Light massage leads to def??

[carnivorouszoo]

I had the overweight female I got out and she sat still for a while so I thought I would try giving her a bit of a massage to stimulate her drive to move (works with my others), but stimulated her to poop! It looked almost normal. The actual poop was a bit softer than I usually see. Nothing else looked or smelled off. Someone had seen pics and thought her lumps might be caused by constipation. . .can a snake be constipated but still poo?? Maybe just not as much as normal? I would have called my vet but its Sunday and he is closed today. When I had the fecal done to check for parasites he did not say anything was unusual and she is free of parasites. So . . .maybe I just helped her realize she needed to go?

Also, the male defficated while he was out and something odd happened. Just before he "went" he accidentally presented one of his hemis. Does this just happen from time to time or should I take this as a sign of constipation in him?

I will be calling my vet tomorrow but wanted to ask you guys to be sure I got a nice well rounded answer of what it might be. :D

[Haarstad]

Sorry but i do not know, that's interesting that the message made her poop for you. I figured i'd let you know that i had no idea so you weren't left in the dark. But maybe the massage worked like a warm bath, doesn't mean they are constipated but maybe it just helped her go before she normally would've?

[carnivorouszoo]

I wanted to update on this, the female has defficated each time exercised, is losing weight steadily and the lumps are less prominant. When she first came to us a few scales were creased and some sticking up in the folds between the lumps and now the creased ones are just curved and the ones that stood are now laying down. My vet is confused because constipation is usually a lack of feces, though sometimes lack of movement of the animal can cause the intestine and colon to become sluggish. So if they were not moving as much as corns usually do due to constantly digesting they could have developed issues "going" and the exercise is helping.

One thing the vet had no clue on was the fact that the male seems to be firming up but is putting on weight instead of losing. He is now even closer to 1000 grams.

On the first the male weighed in at 986 up from 964, he is being fed a single hopper each week and being exercised 3-4 days a week. (meaning he has been exercised 3 times with us so far but his schedule calls for 3-4 a week)

The female is was 693, then weighed in at 642 2 days after we got her, now weighs 646 grams. Because of the big drop so quickly after we got her, we put her on weanlings, one every 7 days for this month with the same exercise schedule as the male.

I took new pics of them on the first too. The male is the Amel and the female the Snow.

[bitsy]

One thing the vet had no clue on was the fact that the male seems to be firming up but is putting on weight instead of losing. He is now even closer to 1000 grams.
I don't know if it's the same for snakes but in humans, muscle weighs more than fat. If you're on a combined exercise and diet routine then the chances are that you will initially put on weight - you'll be losing fat but putting on weight as your muscles bulk up a bit. The bloke at the gym I went to when I tried it, said the best thing was to take body measurements to watch my progress and to stay away from the scales.

If the snake seems more toned with less flab, then that might explain the mystery weight gain?