Tirel, Ghost Boa

[CloudtheBoa]

Well Tirel is down to 3 shots left now, and she has become super super grumpy. The past 3 or 4 shots she has come out of her tub hissing and striking. I feel really bad, but she needs to finish her shots, and at least her grumpiness is a good sign she's healthy. She also went into shed soon after the second hissy/strikey shot session, so that could be partly causing her moodiness.

Here she is just starting to go into a blue phase, around 2 weeks after the swelling incident (it is now almost 4 weeks).



This is from her last shot session, she just grabbed onto the nearest thing and squeezed, and it happened to be her. She tried to pull her head free, but just squeezed tighter. I had to get a photo of the ridiculousness before freeing her.



She was especially bad this time, striking and hissing at the TV and her own shadow on the bed. Usually she calms down after a minute or two, but she wouldn't let up. I think that's just because she couldn't see so well. She ended up bucking under the needle pretty hard, causing me to accidentally tear some of her skin under the finger I was using to hold her down and feel for her spine. It was just the old layer, not her new skin, so there's that at least. I'll be keeping an eye on it and make sure she gets most of her shed off ok, she should be shedding by next weekend.

I really hope after her shots are done I can get her to calm down again, I feel really bad only taking her out to stick her, but handling her outside of that would just be overhandling and probably make it worse.

[cristacake]

Poor Tirel, and poor you. You're doing great taking care of her. If she could understand how you were helping her, she would be very grateful for your care


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[CloudtheBoa]

Poor Tirel, and poor you. You're doing great taking care of her. If she could understand how you were helping her, she would be very grateful for your care


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thank you, I can only hope for the best. Hopefully either after she sheds or her shots are done she gets a little less moody. I can open her tub without her getting mad at me, but once I grab for her that's when the hissing starts. She doesn't start striking until I've got her out and bring her to my mom's room for her shot. I don't need a hook or anything, but I don't like knowing she's being so stressed she feels like hissing and striking every time I have her out. I'm trying not to bother her tub too much either, she's torn the squares apart on her paper towels, but she hasn't pooped on them or anything so I'm trying not to change them out to reduce any additional stress to her. Plus, she can still hide under them, she just bunches them up in a corner. I may go ahead and do that Friday or Saturday anyways, so I can give her new paper towels and spray them down to help with her shed, since I'm sure I messed it up.

Her previous swelling:








Versus her shed cycle swelling:








So, as you can see the two are very different, and that's why I didn't think it was a shed cycle when I first posted about her condition. I had a few people make the suggestion that maybe she was just shedding. I have seen many many shed cycles, start to finish, and I've never seen swelling of that degree.


Plus, again, in this photo you can see the swelling was so bad that her lip was being pulled open. Here, it was just that one side, but after a few minutes both sides of her mouth was open, with her lips pulled out.





I want to take her for another check up just in case, but hopefully she's in the clear. It's just so weird that it happened so quickly and then disappeared on its own.

[CloudtheBoa]

Her shots are all done and she's shed, so I've started handling her again. Her defensiveness went way down since she shed, but she's being rather strikey, and she's been even less so since her shots have ended. I still want to get her to the vet's one more time to ask about her poops, as she pooped earlier this week and it was runny again, and her urine was a dark yellow. I've read that Fortaz can cause this, so I'm assuming she's just a tad dehydrated, but I wanted to double-check and possibly re-check her mouth. She's definitely looking a little dry, but not as bad as when I first started the medicine, and her shed was whole.

Here are some post-shed pics (more like a week later but she looks quite pretty in these):








She was quite interested in the camera, and actively strained to reach it, going out as much as 2/3 of her length, never seen a boa so determined to get at something. She didn't strike the lens like Crona has, just rested her nose on it and then tried to climb on top. >.>

[CloudtheBoa]

Well her shots are over and she's shown no sign of any more swelling. The vet just said to keep an eye on her and bring her in if anything else pops up.

I'm still waiting on another poop, but since she hasn't had a shot in a month or so, I'm hoping it will be fairly normal, otherwise I'll see about having a fecal done if the vet doesn't think the medicine is causing it.

She has calmed down quickly since her shots have ended! I've only handled her maybe 3 times, but the first day after her shots were done she came out without any hissing and only struck a few times at my mom whenever she moved too fast (don't worry she likes snakes and knows there's a chance of bites, plus I was standing well far enough away she couldn't land a hit) and nobody got bit. The other two times she did give a little hiss grabbing her, but didn't strike at me and let me bring my hand up under her head to touch her chin without freaking out at all. She does nibble the camera a bit, though....

Her last weight was 502 grams, so after shooting up in weight by 100 grams in a matter of weeks, she's holding steady now, and I expect she'll go back to shooting up like a weed now that she isn't getting antibiotics. SerpWidgets says she's only 3.5' but that seems really odd considering:

1) she came to me already dwarving Nymeria, who had just hit 3'
2) with Nymeria, 100 grams roughly equates to just over half a foot of growth thus far

So if 100 grams is roughly a foot of growth with her, it seems odd she'd only be half a foot longer than Nymeria...I'm not doubting it's possible just seems weird considering. haha Gonna have to brave her teeth and try to get her stretched out along the wall to measure her by hand.

She's looking so pretty after her shed, though.

[CloudtheBoa]

Tirel weighed in at 639 grams a few days ago, not bad weight gain at all! That's ~240 grams since I got her about 4 months ago, and that's just eating a weaned rat every other week rather than the smalls she was getting when I got her. She nearly completely engulfs my hand now, and is quite a bit more docile. She hasn't huffed or hissed at me in a long time, and only recently struck at me. I was typing on the computer with her on my other hand. She struck at my moving hand, but didn't land a hit despite my hand being maybe 4" away, so she wasn't too worried, and she was fine the rest of the handling session.

With her being 1.5 years old in December, I've decided to go ahead and get her conditioned for fasting. Over this winter, I'm going to be feeding her every 4 weeks instead of 2, starting with the meal I gave her the day before. I've also bumped her back up to smalls considering all the size she's put on and the reduced feeding frequency. Hopefully she won't take it too badly. lol

[CloudtheBoa]

I had a hunch earlier this week she was going into shed, and today she proved me right!

She was not happy at all about being taken out, but I had to change her paper towels. They were bloody from her feeding earlier, but I was giving her a few days to let her feeding response die down and give her time to digest. These two photos are before and after she struck at the camera.





And back in her tub. When I change her paper towels I like to spray them down flat because if I don't she bunches them up in a corner. I would have done it before putting her back, but she was in shed and grumpy and wanted to get out of her hair ASAP. She didn't like the spray but didn't strike at me so there's that.





The shipping box is the box Guin was shipped in over a year ago. I just repurposed it into a hide.

[CloudtheBoa]

Still quite blue a week later.

I picked up her hide to see if she was done shedding yet or not, and when I put the hide back over her I touched her tail and that was the last straw. lol

Better safe than sorry spraying her, she look a bit dry, and it's the only way to affect humidity on paper towels. She didn't mind the spray just did NOT want me touching her.

[CloudtheBoa]

Well I've been having internet problems for about 2 weeks now, and our upload speed was so slow I was unable to upload my pics anywhere...finally had the internet company reset everything and everything's working again. So more pics!

She shed on the 29th, and she's really gaining some respectable size now. She doesn't have a lot of natural girth, but once she's on larger rats that should change. Even when she first got here, her tail was oddly tapered from the rest of her body, and now her body tone is more uniform. I think she's just one of those gangly, tall teenagers atm because she is packing on the weight and gaining size quite a bit faster than Nymeria, who is fed similarly but of much stockier build.

















Here she's pulling her mouth open trying to drag herself across her back.

[CloudtheBoa]

I took Tirel out again tonight, and she gave me a single short hiss in protestation, but was docile and quiet when I picked her up.


I thought she had to have been close to 4' by now, but after getting Howl in, I don't think she is. He's quite a bit bigger than she is and comes out to an inch or two at most over 4' on SerpWidgets, she comes out at just over 3.5'.





She was worried there for a bit that she might fall and was really flexing those tail muscles. When she let go her tail was red. haha





And her big fat head.