• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

Feeding with no poo?

chinupcheerup

New member
I have only had my Baird's Ratsnake 2 weeks, and he ate a F/T fuzzy last Sunday just fine, except that he ate it tail first. He weighs about 40g, but is very slender and anything bigger than a fuzzy would be too big.
He seems fine and dandy, but has not pooped. I searched here for constipation, and he doesn't have any lumps or anything that would indicate he is constipated, but he just hasn't pooped! I tried the warm water bath with no luck except making him mad.

My question is: is it safe to feed him again today when he hasn't cleared his last meal? I don't want him to not eat, but I don't want him to eat if it is going to harm him.
He is on Baytril for a URI (he came from a crappy place :( ), would that have anything to do with it?
 
what kind of bedding do you have him on? he may have pooped and you just cant see it or he pooped under the bedding
 
He is on Carefresh natural with newspaper under it. I sifted through the bedding 2 days ago looking for poo, with no luck. In the past when I have cared for snakes at my volunteer job, I could always smell the poo, since digested mouse is a fairly hard to miss smell. No smell here.
(and to anyone wondering, he was fed in a separate container, so impaction is not a concern)
 
well in my short experience with snakes, the poo only smells when its fresh. otherwise it's very easy to miss. also from the stories i've heard on here some snakes will poop every day after being fed and some will wait a week before pooping. i wouldn't worry too much.
 
I wouldnt worry much about it. I had a corn that only pooped once a month. As an adult, she dropped huge bombs about every three meals (and she was eating every 14 days). Either your guy pooped and it was small and hard to see (as it would be with a fuzzy), or he will poop after his next meal. Just be patient and he will poop. Dont stress him out with baths or anything like that, just wait it out.

Also, I would feed him two fuzzies or a small hopper for a meal. Bairds come out of the egg eating fuzzies so you might also be underfeeding him, which would be another reason why you cant find a poop. He might be digesting most of the food and only pooping urates, which are white and hard to see. Bairds are pretty slender but they have huge mouths. I feed my adults rats and they are the same size as my corns, its amazing how they can fit it all in there but they do!
 
I wouldn't worry too much; when I first got my baby girl corn she didn't appear to poo for a few weeks. But as mentioned above, it was likely because her meals were so small that her poos were miniscule. :)
 
Well, I thought I would update everyone: after 4 meals, he finally pooped, and it was a doozy. He was nice enough to leave it in his easy-to-clean wet hide though.

As an aside, he is still eating fuzzies as per vet recommendation. He spent 6 months lost at the place I got him, and so isn't quite where he should be on the growth chart (he is very long and slender, even for a Bairds). He should be moving up to two fuzzies within about 3 feedings.
 
Dress yourself up in an outfit that you're particularly fond of, get him out. In my experience, this induces a bowl movement within minutes, all over your nice clothes.
 
Back
Top