Back in August of last year I got a baby regal ringneck snake, it was captive born...



The snake was regurgitating meals(snakes) on occasion, I didn't think anything of it really, stuff happens. I told the person I got it from about this, and he said crypto immediately. He's had experience with the disease so he knew how it starts. Probably about 3 months after I got the snake, it was still alive, and it was time to hibernate it. I stopped feeding it for two weeks, but noticed a bump in the lower body like there was some prey item there it couldn't digest or something, maybe some swallowed substrate. I raised the temperatures a bit, made sure it had lots of water, but the bump didn't disappear. About maybe 2 weeks later, after I realized the bump didn't seem to be going anywhere, I fed it again, the meal was regurged, and the snake died a couple days later.



Disease snake dies, end of the disease, right? Wrong.



Got a eastern kingsnake baby around January, it was a problem feeder stuck on snakes. Which really wasn't a problem for me to supply. It was a nice snake, would eat in my hands, until it started regurging. It would eat a meal, digest it, eat a meal and puke it up. That was her little pattern. It got to the point where she didn't want to eat food when I offered it to her. She stopped eating for like 2 weeks, ate a snake, puked it up, and died a couple days later. She was never in contact with anything that was in the regal's enclosure, so I don't know the disease could've gotten to her, or even if it was crypto that killed her.



I got 2 baby texas rat snakes with the eastern king, after the king died, they did just fine. They were eating, everything was fine, until they too started regurgitating. They lasted longer, one died about 2 months after the regurges, the other died about 2 months after that. But unlike the rest of the diseased snakes, these 2 didn't take any meals after their first 2 or 3 regurges. They just flat out stopped eating. The bump was only present in one of them.



A couple months later I got some eastern milk snakes from a friend, they were fresh out of a bad hibernation, so they were a bit skinny, especially a smaller 11" or so one. He ate 2 f/t common garters, then puked them up and died. I don't think he died from crypto though. Ya just never know.



When spring came around a friend sent 1.1 eastern garter snakes. One was a blue female that was found in NY, and it was blue, so it's rare. The other was just a nice looking male who attacked mice with no regrets. Well like last month, the garter ate a hopper that could probably be described as too big lol. And he regurged it a couple days later. Well since then he has refused food and became skinny. Last night while feeding the collection, I looked into his enclosure, and he opened his mouth like he was yawning, but I know he wasn't. He's practicly getting ready to die. After that, that's another tank going in the garbage, and then hopefully, just hopefully, that's the end of the disease that destroyed some of my favorite animals.
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Mike

KingPin Reptiles Inc.

Helmz777@aol.com

www.freewebs.com/mikesnake

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