Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Just out of curiosity how many have had a female king get egg bound? And what did you do about it? I had one get egg bound and got her through it and just want to know if anyone else has had any luck with an egg bound king.
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www.Wood-N-Snakes.com

Timely post -- although I have already scheduled an appt. with my herp vet tomorrow morning, I would appreciate input here, as well.

I have a 4 1/2 foot Florida King (wild-caught this Spring and bred in the wild) that looks literally "ready to burst" with her egg load. She had been a voracious feeder ever since I got her (late March) and just started refusing meals about 2 weeks ago (I have tried twice during this timeframe and she refused both times). I have one other (much smaller) female Florida King that I also felt was way behind schedule in regard to her laying time but, after refusing her first meal, she laid 5 eggs about a week later (she also had been a very good eater and has returned to feeding well right after laying).

Based on her size, this big female obviously has gone through multiple breeding seasons in her life in the wild and so I would think her "system" must be OK if she has survived/thrived, to date (?) -- of course, I don't know what causes a snake to become EB either.

One additional note, a few days ago I put her out in the garage where the temps are much warmer (80 to 88 as opposed to the previous 75 to 80) in case the warmer temps help stimulate the laying process and she just shed her skin (this morning) so I don't know if that will influence her ability/desire to lay the eggs. Also, I do have a plastic container with damp spagnum moss in her cage (one large enough for her to get completely inside) as well as a small water dish (much too small for her to get into).

So, does this sound like an egg-bound snake or is a little more patience warranted and, if EB, any input other than my already scheduled vet visit?

Thanks...

Tim O
Sarasota, Florida

Hey Tim-
Seems like youre basing your diagnois of egg-binding on the female's girth...maybe she will simply reward you with a huge clutch. And if she just shed (pre-laying shed), then that event is simply growing near. Just my thoughts.
And yes, Ive had a kingsnake that retained two eggs after an otherwise normal clutch. I kept her at 84 degrees and kept the humidity up. She returned to feeding right away and finally passed the two "slugs" 6 weeks later. They were looked normal but were the consistancy of "hardboiled" hens eggs.
I'm not sure how lucky we were, but she was uneffected otherwise and at least on this occasion, the retention proved uneventful.

Hey Toby
Yes it has happened to a female in my collection, and luckily we were able to get the eggs out. But, the best thing to do is to prevent it in the first place, and your best bet is using a large nesting box with dampened substrate. See FR's post below a few threads for details.

It is just not reasonable to give a 3 1/2-4ft kingsnake a small shoebox-sized nest area with 1" of substrate. Well, maybe if everything that the female wants or needs is controlled perfectly then that would be OK. But I doubt anyone really knows what those needs are exactly, and surely most aren't researching it in home collections.

Couldn't agree more and HEY, Toby! Good to hear from ya! Post lots of pics!
Todd Hughes

I had an eggbound female GBK a few weeks ago. I took her to the vet, and the gave her oxytocin. They said if that didn't work, they would have to do surgery. I just spent a ton of money at the vet on my now 3 legged cat. A friend at a local pet store helped me aspirate the egg with a syringe and pushed it out. She has eaten 4 times since the incident and seems to be doing great. The vet told me that they did not want to aspirate in fear of puncturing something, but the egg was right up against the cloaca. It seemed that they were anxious to operate. Derek

When I get eggbound females I just wait until they expel the bad eggs. I still have an egg bound female from last year. She is doing great . No health problems that I can see. She will expell the eggs someday (I hope).

Taking the snake to a vet for surgery won't save the eggs. I have done that a couple times and usually they destroy the ovaduct so you might end up with a infertile female. Lots of other such "eggbound" surgeries result in the snakes demise. The best doc I have used for this was the vet that checks the snakes at the Daytona show. He used a high pressure water jet to get the eggs out . No cutting was neccessary.

I just recently had a female Fla King retain one large egg. She had it for about a week. I had manually been able to get it to move some. She then got it closer to the vent after I fed her. After a couple days of no progress..I took a lubricated probe, went through the vent and "circled" the egg with the probe. It was stuck to the wall inside. I then manually(and carefully) messaged the egg out. Here is the egg.

I recently had my female knoblochi get eggbound. I took her to the vet, where they gave her 2 shots of Oxytocin with no effect. They then gave me 3 needles to give her at home.....still no movement. I took her back the next day where they tried aspirating the egg. But, they said she moved around too much to get much if anything out, so they went back to the Oxytocin. They finally got it down to her vent, and gave her back to me to "finish the job". I put her back in her enclosure to warm up a bit before trying again. When I went to pick her up, she was VERY rigid, almost like she was trying to push it out herself. So, I just helped her out by pressing the egg toward her vent and it plopped out. She wasn't with any males so I wasn't worried about saving the egg, just fed it to one of the Cali Kings. Here's a pic showing how much the egg had to move from it's starting bound position.......

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Ace