Re: URGENT HELP NEEDED!!! -elaphe radiata.

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Posted by hotshot on January 22, 2003 at 09:32:28:

In Reply to: URGENT HELP NEEDED!!! -elaphe radiata. posted by borneoshankhdotz on January 22, 2003 at 06:19:22:

Might want to get her to a vet ASAP, explain to them what you explained here, and hopefully they can help her. Sounds like you may have poisoned her. Bleach fumes can irritate the throat muscles, and if bad enough can cause the throat to swell shut, causing asphyxiation. Not to mention causing pnuemonia as well.

What kind of moss are you using for substrate? It is a very good chance the moss retained enough bleach in it to make your snake ill. Just a suggestion, I would use either aspen or newspaper, as a substrate, that way once it is "dirty", you can throw it away and replace it with fresh stuff.

Bleach can be a very effective disenfectant, but can also be very deadly to anything living. I use liquid soap and hot water when cleaning my cages, has worked well for me.

Also when bathing your snake, make sure the water is luke-warm, or tepid. Not warm to the touch, that is too warm for a snake. Good luck and keep us posted on your girls condition.
Brian

:I found my CB02 female radiated rat-snake in very ill health yesterday. She is usually quite nippy and fast, but she is really slow now-infact almost motionless! All the way down the length of the animal the body has change form to a triangular cross-section, she is unusually white also and for 2or3" down the neck looks somewhat swollen. I picked her up and her body was just twisting and twisting along the length in some kind of crazy dizzy madness!
:The temps are ok, the humidity maybe slightly too high, branches, good-sized water bowl, hot-spot, relatively large enclosure.
:-The only thing that i think it may be:
:-I recently bleached the substrate moss overnight but maybe didnt rinse all of the bleach away?
:-prehaps the frozen pinky food is out of date and gone bad?
:-i gave the snake a bath in cold water a few weeks ago, and she had a bad muscle reflex to that-she was all twisted and couldnt move until she was warm again?

:-i noticed yesterday that there was some unusual blue-coloured urine clumps in her tank-can this have somethbing to do with the bleach used?

:Any help is appreciated! Thanks.

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