eyecaps question

[pliskin]

I had a bp that was having trouble shedding his eyecaps.

I spoke to a friend and he told me that the humidity was too low. I've subseqeuntly increased the humidity and his last shed came off in one piece including the eyecaps.

the question I have , is baby oil harmful to the snakes eyes?

when my snake was having the eyecaps problem , two different guys told me (on said to use mineral oil, the other said baby oil) to use oil to aid in shedding the eyecaps.

so , has anyone else tried this ? I would just like to know for the future if the problem arises again.

[disabled.101]

How are you measuring temps and humidity if I may ask?
Also just give a layout of your setup please

Aside that bumping up the humidity is the best thing to do and wait for the next shed. Taking off eyecaps is risky and not necessarily the best option. I would suggest just waiting and if they don't come off next shed see a vet. Aside that there are lots of threads on here discussing that have a look around with search function

[joshn6805]

I would try a post shed soak, it might get them off. there is a sticky that gives you a tutorial on the soaking.

[DutchHerp]

First of all you have to be sure that the eye caps are indeed still on. My adopted BPs eye caps have been wrinkled from the time I got him, but his eye caps came off with the last shed.

If you're completely certain, you can soak him for about 30 mins, then get one of those "rubber thumbs". Then just roll over the eye ***GENTLY*** from front to back and the eye caps should come off.

[pliskin]

hi all, thanks for the replies.

He shed his eyecaps on the last shed, it came off in one piece.

My question was about the baby oil/mineral oil that someone had suggested I try .


dutchherp,

on the previous shed my snake's eyes were wrinkled too, which is why I was concerned because they looked like they were still on.

so, how does your snake's eyes look now?

for mine, his eyes look better now. still a little bit wrinkled but at least they're clear now.

[kc261]

Glad to hear that your snake shed in one piece this time. That is always great!

As far as the mineral oil or baby oil if you have future problems with retained eyecaps... I know I have seen it recommended, but it certainly wouldn't be the first thing I'd try. If you keep the humidity up high enough (especially starting when the snake's eyes go blue and you know a shed is imminent), you should not need to worry. If you have trouble keeping the humidity high enough in the entire enclosure, you can add a humid hide at shedding time. If you still have a problem shed, you an soak the snake to help. If after all that, you still have retained eyecaps, most people seem to believe that leaving them until the next shed does not pose a problem as long as they come off that time.

Dented/wrinkly looking eyes can be a sign of not enough humidity and/or retained eyecaps from what I have read. Since usually the retained eyecaps would be a result of not enough humidity, that pretty much is the same thing anyway. So try to increase your humidity some more.

[DutchHerp]

hi all, thanks for the replies.

He shed his eyecaps on the last shed, it came off in one piece.

My question was about the baby oil/mineral oil that someone had suggested I try .


dutchherp,

on the previous shed my snake's eyes were wrinkled too, which is why I was concerned because they looked like they were still on.

so, how does your snake's eyes look now?

for mine, his eyes look better now. still a little bit wrinkled but at least they're clear now.

Hey man,

My normal shed today, and to my total amazement, his eyes are fixed! They're completely smooth now.

I'd just wait for the next (couple) sheds... good luck!

[pliskin]

cool, thanks guys.

kc,

I did actually soak him the last time( previous to this complete shed ) and I even brought him back to the reptile store where I got him and the guy there soaked him for almost an hour. he then tried to roll the eyecaps off but they wouldn't budge.

I had never done the eyecaps removal thing before since I'm still pretty new to this. That's why I brought him back to the store, I didn't want to risk damaging his eyes. I was so relieved when I checked his shedded skin and saw the eyecaps.

hopefully I will not have to go through this again since I know how much humidity to have now.

[frankykeno]

I've seen some pretty disgusting multiple caps on some of the rescues we've had in the past. Saoirse was probably the worst - 3 layers on one eye, 5 on the other. Very, very nasty looking and we were pretty sure under that mess would be a blind snake. We did the soaking, we got some of the layers off, in fact with soaking we got one eye cleared up. The other eye retained 2 layers of caps still but with the advice of Adam Wysocki we didn't mess with that eye. We let it be, focused ourselves totally on making sure this snake had the best possible setup to encourage a good shed and bingo...first shed with us, those last 2 caps were gone.

A bit of a dent which resolved itself in time but guess who to this day has two lovely BP eyes.

Please if you aren't sure what you're doing when it comes to eyecaps be extremely careful. I remember Adam telling me about snakes that have lost eyes to some of the "tips and tricks" folks picked up online.

[pliskin]

I've seen some pretty disgusting multiple caps on some of the rescues we've had in the past. Saoirse was probably the worst - 3 layers on one eye, 5 on the other. Very, very nasty looking and we were pretty sure under that mess would be a blind snake. We did the soaking, we got some of the layers off, in fact with soaking we got one eye cleared up. The other eye retained 2 layers of caps still but with the advice of Adam Wysocki we didn't mess with that eye. We let it be, focused ourselves totally on making sure this snake had the best possible setup to encourage a good shed and bingo...first shed with us, those last 2 caps were gone.

A bit of a dent which resolved itself in time but guess who to this day has two lovely BP eyes.

Please if you aren't sure what you're doing when it comes to eyecaps be extremely careful. I remember Adam telling me about snakes that have lost eyes to some of the "tips and tricks" folks picked up online.

yeah, when the guy at the store told me what to do , I said " I'll just bring him in and YOU show me how to do it" I wasn't going to take the chance and then have him say "I didn't tell you to do it that way" or some other crap.

I was even saying 'I told you so' when he couldn't remove them either.