Hey, don't be too hard on yourself. Freaky things happen, even when you are doing everything right. We lost an adult piebald to a gas-producing GI infection and it wasn't because the food was too big -- it just happened. Hopefully you caught this early and snakey will be OK, but she sounds like she may be a poor-doer/ failure to thrive animal, thus the "you may lose this one" comment.

For the record, we keep our babies around 87F on the warm side and they do great with that.