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1st time snake owner feeding/shedding questions

T

thebigdaddyray

New member
Hello everyone Im new to the forum and 1st time snake owner. I have a few questions about my corn.
Some background-purchased him(dont know if it is a him or his age, he is about 10" long if this helps) 11/12/07. He ate twice since then, frozen pinkies. 3rd feeding he ate the pinkie rear first, halfway and regurged it.(12/10). Then I noticed his eyes were greyed over & he was getting ready to shed. I figured he wouldnt eat from what I read in this stage. His eyes cleared and I couldnt find a full shed skin, I found the head with eyecaps and a few flakes. His shed was flaking off.
I attempted to feed him a few time during this, he did not want anything to do with food. I am going to hold off feeding him until a few more days or until the shed gets corrected.
I think there is a humidity problem in the viv. My viv has a under tank heating pad a basking lite on during the day and a heat emitter on at nite. the viv has a tape type thermom.on the glass and reads 70/75 - 80/85 ( therm is going to be replace today with a better one) I have a large water dish Just moved to the center of viv at the warm/cold line. I covered half of the screened top, made a humid hide in which he has to be placed in, doesnt go in by himself-(this helped a little some more shed came off still in pieces) the viv has logs and a branch and a rough fake plant along with the hides. I was thinking of soaking him in warm water for 20 min today to see if this helps.
How much water should i have in the soak? plain water or should I add anything to it? I was thinking about putting a wash cloth to help When should I worry about feeding him and how will I know if he had a complete shed?
Thanks TBDR
 
WOW, I'm impressed. For a new snake owner you have it figured out.

I think you are doing everything about right. I think the soak is a good idea. A wash cloth would be good. You want the snake to be damp but not treading water for half an hour. Make sure the water temp is around 80*.

With snakes we don't worry too much about exact age. If it's 10" long it was born this year so we'd call it a CB07. Almost all CB07 snakes hatched some time between June and Sept. this year.
 
hmm, that shed doesnt sound to good. Probably as a result of your heating and temperature recording methods. If you've provided a humid hide now, that should really help with the shed, but next time a humid hide should be provided as soon as you notice your snake going into blue. Usually the visual side of a shed has a few stages (each may take a few days) :-

1. Your snake may appear to darken in colour (depending on Morph)
2. Your snake will go into blue (willl have a blueish tone to the scles and eye caps)
3. Your snake will return to its normal colouration
4. Your snake will shed

You definately need to invest in a digital thermometer with a probe, anything else is an inaccurate waste of time in my opinion.

Your temps sound high, if recorded through a tape thermometer. Don't worry so much about ambient air temperatures and find out how warm it is directly on the bottom of you viviarium above the undertank heater/heat matt (UTH). The best way to do this is with the probe thermometer i mentioned.

You might want to turn off all heat sources apart from the UTH at night, theres no need for them.
 
forgot to mention the point of turning off the extra heating (ie. NOT the UTH) may go some way to increasing your humidity levels :)
 
Thanks for the compliment. This forum helped with that. I am going to make a humid type of hide like Nanci's link said to. The pet shop was out of therm/humid stats today could not replace it but will cut off the extra heat in the viv like suggested tonight & see if that helps .Thanks ,will keep everyone updated. TBDR
 
Ok so I put my snake into a soak with the washcloth aprox 20 min (12/18) I still havent found a shed and he still looks dull from the neck down (no visible flakes).I am going to try to get some pics posted of what I am looking at in regards to the shed.
I attempted to feed him pinkie head (aprox 7-8 pm--last full pinkie was ate on 12/3) as advised from regurge posts in a separate container - no luck - I left the food in the container inside the viv over night and it was still there in the AM so I removed it.
Now should I attempt to feed him again? starting to worry
TBDR
 
to raise the humidity a bit more, you could try misting the entire viv with a spray bottle that has NEVER had chemicals in it! you can get a cheap little spray bottle from a dollar store or somewhere like that.
 
Hi and Welcome, How often are you attempting to feed your baby? I would caution about putting the water dish near the heat source you could end up with snake soup. Agree with misting, when I know my snakes are blue I mist a couple times a day as it's so dry right now. Also all you need is a UTH, no basking light or heat emitter. When you get the new thermometer put it over the UTH on the glass, under the substrate. Good luck, although you have really done most of it well to date. susang
 
yeah i'm really sick and yesterday i had a mean cold sweat spell, i was freeeeezing, so i cranked up the heat in my room, and then looked at the humidity gauge and the thermometer, the humidity was only at 30% :| and the ambient temp was almost at 90! :| so immediately i turned the heat off and misted snakeys viv! it seemed to do the trick in raising humidity, and the temperature went down quickly too.

OOPS! a learning experience. at least now i know not to do that in the future!
 
I finally got "Nigel" to eat on 12/27 I used a brown bag and a live pinky. I still dont know whats going on with the shed as i did all most everything I read here, except for the misting. I didnt get any photos yet i'm tring not to disturb him I am basically going to start over fresh like I just got him see where that leads me.
TBDR
 
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