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Hit with Cryptosporidium

S

SnakeLuvrs

New member
Unfortunately we had to euthanize our Jungle Corn last week due to crypto. It was so heavy in his system that the vet found massive amounts in his stool sample. We had him for about 8-9 months and he showed now signs at all up until very recently. We are now very concerned about the rest of our collection and we have some questions. I did read the crypto post that I found in the search but couldn’t really get my question answered. Our main question is how can another snake become infected? Does the snake have to physically injest some infected material or does it just have to come in contact with the snakes skin? And as far as the vet’s testing goes they are charging us around $100 per snake which includes an office visit and I believe three tests. Of the tests, which would be the most effective test to prove positive or negative for crypto? She said they would do a stool sample, gastric lavage and I believe but am not positive a blood test. I know the stool test it kind of hit or miss so I would assume the gastric lavage would probably be the most effective since it takes samples directly from the stomach of the animal. We did take the infected cage and soaked it all night in almost pure ammonia in the bath tub and threw away any cage items…wood, dishes, bushes, etc. I do know if we ever cleaned out any feces from the jungle’s cage we always washed our hands and we also always waited for his feces to completely dry out, which reading one of the medical studies on crypto says that letting it dry out causes the bacteria to become 98% ineffective. Thanks for any information you can provide to help us through this.
 
First of all, that is such a shame that you got hit with crypto.

I recently had a scare, that turned out not to be, but i will give you some information. I would get all the snakes in your collection tested every 3 months or so, it is extremely contagious.

It can be caught so easily, you touch the infected snake, touch a door knob, your brother touches the door knob, and touches a clean snake, it becomes infected too. IT is VERY Contagious.

Im sorry this had to happen.

Ryan
 
I remember someone posting this link and I thought it was the most information I had ever found on the subject so I saved it.
http://biology.kenyon.edu/slonc/bio38/hannahs/crypto.htm#trans
I believe the acid fast test is the best way to determine if they are positive, although I would have the vet take a peek first to look for coccidia. As far as I know the vet can tell by doing a float if coccidia is there and the acid test would confirm if it was crypto or not.
Although that is just going off my memory of info gathered so hopefully someone more familiar with it will post. I'm sorry to hear you have to go through this. :(
 
Thanks for the link carol, I skimmed through it briefly and need to go through it again and digest it. By the looks of it, it appears it has to be a fecal to oral transfer to another snake or through fecal contaminated water. That makes me feel a little better since we have always been pretty sanitary when it comes to spot cleaning the feces of any of our snakes. We're currently "shopping around" for a vet with a reasonable price to test our other 13 snakes but so far no luck, it's pretty expensive. We may only be able to do one or two every so often as funds allow. Thanks Again
 
The acid fast test is the best test to actually identify the organism as crypto. From what I have read a regurged food item or gastric lavage is the best bet for finding it. A negative stool sample does not mean the animal does not have it.

Crypto is spread through a fecal oral route - meaning that somehow the snake has to ingest fecal material. This is actually a very common and effective means of transmission for pathogens. The most typical scenario would be that an owner cleans feces from an infected animals cage and then goes to wash their hands. Even though they do not think they have been in contact with the feces they probably have had microscopic bits touch their skin. They turn the tap on - infecting the tap, and even though they wash their hands well, when they go to turn the water off they are reinfected with the crypto. They then go to clean another cage and leave some of the microscopic crypto on the next snake's aspen. At some point that snake will ingest the crypto by just smelling around their cage.

Unfortunately crypto is very hardy and can survive as a spore on surfaces such as tubs, glass, formica etc. for a very long time. When conditions are right, they will infect another animal. Very little is understood about crypto in reptiles. There are reptiles who carry crypto and never get sick, some that will get sick if they are stressed and some that will get sick and die not long after becoming infected.

You may want to consider getting rid of the cage your snake was in since it is not clear that even ammonia will get rid of the crypto completely. I believe that heating to a certain temperature might kill the spores.

I am sorry for your loss and wish you the best of luck with the rest of your collection. You might decide not to test any of your animals and just treat them as pets. If they stay healthy great - if not you will have a good idea as to what is causing the problem.

Good Luck,
Joanna
 
We have another question, generally, how long would it take an infected snake to show any symptoms? I know some snakes can carry it and not get sick but if it were to show any signs, what would the timeframe be? I think we are leaning towards not getting our collection tested and monitor them over the next few months and see. We are going to do our best and clean all of their cages and try and be as sanitary as possible when it comes to spot cleaning and handling.

Thanks
 
From what I have read, you never know. Like I said some snakes can live with the crypto without any obvious outward signs and some manage to clear themselves of it. The problem is, it will be impossible to know if your other snakes are not infected, are living with it or have cleared themselves of it.

If you had plans to breed I would recommend nixing them since it will be very hard to ensure you are not passing the crypto to others.

Connie Hurley who puts out a wonderful newsletter - There's Just Something About Corns - did a very good review on Crypto in the November 05 letter. I know she is selling a CD with all the previous issues on it. Check out his link - http://cccorns.com/Newsletter/newsletter.htm .

Good Luck,
Joanna
 
Thanks, we are already planning on not breeding this upcoming season to be safe. God forbid if any of our other snakes do have it I hope they do show some symptoms so we can deal with it immediately. We've always been extremely sanitary with our snakes and our infected snake was probably our least handled and was also never brought in contact with our other corns due to him being part king snake. We're just keeping our fingers crossed and hope we dodged a very big bullet!

Thanks
 
Thanks, here's a couple pics of him, he was definitely one of our more unique snakes.

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RIP
 
I'll be the pessimist and bad guy here.

As expensive as all the testing would be, and knowing how easily (magically it seems) crypto is spread, I suggest having all your snakes tested. I am a realist and a downer on this subject, because if one snake has it, it's very likely they all do now. Unless you sterilize everything that's ever come in contact with that animal, including yourself and your clothes, crypto can be spread to your other snakes. Bleach doesn't kill it, hot soap and water can be effective, but it only takes the tiniest amount to spread it. As much as it would devastate me, if it were found in even one of my snakes, I would euthanise the entire collection to prevent the problem from growing. It's just that serious, in my mind. You may get lucky, but I don't suggest you consider breeding, even next year, until you know for certain that none of your other snakes have it.
 
I agree about the never breeding part. In my opinion it is most likely that the whole collection is infected. It does not mean they will all get sick and die and they may love very long healthy lives as pets. Even if all the snakes had multiple fecals done, gastric lavages and/or gastric biopsies that were negative you could not say with a 100% certainty that the snakes are clear of crypto. The only thing you could be sure of is that a certain snake is infected if any of those tests came back positive!

The fact that the snake was roaming on the carpet means that he may have shed some crypto there. Another snake then could have picked it up. Remember we are talking about microscopic organisms that can be present at the vent even if it looks clean.

He was a beautiful snake - I am very sorry for your loss.


Joanna
 
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