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Shedding with Injury

WingedSweetheart

WingedSweetheart

New member
Last month my snake, Sylvara decided to take an adventure for three days. When I found her I didn't know that her tail was under my rabbits cage and when I scooted the cage over to get her I made a cut on her tail. :cry:

Anyway I wasn't worried about it since it wasn't very deep and was pretty small. I cleaned it and put some neosporin on it and it scabbed over.

Well last week Sylvara went into shed. She finally shed about an hour ago. I checked the skin to make sure everything came off, but it hadn't. The tail tip was still stuck on her. I got her out and looked and it was right were the injury is. I soaked her for a few minutes in room temp water and them gently pulled the skin off. It was a little harder to get off this time (I had to do this once when she was a baby) because of the scab. When the skin came off the scab came off too and now there is a little open wound on her tail again.

My question is about what should I do next time she sheds? If it scabs again and the skin gets stuck again... What should I do? I don't think it's good to keep pulling the scab off. Any advice? :confused:
 
I've had a couple of snakes shedding as part of the recovery from surgery. There always tend to be ragged bits of the shed left immediately around the wound. As you've found, these can't really be removed because of the risk of re-opening the cut.

What I've done is make sure they have a humid hide coming up to the shed (even if they don't normally need one) so the rest of the shed is as lubricated as possible. When they shed, I allow a day for the area around the wound to settle down (it must get pulled around during the process and there's a risk that even that will pull the wound open) then put antiseptic on the area round the wound, old skin scraps, scabs and all. I figure the old skin bits and scabs need to stay, but I can minimise the risk of the wound getting infected which I see as a greater problem than a bit of stuck shed.

I just repeat this until eventually the new skin closes over the wound completely and the accumulated scraps of old skin come off with a lovely complete shed. A wound will usually accelerate the shedding process but it can still take several cycles before you get a clean shed. I also keep them on newspaper so they don't get substrate bits in the wound while it's healing.
 
Thanks for the info. I just worry about it because it's the very tip of her tail and I know leaving the skin there can make the tail die and fall off.
 
Does the shed get stuck all around the tip? It's the constriction that obstructs the blood flow and causes the flesh to necrotise.

If it's just a patch on the tail tip then it shouldn't be a problem, but if it's the entire tail tip that sticks then I agree that needs dealing with at the time rather than waiting for the wound to heal.
 
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