Broken tail

*Bumpety Bump Bump*

(I had just one "bump" but it was too short a message)

I guess I'm on my own to figure this one out? All right... :awcrap: (yes I did go in the search engine as well)

There is a stickie on this forum about dealing with bad or incomplete sheds.

This thread may help http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56170

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!:bowdown:

I've been looking for a few days & it didn't matter what I typed in, that thread never popped up. Now let's hope I do it right & Martha cooperates. *crosses fingers*

Woohoo, last AB jab was tonight, we were both getting pretty good at it.

Gave her a nice 20 min soak & we didn't get a shed. The underside of her tail is looking dark IMO. She did drink a lot, which is good & we finally had a poop! And of course who has to pick it up to put in the poop jar? Mom (moi) of course! *rolls eyes We need 2 more poops...

... uhm... how often do 1yr old snakes poop? Last time she ate was 3 weeks ago. And we've offered her food twice since the "accident" & she just refuses it.

There was an odd behaviour (well for us anyways), at one point she was rubbing the underside of her throat area, side to side, on my son's arm & she was widening her cheek area. I thought maybe she was trying to get a shed going but we've never witnessed a shed. (Feeding yes but not shed) We were hoping she'd do the same thing on fabric instead of a bare arm but nope. So we put her in a different tank (our veiled chameleon's old tank. Same dimensions just twice the height.) since our darling (NOT) cat decided to jump on the tank & somehow knocked it over but we brought down the table it used to be on when she was in my son's room. I hope the height is ok until I can either get another tank or build one? I wouldn't want Martha to get hurt trying to climb the slippery walls.

Our corn is in a 75 gal tank that is approx 2ft. tall and she climbs right upto to the screen, but never seems to be a problem. She fell down once but just kept on movin'. I dont think the height is an issue

(Were still waiting for a 1st shed too)

It still makes me nervous when I see her go up & then "thud!" she just plops down.

If anyone is still following this thread: How often can you give them a soak? Martha's dead skin still hasn't come off despite last night's soak & light rub (she still doesn't like getting her tail touched) & I'm starting to worry. I'll try & take a photo.

*Le Bump* Thanks

Updates in a while please! It's a real shame it happened, but I hope things are going to get better.

Lyion said:

Updates in a while please!

Click to expand...

Sorry? Meaning I'm asking too much too soon & expecting too much? I don't mean to, my sincere apologies. I figured that if I've tried my best to figure things out by myself & haven't got anywhere, asking experienced people on here was ok no matter if it was one question or a multitude. :awcrap:

What happened to Martha was pretty nasty & when it's the first time one experiences something like that, it's freakin scary. We thought she had only lost 1/2" of the tip of the tail but it's not the case, she lost more than half of it & I'm doing my best not to have her lose more. Her vent is finally healing & at least having taken a soak the other night helped her have her first poop in over 2 weeks. I'm still trying to find out how many times a snake usually poops or can poop when having skipped a few meals but still can't find anything in my search.

I took photos last night, so will post them later today.

Apologies again... my English speaking son brought to my attention that my answer was the French version: too long.

I personally don't see an issue with asking questions, ask away I wish I could help answer....but these are questions I'm curious to know the answers too as well. Best of luck to you with Martha, sorry that your dealing with the stress and the 'what ifs' of her health without knowing what you can do to help.

Thanks I appreciate that.

LMS68 said:

Sorry? Meaning I'm asking too much too soon & expecting too much? I don't mean to, my sincere apologies. I figured that if I've tried my best to figure things out by myself & haven't got anywhere, asking experienced people on here was ok no matter if it was one question or a multitude. :awcrap:

What happened to Martha was pretty nasty & when it's the first time one experiences something like that, it's freakin scary. We thought she had only lost 1/2" of the tip of the tail but it's not the case, she lost more than half of it & I'm doing my best not to have her lose more. Her vent is finally healing & at least having taken a soak the other night helped her have her first poop in over 2 weeks. I'm still trying to find out how many times a snake usually poops or can poop when having skipped a few meals but still can't find anything in my search.

I took photos last night, so will post them later today.

Click to expand...

No no no D: Asking for help is one of the best things you can do! I meant that I want you to continue to tell us how she is doing in the future!

To answer the other question... I think that I wouldn't soak too often. Maybe every other day? But I'm not sure why you are soaking her..
I think, this is my opinion, I'd hold off on soaking her until she goes out of "blue" so where she is really close to shedding. My mind tells me that it is best for her to get a good scab over it until she is close to shedding. It will help her to shed off the scabs by soaking her before she sheds. And sorry to say, it's going to be open and bleeding again when she sheds
Just to compare to, I had a bullsnake with a bad nose rub and the first two sheds it opened up and bled all over. Finally the third shed it turned into a scar. I think it will take longer with the type of injury you're describing.
Am I correct in that she degloved the tip?

Lyion also meant that you should post progression pictures! lol.

I'm not much help in the way of advice for the tail, but I do have experience with a mangled vent. Our corn somehow mangled his, we don't know how. I took him to two vets, wasn't impressed with the first, and the things they stressed to me was to keep his viv with minimal things unless extremely smooth and to keep him on paper towels until it healed. They stressed the importance of keeping his vent moist with a medicated cream during the healing process. They had me cleaning his vent by gently rolling a Qtip doused with peroxide once a day and applying the cream two to three times a day. I used to have to put him in a shallow bath to make it easier for him to poop, I did it a number of times during the healing process {which for us took about 4-5mths}. I also kept his meals on the smaller side so he wouldn't have too much trouble passing it out, the last thing we needed was him prolapsing from trying to push it through a scab. My little guy's vent has been healed for a while now, it's deformed but it works great for him and that's what is important. Best wishes to you and your corn, I'll be keeping you both in my thoughts.

Oh good god... just call me Derpina! *smacks head* I consider myself pretty bilingual but there are times that stuff gets lost in translation. Huge apologies!

Ok I still need to upload the photos to show you guys but in the meantime, this morning I noticed Martha was dull & blue! Big PHEW!!! We had a follow up visit with the vet tomorrow but I postponed it being that she still hasn't eaten in 3 weeks, just finished her shots & now turned blue, I didn't want to stress her even more by going on a car ride (30min trip one way) & it's still cold out there on top of that (though not as cold as 2 weeks ago for our first visit). I told the receptionist I preferred not to stress her more but the moment I see things aren't good, I'd come by. Otherwise, I rescheduled for next Tuesday & hopefully by then we'll have a shed & a full belly!

Forgot to respond to why I was soaking her; it was because on the belly side the scales (clear) were flaking off as if it was a bad shed. Like when you get a sunburn & after a while you have dead skin that's flaking off. You could see some falling off or a few about in her viv & when she moved you could hear the dead scales crackle. Her tail also had a white dead skin film on it. On the side of the vent that was damaged there was an object poking out, so either a displaced scale or a piece of aspen stuck in there. Regardless, it's not something you just yank off. Though I was applying polysporin to it, I figured a bit of water to hydrate would not be a bad idea. Plus it helped her pass a long overdue poo that she couldn't produce with all the stress & swelling.

I had tried for a couple of days to add humidity (2X/day) with the spray bottle. We were also noticing a faint blue hue over her body but her eyes were clear. I had been told to expect a sudden shed. Then finally two days ago she finally went in the "Blue shed" phase. Anyhoo... hope that clears it up a bit.

Yesterday morning I thought I had made a mistake by canceling her vet appointment, she was darker IMO (noticed she was dark & dull the day I saw her eyes were blue) & seemed lethargic. She had also been found often on the cold side of the viv. I picked her up to check on her, she was all coiled up, so I picked her up & put her on my chest & cupped my hand over her. She started to warm up & perked up. After checking her & handling her for a bit (she was exploring) I put her back in her strawberry hide, on top of the UTH (I had also spritzed to raise the humidity) & she's stayed in the warm area either in her hide or under the paper towel ever since. This morning her colours were better & she was much more perkier. Tonight her eyes were not as blue. I never really payed lots of attention on how long she stayed in the blue phase before.

Ok I finally have some photos... I tried capturing the best ones off of videos we took (a friend who's a vet student wanted to see her & how we gave her the injections). I'm uploading a couple of videos of close ups of her tail from the 23rd. So, 5 days after the accident.

I can't find any from the first 48hrs but here are screen captures off the videos taken at the 48hr mark just before her pain med injection. My apologies for the bad quality.

Jan. 20th 48 hrs




Jan 23rd






Hiding in her strawberry...


More pics to come...

Jan 31st
Having her 2nd soak. I was by myself, so she was very active at first, those dry shots didn't go too well. I started taking the photos after 10 - 15 min of soaking




The grey hue, when the tail is dry, is the white dead skin.






20 min are up & I'm outta here!


More dry pics to come...