Meet Lazarus (rescue)

[Spirit_Scale]

Aaron, if I need to, if there are eggs lying around and there is a second outbreak, then I will step up my methods. But I would first like to try something as snake friendly as possible.

Diluted or not, the fact that there have been fatalities and damage makes me hesitant to use it in a scenario where

A) The mites are not heavily established nor had they had time to breed. The snake was put right away into a clean tank that had been treated, and the snake was treated as well. Immediately nine times out of ten any mite I saw or came off the snake was dead. To me, this suggests that in combination with the low numbers of mites and the fact that they hadn't had time to colonize the tank that they would not have ample time to breed.
B) I treat, disinfect and wipe down the cage daily.

Which suggests to me that drastic methods are not called for.

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

As I said, doesn't NEED to be bigger.

Quite often we over feed our captives and overestimate what they need to thrive.

People love to feed huge meals to their captives on a regular basis. Try feeding your pets 10 - 15% of their body weight on a regular weekly basis, bet you'll see a faster growth.

Ah, yes. That's the kind of schedule I've had Cloud on. Now that I've started actually having him weighed monthly, so I have a better idea of his weight. Last month he was almost 4.5lbs, and I'm guessing he's now 5lbs (if not a little over), as he gained 9oz between the last two times I weighed him. I'll be taking him to be weighed tomorrow, and he's due to eat tomorrow as well, but I might hold off another day. He's eating 275-280 gram large rats once a week (this feeding is late due to his shedding cycle), and I was thinking about going biweekly, but I'm not sure now.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by dbassa

I really like feeding by this percentage formula. I first read about it on Alessia55's web page which sadly I can no longer find, and have been using it for the entire time I have had my ball and corn snakes.

Yeah, there's a really good reason she put that there. Learned it from a couple other people.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by mikoh4792

do you feed adult snakes weekly too when using this formula?

I do yes. I am breeding my animals so the females absolutely need a regular meal offered.

I'd do it anyway, even if I wasn't breeding. Purely because I think it's a solid size as it isn't too big or too small and keeps the snake at a good, proper weight.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by Spirit_Scale

Aaron, if I need to, if there are eggs lying around and there is a second outbreak, then I will step up my methods. But I would first like to try something as snake friendly as possible.

Diluted or not, the fact that there have been fatalities and damage makes me hesitant to use it in a scenario where

Whoa whoa whoa. Don't change your tune here. You said even diluted it's killed animals. Multiple animals. I politely asked if you recall where this happened. I think it's a fair request being that I use the product and to my knowledge unless not properly used is safe for my animals.

A) The mites are not heavily established nor had they had time to breed. The snake was put right away into a clean tank that had been treated, and the snake was treated as well. Immediately nine times out of ten any mite I saw or came off the snake was dead. To me, this suggests that in combination with the low numbers of mites and the fact that they hadn't had time to colonize the tank that they would not have ample time to breed.

You're silly to think they haven't 'colonized'. They don't colonize the tank, they colonize the snake. The fact that they were escaping off the snake when you first got it tells me it was grossly covered. There are FAR more of them, and breeding, then you think. They already had ample time to breed before you ever saw them.

"Low numbers" means squat when there's multiple ADULTS already established on your snake. You're underestimating these things.

Hope you don't have to re-treat. Sincerely, good luck.

[bcr229]

Kudos on the rescue and I really hope you can bring this poor guy back to good health.

I'm going to back up Aaron's recommendation to use the Nix. Here in the US we can also get PAM which is a 0.5% permethrin product in an aerosol can, but I don't think it's available in Canada. If you mix the Nix concentrate with 1 gallon (4 liters) of distilled water, you get the same basic product - you just need a squirt bottle to apply it.

You don't treat the snake directly with it, only the enclosure (remove the water bowls first) and substrate. We use paper towels for QT'ed animals, spray everything outside with the diluted Nix, and let it dry before bringing everything back inside and returning the snake to the treated enclosure and substrate.

Mites have five phases in their life cycle, and the third and fourth phases (protonymph and deutonymph) typically do not live on the snake. Also, the females don't tend to lay eggs on the snake either, they prefer a hidden corner. This is why the Nix or PAM treatment works even though only the enclosure and substrate are treated - the mites that hatch out don't live to adulthood because they travel across the treated surfaces, and the females die when they leave the snake to lay eggs.

[Spirit_Scale]

Well, if I need to I will consider the nix in the future.

Just got back from the vet, Lazarus weighs 2.2 kilos/almost 5 pounds and other than a retained eyecap, some old burn marks/scars on his nose and the abscess he's in good shape. He still does huff/puff/wheeze a bit but the vet didn't say anything when she examined his mouth. Worse comes to worse I'll take him back in if I notice anything off.

His abscess is actually three tiny ones close together, none of them are attached to the bone and none of them seemed very bad. So she decided to do the conservative option (in part due to his age and his health as its impossible to know *exactly* what his status is) and do two weeks of daily (baytril) antibiotic injections and see if it begins to go away on its own. Added bonus is that it should help if there's any beginnings of an RI in his lungs as well.

If not, we'll do the surgery, lance it, clean it out etc.

I'm very surprised and proud of him---hell of a lot of noise but no strikes or bites.
Though that may change with the daily injections lol.

[KORBIN5895]

I think daily injections for two weeks is very extreme. Also nix is supposed to be sprayed directly on the snake.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by Spirit_Scale

Well, if I need to I will consider the nix in the future.

Just got back from the vet, Lazarus weighs 2.2 kilos/almost 5 pounds and other than a retained eyecap, some old burn marks/scars on his nose and the abscess he's in good shape. He still does huff/puff/wheeze a bit but the vet didn't say anything when she examined his mouth. Worse comes to worse I'll take him back in if I notice anything off.

His abscess is actually three tiny ones close together, none of them are attached to the bone and none of them seemed very bad. So she decided to do the conservative option (in part due to his age and his health as its impossible to know *exactly* what his status is) and do two weeks of daily (baytril) antibiotic injections and see if it begins to go away on its own. Added bonus is that it should help if there's any beginnings of an RI in his lungs as well.

If not, we'll do the surgery, lance it, clean it out etc.

I'm very surprised and proud of him---hell of a lot of noise but no strikes or bites.
Though that may change with the daily injections lol.

Baytril is bad to just use as a RI "preventative".

If an RI is present (doesn't sound like it) then a culture would be needed as the cause of the RI could be resistant to baytril. Hopefully no burns turn up with the daily injections.

I'm not trying to be a jerk here but boa abscess's are not like ours, they tend to be "hard" and not fluid filled. I don't see them going away on their own with a general drug like baytril.

There's nothing wrong with his health it seems from the outside other than the parts you mentioned and his age is still fairly young (even if it's 11 years) so I'd go with the surgery to get rid of it for sure.

All the best though. Good luck.

[Spirit_Scale]

I know that snake abscesses are not like those in mammals. But this was the option my exotic vet wanted to try and if it saves him being put under and me the cost of surgery then I'll give it a shot.
She wasn't able to do the surgery today and would've only been able to schedule it in at best two weeks so it gives me room to see if the baytril will have any effect.

As far as I know as well abscesses can often indicate systemic bacterial issues so this should help clear that up.

I'm familiar with baytril and know that it isn't effective for many pathogens anymore as well as can cause burns/lumps in snakes, so I'll be alternating his injection site and hoping all goes well. The RI preventative was more an off-hand comment 'hey maybe it'll help if I'm lucky' then a serious 'it'll treat this for sure' type of thing.

He just shed a little while ago, everything came off in one piece minus (as I predicted) his head, which with a wet cloth I was able to roll off the stuck skin---it was ready to come off just between the abscess and the scars it is tricky for him. The retained eyecap is gone as far as I can tell and both eyes and nostrils are clear. There's still a piece stuck where his abscess is but I'm letting him soak and calm down before I work that off him. There's an odd patch on his back that looks like either damaged scales or a scar---its not stuck shed (though perhaps retained shed from a long time ago?) as it doesn't move when soaked and gently rolled and there weren't any holes in his shed when I checked.

I'll get some pics up of him and the odd patch

[slowhite03]

So, I've been reading this and as an outsider I'm going to say this, I don't want to start a war or an off topic starter. They are using a well used mite remover and he wants to use it, quit trying to force him to use a diffrent product when he is comfortable using the product he has. Why does everyone say take their pets to a vet and once the vet recommends something they say the vet is wrong and they know what's best. If the vet recommends something, I would trust what they say. Sorry to rant but I just had to speak my mind.

[KORBIN5895]

Originally Posted by slowhite03

So, I've been reading this and as an outsider I'm going to say this, I don't want to start a war or an off topic starter. They are using a well used mite remover and he wants to use it, quit trying to force him to use a diffrent product when he is comfortable using the product he has. Why does everyone say take their pets to a vet and once the vet recommends something they say the vet is wrong and they know what's best. If the vet recommends something, I would trust what they say. Sorry to rant but I just had to speak my mind.

You are 100% percent correct in saying mite-off is well know. Unfortunately it is well known as being extremely ineffective. The only people that purchase this are new snake owners.

Originally Posted by Aaron_S

As I said, doesn't NEED to be bigger.

Quite often we over feed our captives and overestimate what they need to thrive.

People love to feed huge meals to their captives on a regular basis. Try feeding your pets 10 - 15% of their body weight on a regular weekly basis, bet you'll see a faster growth.

I completely agree with the fact that we feed our snakes way too much.

I personally feed very large meals but I space them way out. Today I fed my 6'6" female albino a rabbit weighing 3 lbs 11 oz. I won't feed her again for 5-6 weeks at the earliest.

[Aaron_S]

Originally Posted by slowhite03

So, I've been reading this and as an outsider I'm going to say this, I don't want to start a war or an off topic starter. They are using a well used mite remover and he wants to use it, quit trying to force him to use a diffrent product when he is comfortable using the product he has. Why does everyone say take their pets to a vet and once the vet recommends something they say the vet is wrong and they know what's best. If the vet recommends something, I would trust what they say. Sorry to rant but I just had to speak my mind.

Actually I didn't "force" anything. If you actually read my entire comments I made note to say my comments were so anyone who needed help reading the thread would have two viable options and the pros and cons of both to make judgement on.

I never said I knew more than a vet but I certainly know a heck of a lot about reptiles. I only made suggestions based on known facts. Do you take everyone's knowledge at face value? I'm a professional, I get paid to raise snakes, why is my opinion not apparently valid?

[Spirit_Scale]

These are the pics from a few days ago right after he shed.

As for today, Lazarus is doing well. I can't be certain but I *think* the abscess is beginning to shrink after three days of shots and I'm hearing less noise from him (I checked his mouth, no obvious bubbles or drool). He's taken two small rats (cleaning out the freezer of the remaining stock before I go get mediums for him and my BP---occasionally I switch up sizes with my BP when he begins to get fussy as sometimes smaller-than-normal prey does the trick) and is very active and curious.

No bites or sketchy behaviour from him and the mite situation is under control thus far, I find a dead mite or two every other day.