Tirel, Ghost Boa

[bigsnakegirl785]

This is one of my two new arrivals! She's a poss super ghost 66% het albino, born 5/27/15. I bought her from Dave Green at Green Constrictors. He was easy to work with and gave me several updates on her. There was a bit of a mix up on schedules when it came time to ship, causing me to wait an extra week, but there were no other delays and she got here safely.

Like Morzan, she came out of the bag swinging. Snapped at my face a couple of times, and eyed my hand if I made any movement, but I didn't get bit and she wasn't overly intent on murdering me. lol Slightly more laid back than Morzan.

She's a lot bigger than my other June 2015 girl Nymeria, already on small rats, roughly 3' long. I'm ordering a shipment of rodents here in a couple of weeks, since Nymeria is moving up and I need to get smalls for Bud, so for her first feeding she'll get a jumbo mouse but by her next feeding I should have the proper rats in. I'm thinking of giving her a weaned rat first before going straight to smalls since I like to feed a bit smaller, but I'll see how the rats look when they get here. She's definitely going to be fed every 2-3 weeks since she's a year and on the larger side of average, and I'll try her on a mouse next Thursday.

The other new arrival is an anery motley 66% het albino male, and he should be here Tuesday. The weather in Texas delayed his shipment, otherwise he'd be here with her.

[macandchz]

beautiful snake! those eyes say, "Don't turn your back on me!"

[Albert Clark]

Wow! Nice. It won't be long before you are breeding Vin Russo style. Lol.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Albert Clark

Wow! Nice. It won't be long before you are breeding Vin Russo style. Lol.

It will still be quite awhile, I don't plan on breeding either of my females before they're 4.5-5 years (would like them to be closer to 5). So, still about 4 years to go. She's huge for a yearling, I thought she was only 3' but she stretched nearly the length and height of her tub, which is 34" and 15" respectively. If she's already so big she may actually be the first one to breed...If she is 4' she's bigger than I'm comfortable with for a yearling, so she's going to have her feedings spaced out faster than Nymeria's although if she is 4' smalls are probably going to be my only option for feeding her. 4' is a bit big to be on weaned rats.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Well, I went ahead and fed Tirel since I'm working tomorrow, and it's only a day early. The jumbo mouse was bigger compared to her than I though it would be, so weaned rats may actually be perfect for her for awhile yet.





A few hours after eating:

[bigsnakegirl785]

Well I began handling on Friday, the handling session went well until I wanted to put her up. -.- Once I set her down, before I could get her off my hand, she shot up her tub and grabbed onto the lip with her head. I tried to pick her up off of it and she got ready to headbutt/snap at me, but pulled away halfway through the strike. After that, she let me put her up with little hassle.

I got to take her outside so here are some daylight photos. She's in her dark phase here.







She seems weirdly intrigued by my camera, whenever I have it out taking pictures of her (during the two actual handling sessions I've had with her), she keeps bumping at the lens and trying to climb on the camera even as I'm pulling it away from her. (You can see her belly in the corner because she was crawling on it.)



Here she is again investigating the lens, while I take a close up of her tail.

[bigsnakegirl785]

And here's from tonight. I got some fake plants in today and put one in her tub. She was all excited over the washing machine going earlier, so I took her out to try to expend some of her energy.

Unfortunately I must not have had her out long enough because she once again shot up out of her tub, and grabbed onto her water dish, knocking it over while I tried to retrieve her. I ended up just leaving her there so I could take a photo and change her bedding.





And some from the handling session before becoming a problem child yet again.







And some that were a bit truer to color. She was in a light phase, so she was looking whiter/grayer than ever, with the brownness a little less pronounced, on her back.

[Eryaw]

Beautiful animal. I really like the ghost boas- have 2 currently

[Albert Clark]

Amazing boa! He really looks healthy.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Eryaw

Beautiful animal. I really like the ghost boas- have 2 currently

I'm not actually a big fan of ghosts, but she fits in well with my breeding plans so I got her. I still think she's gorgeous, but ghosts don't generally strike my fancy.

That said, I do like some of those linebred ones, like the white group, bred to be less brown and more white/gray.

Originally Posted by Albert Clark

Amazing boa! He really looks healthy.

She's actually one of my females - or better be. lol

[bigsnakegirl785]

This feeding day she got her rat. I gave her a small rat this time since that's what the breeder had her on, but I think the bulge is a little large so I'm going to give her a weaned rat and see what sort of lump that leaves. If it isn't too small, I'll step her down to weaned rats, if they are too small I'll keep her on smalls but space her feedings out to every 3 weeks.





And the bulge after (it's cool seeing these pics side by side because she goes through such a nice color change).



It didn't look too impressive from that angle, so here's a side view. Considering how large she is for her age, and the fact she's a year old, I'd like to see a barely noticeable bulge. I like to feed smaller prey items rather than feeding larger and having to space out the feedings even further.



These photos are from the morning of. Whenever I open the window and turn on the fan, it makes her antsy for awhile and then she settles down at the front of her tub. Well front for me anyway.

Heard a thump in the night and found this. She was belly up but rolled over when I opened her tub.



What are you looking at?



And one from later on that morning, when she ended up dumping her water dish. She was not happy at all, and actually hissed at me when I went to pick her up. She didn't put up a fight at all and immediately stopped hissing when I lifted her up.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Well today we had to take a vet visit for Tirel.

I woke up at 1 pm and Tirel was doing fine, she had her head hanging out of her vine. At about 2:30 pm I noticed movement in her vine: she was switching her tail around. I thought she was pooping so I came around to the side to look under her vines and see. I was greeted by a very swollen head, a loud hiss, a strike to the side of the tub, and then she violently jumped away deeper into her vines.

I lifted the vine out to look at her and I freaked out because her face was all puffy and she was still swinging her tail around.

Here's a video of the tail wagging.

https://vimeo.com/172488521

Here are some photos from before I took her to the vet.







And at the vet's waiting to be seen.



The vet said it's probably cellulitis and it's usually caused by a bacterial infection. He said we'd need to put her on antibiotics and and I asked him if it was possible to get some cultures done on it. We were unable to get any samples from the swollen area, so he got some from her throat but says that probably won't tell us what's going on with the swelling. He contacted the place they send the samples to see if there was any worthwhile samples he could get and we'll decide where to go from there.

For now, she got a shot of Fortaz so she at least has some sort of treatment overnight. Depending on what happens we'll either be staying with him for her treatment or going to the one in Asheville if we need a more experienced vet. I should be getting a call tomorrow to see what to do with her next.

She absolutely hated the visit, I thought for sure she'd bite or hiss or poop on us but the most she did was one very soft hiss and musk us. She had her pores WIDE open smearing it everywhere, it smelled heavily of fish in the office after that.

The weirdest thing is it went away as fast as it came on. Even before she got the shot he swelling went down. Her chin was so swollen it was hanging open slightly before I left but by the time I got to the vet office it had gone down enough to allow her mouth to close. By the time we took her out to give her the shot the swelling was almost completely gone.

Here she is when we got home.



Hopefully everything goes well and we'll easily have her treated with a round of antibiotics. I'll post more tomorrow.

[SWDK]

Hope she'll be ok in a few days. Definitely quite strange how the swelling seemed to vanish so quickly. Good luck with her and keep us posted on her.

[moshirimon]

I wouldnt worry too much yet. You may be over thinking. Looks to me like shes either got a shed coming , or something about her environment is off. Ive had a couple whos skin stretch and swell up right after being in blue. Basically a day or two before their shed. Even when they lay a certain way in their enclosure for very long and they move, their face is sometimes shaped to where they were resting. Not sure if it makes sense. Also after drinking a large amount of water their, throat seems to look quite full and can actually look so for a couple hours. Weird looking but it comes and goes. I dont have a great explanation , but as long as its gone now and it was gone fast, and she eats, poops, huffs puffs and all the good stuff, you should be fine.

Ps. Try adding height to her enclosure only if you think it could be her enclosure making her stressed. Ive had a boa that wouldnt eat and was extremely aggressive until i provided a perch. Since then he ate every time. Still agressive but you could tell he was much more comfortable.

[bigsnakegirl785]

This definitely wasn't swelling from shedding, I've never seen my shedding snakes swell to this degree (also, usually the swelling doesn't happen until they go blue). She shed not long before she arrived here, so it's been about a month since she last shed. She could be due for another one, but it's hard to tell if her colors are off from whatever was irritating her or if it's a shed. I'll check up on her again tomorrow and see if there's any signs of shedding.

I am also aware of the drinking thing, but usually they drool and no water came out when I pressed on it. Her whole body was swollen-looking, but it was most noticeable in her throat.

She has yet to poop in my care, so it's been about 3 weeks at least. She did drop a urate, but no feces. She's eating fine but has only taken two meals so far. I'm hoping she'll poop by the time her next feeding day comes up, I plan on feeding her every 3 weeks so surely there will be some poop by then.

The fact that I don't know it is a bacterial infection is why I've asked the vet to get a culture before doing any more shots, the Fortaz was just preventative since we can't do anything right now.

I have no clue what could be off. Her husbandry is good, hot spot of 90F, 86F above the paper towels, and a room temp in the high 70's low 80's and it drops down to the low 70's at night. I felt like the small rat I gave her was a bit too big of a meal but surely that didn't cause it, she'll probably be put on weaned rats instead.

She's in a room closed off from the rest of the house, and there were no appliances running or anything.

Of course this doesn't mean there wasn't something off, but there's nothing immediately identifiable to me that could have scared her. She was tail-wagging before I even made a move towards her, it's what brought my attention to her in the first place.

She's generally rather docile, if a bit touchy, but I wouldn't call her defensive just easily startled.

But again, I'm trying to get a culture done to see if there is an infection.