Reptile & Amphibian Forums

She shed over last weekend and she took two mice yesterday so I think she is going to be ok but I still find myself questioning what exactly happened. Post shed it looks like there is still a little fluid in some of the scales; nowhere do I see any scabs but some of it looks slightly crusted and in one tiny spot her scales are now black and white. Her belly which was pink before is almost normal. Because of this I'm leaning more towards the vet's diagnosis of bacterial infection than burn but I can't stop thinking about it. I had plans to breed her next seeson but now I have second thoughts. Should I wait until the season after to be sure that this isn't some kind of reoccuring viral thing? Will she be ok to breed next season after having gone through this now? Any thoughts would be appreciated.
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I have Balls!

First, thank God....congrats, I was worried. Pink belly when not in shed almost always bacterial infection. Virus and bacteria are two differnt things...bacteria is a common nskae issue and usually caused by cleanliness issues such as feces left in water bowl, feces in tank that didn't get fully cleaned up, etc. There are other ways but these are most common. Make sure you disinfect your tank fully (to make sure you kill that bacteria fast), and always clean up feces immediately, change water, clean the bowl, etc., taking care though of the types of chemicals you use for choose the wrong ones and you get another lovely problem, loss of motor control and/or death.

As for breeding if she gets back to good health, eats, etc., I so no reason why not to...many months away.
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Mike and David at 3-D Pythons
www.3dpythons.com

thanks for the reply. I think my hygiene is pretty good (heavy clean once a month, spot as needed) but I have kicked it up with her. No problems anywhere else so I figure this was something else. Maybe something that she had when I got her in sept that just showed up, like when you feel a cold coming on for a while but it dosn't really hit you, and then bang! If I don't know exactly what happened at this point I guess I won't but I keep pretty thorough records so god forbid, if it turns into a patern type thing with her I should be able to figure it out if it is something I am doing. I really can't imagine what I could have done though. Like I said in my original post, I've never created a problem before. Again, thanks for the reply and it is good to know that you were concerned. I always worry about all the little pythons too.
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I have Balls!