ( mentioned as it may be relevant) - while she kept eating happily nothing seemed to be coming out the other end. I assumed I was probably just being paranoid but it was starting to worry me. She had eaten 2 f.g mice, 4 half grown rats and 1 medium rat.

I've been keeping an eye on it and when I looked at her this morning it seemed to have got a lot bigger very fast. Now I live in the capital city of scotland and only know of 2 reptile vets none of which is actually in the city. Since I am unemployed, don't drive and am at the end of the cheque till tuesday this is somewhat of a problem. Taking my snakes on the bus is never fun so I was panicking slightly.

When I palpitated her I could feel several very large lumps and a lot of either fluid or gas. Either way it was distended enough for me to consider trying to do something about it then and there.

So I filled a pals pen plastic tank 3 inches deep with warm water and sat her in it. She loved it - to the extent of hissing at me when I tried to take her out to change the water for fresh hot. But 45 minutes later I decided it wasn't actually doing any good.

So I inspected her vent in case there was any signs of something unusual but it seemed perfectly normal to me. At this point I decided to try something we used to do in the old days before there were reptile vets readily accessable.

With her back end still in the water I began manipulating the lumps I could feel.

At this point I cannot stress strongly enough how carefull and gentle I was I have been doing shiatsu and swedish massage for years and am very good at judging pressure applied and sensing the small twitch when you approach a painfull area.

5 minutes later I was rewarded with a jet of dark snake pee across my shower tray which continued for quite some time and left a lot of the swelling gone.
This seemed to make her realise what the idea was and she begn to acually help instead of hinder.

Now the first large solid appeared and turned out to be the largest urate I've ever seen ( I think - see later) there didn't seem to be any way it was moving so I helped by using the stem of a spoon and some small tongs to break it up and allow it to pass. For those intrested in the proccess wearing a groove in the urate with the spoon stem then clipping at it with the tongs till it breaks up.

Once that was out 3 smaller urates came out virtually unaided (see pics at end of post) and then the largest log I have ever seen a royal python produce.

At this point she was looking decidedly "baggy" in the hind third and I have never been so happy to see a slim looking ball python in my life. Her shape now resembles a thin high tire. I checked her again and there were only small peices detectable within her so I checked one final time for signs of rupture or damage to her vent and put her in a clean bare 2 foot tank with a waterbowl but no hides with my fingers crossed. About 20 minutes after that she passed the remainder by herself normally and began to try and escape.

I cleaned the tank and put her back in with a couple of hides to keep an eye on her ( in fact I'm looking at her as I type) and she's moving around the tank apparently none the worse for wear.

At this point I imagine hordes of you are getting ready to shout at me :worry: :tears:
Before you do I'd like to say in my own defense;

If it hadn't got so much worse so quickly I would have been happy to wait till tuesday to go to the vets.

I had done this before ( admittedly that was on a 10 foot burmese) so wasn't just making thing's up on the spot.

While she seems fine now I realise this could go one of several ways;

1. She was fine and I have just seriously annoyed her for no reason.
2. She wasn't fine and annoyed is better than dead if I had done nothing.
3. She wasn't fine but might still die from an underlying cause.
4. She might die as a direct result of my actions :tears:

If it turns out to be the last one then maybe this thread might stand as a warning to others not to try it.

And if anyone fels like offering me some advice there are a couple of things I would like to ask;

The urates seemed very egg shaped - is it possible they were retained slugs? I kept the 3 that came out intact and then broke them open to see if there was any internal structure. (pics below) It's unfortunate in a way I had to break up the biggest one but it was about another 20% bigger than the biggest one pictured at least I think.

Also I was planning on not feeding her for a couple of weeks to let her system recover and the putting her on a single adult mouse for a month or so to see how she gets on. She's a bit of a greedy eater though and isn't likely to be all that happy at only getting mice. Do you think that's my best course of action?


the 3 urates;
https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...rnalurates.JPG


the internal structures;
https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...nalurates1.JPG

close up of the biggest one's bits;
https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...nalurates2.JPG



dr del :worry:

wow... :O


Well, I'm not gonna "yell" at ya or anything! Sometimes things just don't work out the way we'd always want them to. (Having a proper vet close by and easily reached, for instance.) It seems to me like this may have been one of those rare cases where a bp was truly impacted and needed assistence passing it.

I wish I had the experience and knowledge to know what might have caused such a thing, or to know if those "urates" are anything but.

Sounds to me like you did what you truly believed was best for your snake at the time. I hope she's ok and makes a full recovery from her ordeal!

That was a good post, and I give you credit for your honesty and posting it. I don't think what you did was wrong; you did what you had to do given the circumstances and were ready to accept whatever consiquences came of it, good or bad. I think you helped the situation but I would still get him to the vet to be absolutely sure.

Good luck.

You tired to help your snake and that's great. Yes money issues suck but some people would rather their snake go into pain or die then deal with an issue. I hope she recovers and hope this never happens to her or you again. :)

Wow that alot of urates. The first BP i ever got had mites, ticks and dehydrated and had a rock hard urate that the vet removed. I was told she was CH (yeah right). Any way soaking reptiles in general once and a while is what my vet recommended to avoid this problem in the future. Good luck with her I think she os feeling much better. A couple of follow up soaks will probably help her re-hydrate and flush out. Good luck with her and heads up on treating yourself.

Ill be as honest as you were del - I had the same exact thing happen to me with one of my snakes, and i did the same exact thing you did.


I had just gotten the snake, and the kid told me he was feeding her large rats and was ready to move her to x-large :O
Now we all know thats too big and i think she just ate more then she could handle. She got backed up, obstructed, bloated, and I helped her pass it. I fed her small-med rats after that, and she has never had any problems since.

I dont think what you did was wrong - you did what you could do to help her...

I hope she feels better and never has a problem like that again :)

Thanks folks,


I'm glad you realised I was trying to help her as best I could. She still seems fine to me but it's going to be a couple of weeks before I can start to relax I think. More in fact because untill I see that first dukey she's probably going to get fed up of my face staring at her.

adizziedoll,

How long did you leave her before you tried feeding again and did you use smaller than normal prey items at first? I can't help thinking this would have the same detrimental effect on her digestive system as a regurge. I was wondering how to explain to the vet as I worry the backing up of the urine could have put strain on the renal system as well - though as that was only one day ( judging by the sudden swelling ** crosses fingers**).

On a slightly lighter note 2 of the three hatchlings have now shed so once the third one does it ( hopefully by tomorrow) I will try them with a fuzzy.


dr del

I certainly think that offering a smaller prey item would be best and certainly wouldn't do any harm as opposed to a normal size that you would typically offer. I'm not too sure how long I would wait though before offering a meal. You sound very concerned, and if its within your financial means when you get paid maybe a vet visit would give you the closure you need to know that your snake will be fine. Best of luck to you and your girl.

can we see a pic of her?

cause if she has good weight on her... would it harm her any to wait another week or two to offer feed? (to be on the safe side)

Ok here are some pics I just took - shes wriggly as heck and the pics are worse than usual as I needed one hand for her and one for the camera.


https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...16adjusted.JPG

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...21adjusted.JPG

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...6/00_00008.JPG

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...6/00_00004.JPG

This shows what I mean by shes now tall but skinny;
https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...009_633668.JPG

Finally managed to get her to stretch out a bit;
https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...20adjusted.JPG

She now weighs in at only 1119g - on 30/10/06 she weighed 1350g. But by then she'd had 2 f.g mice,2 small rats and 1 medium rat since laying the clutch. I'm guessing what I thought was weight gain was merely crap retention:( .


dr del

I believe I gave her 2-3 full weeks before I fed her. When I did, I gave her about 2mice (were talking about 2500g snake here) every week for about a month, then stepped it up to just one small rat.

Those clumps look like dead eggs that she retained.I had a female corn snake that retained her eggs last spring and she died as i never caught it in time:( .I am glad your girl is doing ok:) .Now i think if i was you i would make a vet app and have her looked over just to make sure she is fine.

HI,

Yeah I agree on the vet thing, think I'll phone to make an appointment on tuesday ( in case he says "bring her right in") she does seem ok so far but thats hardly conclusive.

What kind of tests do you think he's likely ( and justified) to do? He has caused us some hastle in the past by lack of knowledge but he's also the only one in private practice and the vet school , while excellent, tends to have a hell of a waiting time.

Fred once told a customer we'd sold a rainbow boa to that it had septacaemia because it's belly was pink. sadly it was supposed to be but it took us hours to convince the guy we weren't going to pay a £400 vet bill on a perfectly healthy snake for him. Even fred had said to him " she seems remarkably healthy for a snake that ill". God knows how many tests he'd run trying to find out what was wrong with it.

Come to read that again I've just talked myself out of using fred and will go for the vet school option. Now to find out where they moved the damned thing to :D .


dr del

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by dr del

HI,

Yeah I agree on the vet thing, think I'll phone to make an appointment on tuesday ( in case he says "bring her right in") she does seem ok so far but thats hardly conclusive.

What kind of tests do you think he's likely ( and justified) to do? He has caused us some hastle in the past by lack of knowledge but he's also the only one in private practice and the vet school , while excellent, tends to have a hell of a waiting time.

Fred once told a customer we'd sold a rainbow boa to that it had septacaemia because it's belly was pink. sadly it was supposed to be but it took us hours to convince the guy we weren't going to pay a £400 vet bill on a perfectly healthy snake for him. Even fred had said to him " she seems remarkably healthy for a snake that ill". God knows how many tests he'd run trying to find out what was wrong with it.

Come to read that again I've just talked myself out of using fred and will go for the vet school option. Now to find out where they moved the damned thing to :D .


dr del

---

Yea i would avoid Fred.Well for one test i think maybe a x-ray to see if she is indeed clear and empty.Maybe when you tell them(vet school) what happened they might get you a emergency app.I would at least keep those clumps that she kicked out and that way they will be one step closer to taking care of her.It will also save some cash for a unneeded test:) .Let us know how things go.

oh heck,

It never occured to me to keep those. Hopefully the pics might help a little. Yeah the x-ray sounds likely - she feels empty but then again so does my head some days.


dr del

Update.


Managed to get an appointment for wednesday afternoon at the vet school :)

Its going to involve about a 3 hour round bus trip but they really do know their stuff and they say checking kidneys ( the bit I'm really concerned she might have damaged) and everything else should be no problem.


She still seems ok so far and has been drinking no problem but she is spending most of her time at the warm end of the tank so better safe than sorry.

Managed to get the pics of urates onto my ipaq so should be able to show her those at least.


dr del

keep us posted please. :hug:

Sorry for the delay - was shattered last night and went to bed to recover.


Well I took her to the vet but didnt get to see the usual girl I remember sadly.

The guy I did see seemed fairly knowledgable ( but to be honest I have doubts - see later ) though but did say I'd brought her in "after the event so to speak". He said ( from the pictures) that the large obstructions were definately necrotic eggs and prescribed a course of baytril to prevent any infections while she was recovering.

He did mention x-ray's but decided against when he had palpitated her as he said he could clearly feel she had nothing else inside her. I asked about blood samples but he said they would only give him a snapshot and he wasn't sure they would provide anything usefull - and that to get one he'd probably have to put a needle in her heart :eyepoppin . I was a bit surprised ( and horrified) by this as I don't remember ever being told this before, he did say you can sometimes find a vein in the tail but I thought the last time I saw it being done it was under a belly scale :confused: .

I asked if the needle in the heart was dangerous and he said for all the sample would tell him he wasn't certain it was worth the risk in her condition but would let me decide - I decided against. Was this wrong?

He did say since her kidneys are located so far up her body there was only a slim chance they would have been damaged anyway.

He said her overall conditioning wasn't good ( loose muscle tone) and suggested soaking her a couple of times a week using some pro-biotic stuff ( which I cant find in any pet stores irritatingly enough) called something like repton?? (my memory is terrible). Whatever this stuff is it has glucose in it as he said I'd need to wash her afterwards as it would make her sticky- his idea seemed to be she would drink this and it would give her a boost and get some fluids into her.

But shes drinking fine and isn't dehydrated at all :confuzd:

I got some vitamins to put in her water as that was the best I could find in the shop but so far I've ony seen her sniff it :)

It was quite funny the speed his hands retracted everytime her head moved even though I kept telling him she doesn't bite :D . In revenge the baytril is to be given orally as he felt that would be better than injecting her - as I am the only person here this isn't as easy as it sounds and the first dose went on the carpet. The little plastic tube on the syringe is thin as heck and bends all over the place - in this case out the side of her mouth :mad: . He had suggested something called a crop needle used for birds which is made of metal - can't find one of those anywhere either but since were only talking about 0.25 mls of baytril I suppose the little thing means less of it in the tube and more in the snake ( when she lets me).

She is spending a lot of time at the warm end however so the baytril might just nip something in the bud.

She was quite a hit with the receptionists who asked if they could see her ( I got the feeling they don't see many these days) and one of them even held her for a couple of minutes but the place was freezing - and this from a man who only has heating in one room!!

The journey overall was a total nightmare - there is only one bus an hour that goes there and it was 25 minutes late going and 15 coming back :taz:

This meant she spent a total of one hour outside in scotland in december. It's a miracle she survived that alone - I had a hot water bottle in the bag wrapped in a towel beside the box her bag was in but hadn't filled it with really hot water as I didn't want her to overheat on what should have been a fairly brief and easy journey. When I filled it it was still to hot to touch mind but by the time we arrived it was already a lot too cold for my liking:( . I left the house at 11.45 to get a bus up to the main bus stop for the 12.11 bus which turned up at 12.37 ( I phoned to tell them I'd be late - didn't matter the place was empty when I arrived anyway) we should have arrived at 12.47 for my appointment at 1 pm but didnt get there till 1.11. Since the place was also freezing and "didn't have a kettle I could use" I honestly don't think I'll use them again - it's just not practical unless I can get someone with a car next time:( . I finally got back home at just past 3pm and let her slowly warm up in the living room for a little while before putting her into the tank to recover from her ordeal.

The final bill was only £19.49 ($38.24) and would have been £50 ($98.10) with the blood tests so all in all their prices were quite reasonable I think.
I am however left without any questions really answered and apart from the anitbiotics (which even the vet called prophylactic ) the original situation remains "if she lives, she lives and if she dies, she dies" vets in the U.K really are useless for reptiles in the main it seems to me.:(

He did say it might be an idea to get a blood sample after the course of baytril is over for a "baseline" and that he'd like to see my other snakes as well sometime but, to be honest, I don't fancy putting any of them through the travel ordeal just so he can see them and possibly do a checkup on perfectly healthy snakes.He did ask about husbandry and seemed satisfied with that.

Maybe next time I'll ask if the two original female vets I saw still work there and request them :P this guy kept calling natasha ( yes that's my snakes name) "he" which you'd think the eggs might have prevented that mistake and I'm sure she didn't mind but it started to niggle at me by the end :oops: .

Sorry for the rambling nature of this post - I started it over 2 hours ago and keep having to stop to go check on my home made soup and watch the shedding amel corn destroy her tank at me.


Dr del

She looks quite healthy I think. Although, is that just coloration or is there damage to the left of her vent in the pic you posted?
Hey let's face it, most of us would do whatever it takes to ensure the well being of our scaley friends. In our household, our pets are family, and family is everything.
I spent 4 years in the Airborne Infantry, and consiquently 5 months in Desert Storm. I'm telling you this because, if there's one thing I learned in combat, hesitation can get you killed. Same applied here, I believe. It is all too likely that if you had waited and done nothing, your snake could have gone septic, or become very ill at a minimum.
I aplaud you for your actions, and appreciate the fact that you posted a detailed description of how you did it. You never know, this could very well save someone else's snake some time to come.
Hope your Ball is doing well and hope you are too.....:)

Hey Kojak,

That dark spot is just coloration - the vet managed to get a good look at her vent to make sure there were no signs of trauma ,he actually seemed surprised I could get her to show it to him.:)

She seems a little more toned muscle wise today ( well she hit me in the mouth with her bum while I was trying to squirt baytril into her throat :D ) so I think she's going to be ok **touch wood** So far she has had 3 doses of baytril and the carpet has had one and a half - but I think I'm getting the hang of it so hopefully I won't be wasting much more of it. Do you think another vet ( closer to my house) would give me more if I turn out to have wasted too much of it? Or is that bad manners in the vetinary world.

I'm still going to avoid feeding her this week just in case but If her muscle tone keeps improving I think she should be ok to feed next week. However ,with typical good timing, she is beginging to hint at the start of a shed cycle. :irkd:

I am also planning on giving her another soak on saturday time permitting as she really did seem to enjoy it last time.:)

I am very gratefull for the supportive posts I have recieved in this thread and it does seem that this time around manualy helping her was the correct thing to do in the absense of vet care. But if I am unlucky enough to be in the same position again I would plump for taking her straight to the vet by fair means or foul just to avoid the nagging doubt and guilt over the days before I got her to the vets.


dr del