On Valentines Day I purchased a Butter/Lesser BP from PetSmart (the store I work at). We received her from Reptiles By Mack on September 19th, 2013 and seemed to be a in fairly decent shape. She was eating one pinky every four days (company policy) until she came to her first shed.

My manager and I noticed early on that she was taking a lot longer than most snakes to complete her shed. We took her to the vet who just recommended giving her a warm bath with some Shed-Ease once every day until the shed was gone. It took about another week until the shed was completely gone.

During this time, she stopped eating. Went a whole month before the vet force fed her some carnivore care. Afterwards, we were given a syringe and a packet of carnivore care along with directions to force feed her every other day until she eats a pinky.

This continued on for a few more weeks until she finally took a pinky.

However, each associate had a different way to get her mouth open and a couple of them were a bit rough.

Fast forward, I purchased this snake a few days days ago. Her bottom lip has a thin black lining and I feel she holds her mouth slightly open. I plan on taking her to my usual exotics vet but until then, I was wondering if anyone knew what this could be and if it is potentially life threatening.

Here are a few photos, I apologize for the quality as these were taken by cell phone. I can get some better ones tomorrow.



Is she holding her mouth slightly open or am I just seeing things?