Kali
lost cause
It's been quite a while now, but I thought to tell you how my girl Mathilda came to live with me.
A gardener in our zoo (I'm a zookeeper) found a corn in his basement, stuck with it's head in a mousetrap! Not knowing anything about snakes and afraid it might be a venomous one, he brought it to work the next morning, trap still attached! Our vet took it off, but there wasn't much he could do apart from desinfecting the wound. The quarantine area was full at that time, so he asked me if I could take her. I had gotten a male years earlier there too.
She looked really horrible, poor thing.
In the pics, the wound has closed up (wasn't very big and closed fast), and the swelling seems to be smaller than they were in real life, but you get an idea...
After work I was normally meeting someone, so I called her to say I would be late, rushed home, got the old aquarium from my basement (no corns there
), put her in there with a shelter, water and put a lamp on it. She started drinking like there was no tomorrow. (wonder how long she had been stuck there!) I put a note on the aquarium for my boyfriend to find when he got home ("hi, my name is Mathilda, I got lost and stuck in a mousetrap, can I stay here?" ).
And then started the waiting game. Applying an ointment I got from the vet every day, hoping the swelling would go down. The question was wether her neck was just forced and swollen, or was there something damaged in there that would prevent her eating. But she has healed nicely, immediately ate the first small mouse I offered her, and is completely healthy now. Last year she and my male I already had, made some beautiful hatchlings for me
I'd post a pic of what she looks like now, but haven't got any good ones at the moment, and can't take any now, because she's gravid again and very defensive about it
A gardener in our zoo (I'm a zookeeper) found a corn in his basement, stuck with it's head in a mousetrap! Not knowing anything about snakes and afraid it might be a venomous one, he brought it to work the next morning, trap still attached! Our vet took it off, but there wasn't much he could do apart from desinfecting the wound. The quarantine area was full at that time, so he asked me if I could take her. I had gotten a male years earlier there too.
She looked really horrible, poor thing.
In the pics, the wound has closed up (wasn't very big and closed fast), and the swelling seems to be smaller than they were in real life, but you get an idea...
After work I was normally meeting someone, so I called her to say I would be late, rushed home, got the old aquarium from my basement (no corns there
), put her in there with a shelter, water and put a lamp on it. She started drinking like there was no tomorrow. (wonder how long she had been stuck there!) I put a note on the aquarium for my boyfriend to find when he got home ("hi, my name is Mathilda, I got lost and stuck in a mousetrap, can I stay here?" ).And then started the waiting game. Applying an ointment I got from the vet every day, hoping the swelling would go down. The question was wether her neck was just forced and swollen, or was there something damaged in there that would prevent her eating. But she has healed nicely, immediately ate the first small mouse I offered her, and is completely healthy now. Last year she and my male I already had, made some beautiful hatchlings for me
I'd post a pic of what she looks like now, but haven't got any good ones at the moment, and can't take any now, because she's gravid again and very defensive about it
