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Urgent! Baby corn vomitted after a day

G

galeant

New member
Hi, I got my 3,5 months old corn snake a week ago. It was quite curious and didn't show any signs of stress(at least as far as i could tell) It wasn't even a bit scared of my hand, though i never handled him. Yesterday at night i gave him a pinky which he ate without a problem. Today when i came home i found the pinky vomitted to the terrarium. He also accidently ate some of the substrate too. If it can be cause? What should i do. I'm quite worried :(
It's my first snake and trying to make everything as optimal as possible. The humidity is about %35 and the hot side is about 26.5. Please help. Thank you
 
edit2: he vomited again some substrate and to remove it he scoops his head in the subsrate. I'm removing some of the subs with paper towels. Pelase tell me what to do
 
Alright. I'm not an expert, but I've got a couple corn snakes and did run into an issue with regurgitation last year.

First thing first, you need to increase your hot side temperature. I'm more familiar with farenheit, but converting to Celsius, your hot spot needs to be 29.5, not 26.5. Try and measure it with either a probe thermometer or a temp gun (cost about $10-15 at walmart) below the substrate above the heat mat (or on the surface if you are using heat bulbs)

It is most likely that your corn regurgitated due to not enough heat to digest his meal. What happens if the heat is too low is the food starts rotting inside him before he can digest. They heavily rely on the heat we provide to digest. Please don't be too hard on yourself, but do learn from it.

I believe there is a sticky thread on here somewhere about regurgitation and protocols for afterwards.
I'll give you a basic rundown of what to do, but please go look for that post to get more detail from someone with years and years of experience.

Due to the loss of stomach bacteria and the burns it causes up the throat when they regurge, you will need to not feed him for 2 weeks, a full 14 days, to give his throat time to heal.

Get some of the Nutribac vitamin powder. You will want to use this to help give him back beneficial bacteria when you do go and feed him. This is just dusted on a slightly damp feeder.

Feed smaller prey for the next several meals (each at a 1 week interval to allow him to build back up his gut flora. At pinky size typically feeding is every 5 days, but this is an exception).
Since your snake is eating pinkies, this means you will need to cut the pinky in half and offer him only the head. (I would suggest you do not freeze and use the other half. Refreezing is generally not good for the feeder and will probably be a mess when thawed again.)

Do this for at least 3 consecutive meals where there is no repeat regurgitation.


Can you give more information on your enclosure and snake such as his weight?

His weight is something you will need to watch closely at his young age (and presumably size). Even if the usual recommendation is to not handle at all until he has eaten for you, a regurge changes things. You will want to handle him for a just a minute once a week to get a current weight and ensure he isnt losing weight while you wait for his throat to heal up. Be calm in handling and as long as it is brief he should have no ill effects.

If he loses weight, I'm not sure what the ideal method would be, but you will probably want to bring him to an exotics vet and explain this to them for professional advice. If his weight doesnt go down more than 10% you are likely just fine with the above method.


As for the substrate, what is it? How large is the piece? (Proportional to his head, perhaps).
In many cases it won't be an issue if he does swallow and he may be too tired to spit it out after the regurge. I would he surprised if it is still there in the morning.
He probably wiped his face after regurging and it got stuck to him due to the stomach acid he spit up with the mouse, and it will probably get rubbed off or spit out just fine.

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galeant said:
edit2: he vomited again some substrate and to remove it he scoops his head in the subsrate. I'm removing some of the subs with paper towels. Pelase tell me what to do
Click to expand...
Are you sure that the substrate was vomited (coming from his stomach) rather than spit out (in his mouth but not down the throat)?

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First of all thank you so much for taking your time and explaining it so well,
I have a precise measurement device like a heat gun. I just made the hot side exactly 29.5C
Sadly in my country they aren't legal thus there are no snake vets.
The substrate is the one that I could find from the pet shop. I checked that he was really okay with it. He was burrowing etc. Now I see that it would better have been digestible. It is about 1/2 to 1/3 of one of his eyes.
I saw him vomit some time ago but it can also be one from the pinky
He is now in a corner standing still. Or maybe sleeping(but would he sleep outside when he can do so in a hotter hide.)
 
Do you know what kind of substrate it is? Some kinds snakes are able to digest or pass through without issue, but others are not.

Sand and gravel are not digestible and can build up inside the stomach so that they die from starvation eventually. Not usually a cause for a regurge tho and not from only 1 meal.

Most typical substrates people use are wood chips or shavings (excluding pine and cedar as those have oils that are toxic to snakes). Good ones include Aspen and cypress or orchid bark. You could also use ground coconut fiber. If snakes are not legal, I doubt they sell reptile brands, but the wood chips are often sold for small animals at pet shops.

Most people recommend Aspen for corn snakes. You can also keep him on paper towels just fine. Might be best to do for now.

I'm not sure where you are exactly or what is not legal (snakes entirely, just the vets, or corn snakes in particular) so if at all possible, make sure to order the nutribac before you feed will help. You can find it on Amazon.

If you can get a picture to post that would be helpful. If you can weigh him, an object for scale would be good as well, like a quarter or a credit card in the photo next to him.


I meant to add before, if you can get pedialyte, that can be added to the water he drinks from to help give him a bit of electrolytes and things. I suggest a Google search for the proportions since I havent done it before, but many people say it helps a lot.

He may not move much for a few days as he recovers from the regurge, it takes a LOT out of snakes, esp young ones. Now that he isn't digesting anything, I wouldn't worry about where he is in his cage, there isnt anything left to digest unless he regurged only part of a pinky somehow. He may be too tired to care about being in a hide or not and it would be more stressful to him to move him into a hide, so let him sleep where he likes. (Do try to make sure you see breathing or him move around the cage, if not touch him gently to make sure he hasn't died. Not that I would expect that at this stage unless he was in poor health beforehand which you may not have known.)


I had hoped someone more experienced would chime in as well, but I'll help as much as I can.

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You have already provided good info to the original poster in Turkey. I am wondering if the substrate was stuck to the pinkie and that is what caused the regurge? Anyway, I do not use substrate on my hatchlings or small corns, just paper towels. If you are going to house the little guy in a vivarium with substrate, just feed him/her in a separate small deli cup then return it to the vivarium after eating. Regurges are not uncommon for hatchlings or smaller corns. I had 20 hatchlings all eating the same size very small pinkies. 3 of them regurged, so I just waited four days and offered a pinkie head and they were all doing fine. For subsequent feedings I just cut off a bit more flesh with the pinkie heads. By the 3rd feeding they ate a whole pinkie. Nutribac df is good stuff but if you can't get it there look for other reptile probiotics.
 
Twolunger said:
You have already provided good info to the original poster in Turkey. I am wondering if the substrate was stuck to the pinkie and that is what caused the regurge? Anyway, I do not use substrate on my hatchlings or small corns, just paper towels. If you are going to house the little guy in a vivarium with substrate, just feed him/her in a separate small deli cup then return it to the vivarium after eating. Regurges are not uncommon for hatchlings or smaller corns. I had 20 hatchlings all eating the same size very small pinkies. 3 of them regurged, so I just waited four days and offered a pinkie head and they were all doing fine. For subsequent feedings I just cut off a bit more flesh with the pinkie heads. By the 3rd feeding they ate a whole pinkie. Nutribac df is good stuff but if you can't get it there look for other reptile probiotics.
Click to expand...
The reason I suggest longer waiting and a slower increase in size is because I had a juvenile corn who chronically returned to death last year waiting 7 days between and using the probiotics.

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Thank you both so much. Today I'm going to try to find the best vitamin for him. Unfortunately, the one you mentioned isn't available in here. There are no more particles around his jaw(hopefully not in either). But i can see he is quite fatigue. Is it okay if I handle him to move to another box to do some work with his viv or would it stress him more?
 
My opinion would be that if it is minor work like removing bedding in the spot where he regurged to replace with new, changing water, or just moving some decor, I would try and leave him there and work around him if possible.

If you are planning larger changes like fully replacing the substrate or disinfecting the viv, then you would have to move him. I think that as long as it is brief and more than a few days before you attempt to feed, he will probably be fine.

It would be easier to say what is safer for him if we knew his size and the size of the viv you are using is.
Do you have a small kitchen scale or anything like that you could weigh him with while he is out if you decide to move him?

It's good that he got all the substrate off.

With more limited access to reptile products, you will have to do what you can with what's available to get him back on track. Let him get as much rest time as possible before you try to feed again if you need to pick him up to move him or make necessary changes to the viv.

Let us know how things go, I know I'm rooting for you and the little guy.

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Here are the photos of him before the regurgitation. I keep him in a fairly decent size glass viv even an adult one can live. Would it make him stress more right now. He moves very very minimally. I want to remove all the substrate but i feel like he would be quite stressed if I move him now. I'm going to try to get as much of it as possible without touching him. At least he doesn't get scared by my hand. It would make it a lot harder
 
I can't tell what kind of substrate that is, but it does look like one that most people strongly recommend avoiding. Looks a lot like crushed walnut shell to me. I would get as much as you can without touching him and lay paper towel in a bare area and move him carefully onto the towel to get the rest out.

Usually corn snakes arent bothere by larger cages, so that's probably fine. He may like more clutter though, so you could put some toilet paper cardboard tubes in or crumpled up paper towel to give him some more security since it seems like a lot of open space.

Moving him is probably ok if it is a short time and he has a few days to calm before you try feeding again, so dont be too concerned about that today.

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That corn looks like he should have no problem eating a pinkie. He is already large enough so that you don't need to feed pinkie heads, but for his next feeding I'd use the smallest pinkie available. However, I have had a few young corns eat and regurge just before a shed. After the shed and a rest they returned to normal. I mention that, but it happens infrequently. Most people will tell you the sparse decorations can cause stress, or more precisely, the lack of several hides. I use paper towel tubes, flattened a bit for hides. Gradually they can be replaced with something more decorative as hides. Let's hope he didn't ingest that substrate.
 
I will add more to the vivarium. He recovered some its energy back today which made me quite happy. He started wondering in the viv again.
 
Update: Without touching him I replaced almost all of the substrate with paper towels. He still isn't very energetic but at least he moves inside the viv. Concluding from what you have said I think it's okay to feed him half a pinky the day after which makes it a 5 day wait.
 
I'm a bit concerned that he isn't more energetic. Although some of my smaller hatchlings may have regurged due to the size of the pinkie, they were active anyway. Are you sure he isn't going into a shed? Do you know when he shed last? It's typical for my young corns to hide and become less active right before a shed.
 
Yea it started concerning me a lot too. Now i came home and he was in the same location as he was this morning. Maybe he moved but i doubt it's a lot. I had to make sure he wasn't dead. I learned from the previous owner that he has shed approx. 15 days ago and I don't see any cloudiness(if that's a word) in his eyes. Is there anything else I should be doing at this point?
 
If he is still not very active, I would wait longer to feed him. If he doesnt have energy to move around, he probably will not have energy to digest his food and could lead to another regurge.

I have explained before why I would wait minimum 10 to 14 days before feeding, contrary to twolunger's opinion. Waiting 7 or 8 days was not enough for my corn snake (juvenile roughly 30 to 40 grams) and he regurgitated meals weekly for about a month and a half before he passed on. He had no other issues for us and had shed normally before the regurgitation issues began. He saw a vet after the second regurge and they re-iterated that wait time or double it and provided some medication that did not help in the end.

I strongly suggest waiting. Especially since you do not have a vet to go to for help.

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