weight problem?

hello all

now ive had my eldest girlie since she was 3 months old, shes now 5 years old, 5 foot in length and just over 600 grams!
i took her to the vet back in august as she looked gravid and i thought maybe that was the problem, but he checked her over and said she was heading towards obesity, ahhhhhhh, well he said to give her 2 baths a week to keep her active, handle her more often and let her slither about on my floor or something, and to feed her one mouse every 2 - 3 weeks, i have done all that and she still has put on the weight and shes getting worse, shes called skitzy as she was skitzoid, kept zooming around her viv day and night, but since last august she isnt very active at all, only to move from the hot end to the cool end or to drink water, thats it. i was handling her this morning and noticed that she has these bulges underneath her head and her mouth wasnt shut properly, was a tiny bit open, i panicked big time. now the weird thing is, she is big under the head and neck area and from mid-body to her tail, inbetween her neck and mid-body she thin and her backbone is starting to show quite badly, ive took some pictures but i personally think that they dont really show her size very well, but have posted them anyway. there is only one good reptile vet in my town and hes gone back to aussie over christmas to be with family, hes back on the 2nd january, so i will have to wait until then to get her back.
is she overweight do you think for her size, length and age? what do you all think could be the problem?
she is still eating well when i do feed her. she has never regurgitated and she has never had a shed problem either, she usually sheds in one whole piece but her recent shed was actually in pieces and she had trouble, could that be related to her size at all?

now this is the underneath of her by her tail ~


this is her at her biggest part of her body, now she isnt actually that wide, just where she is fat and squishy, my poor little girl ~


now this part doesnt show it very well at all, but she actually has a couple of creases here where she is coiled and shes big ~


skitzy, again she doesnt look as bad in these photos, she much bigger than she looks in these, she must photograph real well, bless her. ~

Instead of feeding every 2-3 weeks i would cut her down compleatly. I presume she's on large mice? If so i would cut her down to a small mouse every 7 days and she will lose a little weaght steadly rather then all at once which is more healthy for her. Email steve who runs this site http://www.snakepictures.co.uk/index.htm as his male is up and down with his weight, and he's now on a strick diet. He will ansaw any email you send him, and gives out great advice, he's helped me a lot in the past.

Good luck and don't worry to much as she will lose it, and the best way in my mind is gradually, so as to reduce other feeding problems like anorexia. Good luck and keep me updated.

Well, I'll just tell you what you already know. She's fat, that's all.

I have one that is a little fat. He only gets fed 1 adult mouse once a month. After 1 year of being on this diet, he still looks fat. I almost want to extend his feedings more, but I don't want to starve him.

The only other thing I can suggest is to get her to exercise more. Get her out every day for at least 30 minutes. I love to put mine on things such as coat racks, chairs, etc. so they work hard at holding on, etc.

I know your vet recommended baths to get her to be active, but I'm not sure I would do this too often. Baths usually really freak them out and add too much stress.

I would watch her mouth though. Is is possible that she has mouth rot or a respiratory infection? As far as I know it's only common for them to get fat in the last half of their bodies, not near the head. (Except Hurley just pointed out recently that some get swollen necks when they are in shed.)

Another thing I will add is that the body of a rat snake should look like a piece of bread in cross section; flat on the bottom, flat on the sides and slightly rounded on the top. You mentioned seeing the backbone sticking out... is it just that after being on this diet you are now finally seeing the snake's muscle?

cornman1979 said:

Instead of feeding every 2-3 weeks i would cut her down compleatly. I presume she's on large mice?

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oh no, she has a small mouse very 2-3 weeks

if so i would cut her down to a small mouse every 7 days and she will lose a little weaght steadly rather then all at once which is more healthy for her. Email steve who runs this site http://www.snakepictures.co.uk/index.htm as his male is up and down with his weight, and he's now on a strick diet. He will ansaw any email you send him, and gives out great advice, he's helped me a lot in the past.

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yeah i will definitely ask my vet about a small mouse every 7 days then to see what his opinion is, and thanx for steves e-mail, i will definitely forward this to him. thanx.

Good luck and keep me updated.

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thanx again, i certainly will do

Amanda E said:

Well, I'll just tell you what you already know. She's fat, that's all.

I have one that is a little fat. He only gets fed 1 adult mouse once a month. After 1 year of being on this diet, he still looks fat. I almost want to extend his feedings more, but I don't want to starve him.

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yeah i wanted to space out her feedings more too, but like you said i dont want to starve her.

The only other thing I can suggest is to get her to exercise more. Get her out every day for at least 30 minutes. I love to put mine on things such as coat racks, chairs, etc. so they work hard at holding on, etc.

I know your vet recommended baths to get her to be active, but I'm not sure I would do this too often. Baths usually really freak them out and add too much stress.

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yes i understand what you mean about the baths, im not overally keen on doing it either and ive only given her a bath every 2 weeks now and i put her on things around my room more instead.

I would watch her mouth though. Is is possible that she has mouth rot or a respiratory infection? As far as I know it's only common for them to get fat in the last half of their bodies, not near the head. (Except Hurley just pointed out recently that some get swollen necks when they are in shed.)

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the mouth thing definitely freaked me out for sure, i have watched mine carefully of what their actions are, what their bodies are like, etc before and after each shed and have never come across this thing below her neck before, another thing is shes has not long shed so she wouldnt be due to shed again for another month or two at least. i will certainly be pointing this out to the vet though.

Another thing I will add is that the body of a rat snake should look like a piece of bread in cross section; flat on the bottom, flat on the sides and slightly rounded on the top. You mentioned seeing the backbone sticking out... is it just that after being on this diet you are now finally seeing the snake's muscle?

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she certainly does not have a lot of muscle, under her neck she has a lot of squishy skin, well its excess skin, from her neck to mid-body shes quite thin, and i have never seen the line of her backbone before, from her mid- body to her tail i see absolutely no bone whatsoever, an awful lot of excess skin and flab, so to speak. now dont get me wrong, my other 3 are perfect, you cant see their backbone, only in certain movements they do, but they are not squishy either, its solid muscle, as its supposed to be, i have never overfed her or underfed any of them, none of my others have had this happen to them so i dont really understand why it has happened to her. she always used to be so active, she was always the one who kept me awake half the night moving things around her viv.


just wondering i kept one of her 2002 hatchlings from when she was bred, she wasnt big then, she was active and healthy, but is there a chance that my little diaga (whos now 2 1/2 years old) will take after her mother and suddenly get overweight or could it just be bad luck that this has happened? i wouldnt want my little healthy active baby having the same problem?

thanx for all your advice and replies

Missy said:

just wondering i kept one of her 2002 hatchlings from when she was bred, she wasnt big then, she was active and healthy, but is there a chance that my little diaga (whos now 2 1/2 years old) will take after her mother and suddenly get overweight or could it just be bad luck that this has happened? i wouldnt want my little healthy active baby having the same problem?

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Well, let me say first of all good luck with Skitzy.

As for your 2002, well, I guess it could be genetic. I certainly pack on the pounds just like my mom and my husband is as thin as they come, like his parents

I feed my 2002s 1 mouse every 14 days, so if you don't do this already with yours, you might want to, just to be safe and keep her from getting too fat. One of my 2002s is even getting a bit fat on this regimen, but she's a big lazy girl to begin with. I never see her out unless it's feeding day or I specifically get her out to play.

Why not change to chicks missy? I have done with my adult male blizzard (he was malnutritioned when i got him) and refused mice and rats point blank.
I tried a chick (recomended by Cindy) and since then he has eaten twice, and when back up to wieght i'll be keeping him on 1 chick every 10-14 days.
Just thought it might work the other way with Skitzy, feeding 1 chick every 2 weeks till her wieght comes down a little.

Amanda E said:

Well, let me say first of all good luck with Skitzy.

As for your 2002, well, I guess it could be genetic. I certainly pack on the pounds just like my mom and my husband is as thin as they come, like his parents

I feed my 2002s 1 mouse every 14 days, so if you don't do this already with yours, you might want to, just to be safe and keep her from getting too fat. One of my 2002s is even getting a bit fat on this regimen, but she's a big lazy girl to begin with. I never see her out unless it's feeding day or I specifically get her out to play.

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i already feed Diaga a fuzzie every 10-14 days, then the next feeding i feed her 2 fuzzies then the next 1 fuzzie, and so on. you see i think a mouse is still a tad too big for her and dont want her to regugitate, have never had it happen to any of mine so i dont really want to start experiencing it now, you know? but when she gets a little bigger i will be feeding her one mouse every 14 days.
thanx for your reply, you have been very helpful and reassuring.

cornman1979 said:

Why not change to chicks missy? I have done with my adult male blizzard (he was malnutritioned when i got him) and refused mice and rats point blank.
I tried a chick (recomended by Cindy) and since then he has eaten twice, and when back up to wieght i'll be keeping him on 1 chick every 10-14 days.
Just thought it might work the other way with Skitzy, feeding 1 chick every 2 weeks till her wieght comes down a little.

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hmm, have never fed any of them chicks before, as shes an adult is there a chance she may not take it as shes always had mice or rat weiners?
i will certainly, however look into that, thank you.
what are chicks like?
i mean, are they more/ less nutritional or more/ less fatty than mice or rat weiners (baby rats) then?
thanx too for your replies, you too have been helpful and reassuring.

less fatty then a rat and more fatty then a mouse, but they are the same as chickens too us but with added calcium, if you include the beak and feet (some recomend don't let the snake eat them and say do). I feed with the feet still attached and clip the beak to allow a little blood to come through (I am feeding an under nourished snake remember and trying to get his wieght up a little).

Usually I would say stick to mice, but it's another option and a healthy alternative, I haven't used them a lot till i got this snake and (touch wood) he now putting on a few grams, but i honestly believe it will work the other way as well to reduce a "overweight snakes" weight as well. In your shoes i would try and alternate a small mouse or weiner rat and a chick once a fortnight and monitor for about 3 months as you really don't want the weight to come off to quick.

cornman1979 said:

less fatty then a rat and more fatty then a mouse, but they are the same as chickens too us but with added calcium, if you include the beak and feet (some recomend don't let the snake eat them and say do). I feed with the feet still attached and clip the beak to allow a little blood to come through (I am feeding an under nourished snake remember and trying to get his wieght up a little).

Usually I would say stick to mice, but it's another option and a healthy alternative, I haven't used them a lot till i got this snake and (touch wood) he now putting on a few grams, but i honestly believe it will work the other way as well to reduce a "overweight snakes" weight as well. In your shoes i would try and alternate a small mouse or weiner rat and a chick once a fortnight and monitor for about 3 months as you really don't want the weight to come off to quick.

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lol, i already am feeding Skitzy a small to regular sized mouse once every 14 days, have been doing this since last july/august, shes getting more exercise too and yet shes still putting it on, thats what i really dont understand.
shes 5 years old, 5 foot in length and just over 600 grams, would you have said this was a dangerous rate do you think?
:shrugs:

my male is just over 4ft long and weighs just over 300 grams which i think isn't a lot as they tend to be fatter then females.
For a 5ft female (which is a big female anyway lol) i would say nearer 500grams is better. Just drop her down a size for a while and see if it makes any differance.

I've seen this once in one of mine and it wasn't good news. I was told at the time that some Corns have a metabolic disorder, where their bodies process food incorrectly and lay down large stores of unnecessary fat as a result. This is an inherited trait and was reasonably common in the UK when I first started keeping Corns (early 90s), as the captive breeding gene pool was quite limited in the UK at that time.

I don't know the medical term for this or if there's any way of telling whether a Corn has this when it's still alive, but if yours has this problem then I don't think there's anything that can be done. No amount of dieting or exercise will change the faulty "switch" that's been tripped in her system.

Feeding an adult Corn less than one small mouse every 2-3 weeks (your current regime) doesn't sound safe for her overall health. Just a thought, but feeding her an even fattier food, like chicks, also doesn't seem logical? The recommendation to give her baths sounds like it's intended to promote defecation - it doesn't look like she's constipated from your photos, so I wouldn't go down that route unless she's very relaxed about baths.

I sincerely hope that you have better luck with your friend than I had with mine, but if your vet can find no evidence of constipation, parasites or other problems, then you might be facing this problem. Does anyone out there know of more diagnostic techniques that could be suggested to the vet? Would an X-ray show anything useful?

Kel said:

I've seen this once in one of mine and it wasn't good news. I was told at the time that some Corns have a metabolic disorder, where their bodies process food incorrectly and lay down large stores of unnecessary fat as a result. This is an inherited trait and was reasonably common in the UK when I first started keeping Corns (early 90s), as the captive breeding gene pool was quite limited in the UK at that time.

I don't know the medical term for this or if there's any way of telling whether a Corn has this when it's still alive, but if yours has this problem then I don't think there's anything that can be done. No amount of dieting or exercise will change the faulty "switch" that's been tripped in her system.

Feeding an adult Corn less than one small mouse every 2-3 weeks (your current regime) doesn't sound safe for her overall health. Just a thought, but feeding her an even fattier food, like chicks, also doesn't seem logical? The recommendation to give her baths sounds like it's intended to promote defecation - it doesn't look like she's constipated from your photos, so I wouldn't go down that route unless she's very relaxed about baths.

I sincerely hope that you have better luck with your friend than I had with mine, but if your vet can find no evidence of constipation, parasites or other problems, then you might be facing this problem. Does anyone out there know of more diagnostic techniques that could be suggested to the vet? Would an X-ray show anything useful?

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yeah this is the problem you see, i dont want to have to pratically starve her as it would do more damage than good, she eats near enough regular sized mice. her appetite is brilliant still.
when it comes to bathing, its mainly to give her lots of exercise and ive never seen any signs of stress whilst in the bath shes good as gold in there.
i am worried theres something beyond just fat.
you see, she used to live with another female of mine, missy (you may have read about her earlier on in june/july) unfortunately she died, at the start missy put a lot of weight on the bottom end of her and the vet thought she was constipated but it turned out she had a growth on her kidney which then turned into kidney failure, missy also had a lump under her neck and apparently its a sign of kidney problems, anyways skitzy always lived with her up until the day i took missy to the vet to be put to sleep, the vet assured me it wasnt contagious, however now skitzy has a lump thing going on under her neck and is big only at the bottom end of her, so now i am panicking.

skitzy has a vet apointment on the 4th january, tuesday at 1730 and i will be asking the vet to take an x-ray or a scan to see for any lumps or anything, i aint gonna risk just him having a quick look at her, i want to be 100% certain.
if it does turn out to be the same as missy, i swear i will never forgive myself, not to mention i will never go back to that vet either, i just wont be able to believe i put her health at risk like this if thats the case.
thanx for your help kel. i will keep you informed
:shrugs:

Good luck! I feel for horrible for you right now. I havent lost a long term pet since I was a kid. I think I'll be devistated when it eventually happens to one of my beloved snakes.

I wouldn't think that kidney disease could be contagious in corns (it's not in humans). It could just be that the particular rodents and way you fed gave kindney failure a foothold. I hate to tell you this, especially with you already upset. I don't want you to think it was something you did, but you may want to check the supplier of your rodents for the future health of your younger snakes. I remember hearing that kidney failure (maybe it was liver failure... oh shoot, I don't know now) can be attributed to red dyes in the food fed to the rodents.

Kel said:

Feeding an adult Corn less than one small mouse every 2-3 weeks (your current regime) doesn't sound safe for her overall health.

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I don't know about that. I haven't followed around a wild cornsnake to see how much it eats but I doubt it's very often. I'd think that even just 1 mouse once a month is not going to be too little. I do it with one of mine and he's fine. He may be more hungry than he's used to but his feeding response is finally where I think it should be (he never was a great feeder). I personally think her regimen if fine, especially if the snake is still actually putting on weight (though in light or more info, in this case it could mean something other than putting on fat).

cornman1979 said:

my male is just over 4ft long and weighs just over 300 grams which i think isn't a lot as they tend to be fatter then females.
For a 5ft female (which is a big female anyway lol) i would say nearer 500grams is better. Just drop her down a size for a while and see if it makes any differance.

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yeah now i have a 7 year old male, whos 5 foot 11 inches in length and hes real heavy, hes 900 grams, but he aint got no fat anwehere its solid muscle.

my younger two females, one is 4 years old, around 4 foot in length and weighs 300 grams (about 12 ounces), she also had a feeding problem when she was younger but thats sorted now,
my baby is 2 1/2 years old around 3 foot in length and weighs just a little 5 1/2 ounces about 100 grams. bless her. so 600 grams for a 5 yr old sounds quite a lot to me. the poor things.

Amanda E said:

Good luck! I feel for horrible for you right now. I havent lost a long term pet since I was a kid. I think I'll be devistated when it eventually happens to one of my beloved snakes.

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oh my, now i dont want to worry you or anything but it was the most devastating experience ive ever had to go through, i did everything i could for her to make her better but it was no good, ive had my cat now for 17 years and im dreading the day she has to go.

I wouldn't think that kidney disease could be contagious in corns (it's not in humans). It could just be that the particular rodents and way you fed gave kindney failure a foothold. I hate to tell you this, especially with you already upset. I don't want you to think it was something you did, but you may want to check the supplier of your rodents for the future health of your younger snakes. I remember hearing that kidney failure (maybe it was liver failure... oh shoot, I don't know now) can be attributed to red dyes in the food fed to the rodents.

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oh no, i hope it isnt the rodents, i buy all my equipment and rodents from the same reptile place, hes a professional breeder and seller for snakes and rodents, if it is the mice then its a bit late for all my snakes, ive been buying them from him for 7 years.

I don't know about that. I haven't followed around a wild cornsnake to see how much it eats but I doubt it's very often. I'd think that even just 1 mouse once a month is not going to be too little. I do it with one of mine and he's fine. He may be more hungry than he's used to but his feeding response is finally where I think it should be (he never was a great feeder). I personally think her regimen if fine, especially if the snake is still actually putting on weight (though in light or more info, in this case it could mean something other than putting on fat).

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now im not too sure about this, will have to find out, i thought snakes could actually go months without food as long as they had fresh water, but surely it cannot be good for their health.
thanx for all your repies, i am very grateful
:eek1:

I hope it's not a genetic thing Missy, or a kidney thing.
Kel i've not seen this disrder for a few years now in the Uk, but know it still happens sometimtes with a bad gene pool from plenty of in-breeding. I hope this isn't the case with Skitzy, i really do, as their would be nothing that could be done for her.

Keep us updated on the progress and let us know what the vet says.

i've not seen this disrder for a few years now in the Uk

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A friend of mine was unlucky enough to lose one of his a couple of months ago to this problem. She had fat lumps which appeared really quickly (in the space of a month), surrounded her kidneys and caused kidney failure. The PM showed abnormal fat deposits elsewhere inside her body but they weren't visible externally. She was only three years old, so it's still here. Hopefully the condition is starting to die out as owners stop breeding from Corns that show this problem.

Amanda - Thanks for the info about the frequency of feeding. I'm just thinking that if put on a winter-style feeding regime, she might slow down as though she was brumating and get less exercise as a result? Don't know how relevant that might be here, though.

Missy - I really sympathise with what you're going through. Could the vet be persuaded to take a biopsy of the lumps to see if he can confirm whether they're fat deposits? I'm not sure whether you can draw a conclusion from the findings so far. As my friend found, fat deposits can cause kidney failure, so it's possible that that any kidney problem could be a secondary symptom rather than a root cause. I'd have thought your supplier would have gone out of business by now if he was selling suspect food - it wouldn't just be your Skitzy affected. Could you ask the vet if he's seen any other cases in your area recently? It would certainly be worth following up on.

Please keep us posted and the very best of luck to you. My thoughts are with you.

Thanks Kel, i knew it was still around but i haven't heard of a case for about 3-4 years now. I'll have to keep an eye out when i get some more snakes next year. But like you said, hopefully it is dieing out now.

Kel do you know of any reptile shows in the north west area for feb or march? I haven't heard of any yet.