Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Im having a problem with my retic, shes a 2 year old yellow hard bob clark het albino. And She will, So far just when shes sleeping, she will go into a trance like state and start to make a high pithed noise not like hiss more like somethings in her nostral, and while she does this she will rub her head against the cage floor in weird motions and when i go to grab her to check her out she snaps out of it and acts normal, Im realy confused, will take pics and hopefully a video soon.

Any ideas? i don't believe its a Resp. however anything is possible.

Thanks Pat

lower the humidity and keep the temps on the high end... spend some extra time with her so you can observe her behavior... be patient and i bet you will see her display the symptoms.

good luck

Shes been doing that since i put an air conditioner in my room, Should have saw the connection, I raised her temps up this morning. Thanks, Ill have some pics of her soon.

Anything Else I can do other than that?
Pat

I would disagree with the lowering of the humidity levels on a tropical boid that potentially has R.I. Raising the temps is standard procedure, but if the humidity is lowered, the membranes within the lung become drier and greatly increase the chances of an R.I. If the snake already has an R.I., you just make the situation worse. I'm not saying that it needs to be raining within the enclosure, but the floor level humidity should be roughly 70 to 80%. The air conditioning you spoke of within the room not only lowered the temps, but also significantly lowered the relative humidity. Many times with a low grade or beginning R.I., raising the temps and humidity will pull them out of it.

Kelly

Sorry to disagree with you kelly but with a respitory infection we have always lowered the humidity and raised the temps. We have had nothing but excellent results in just a few days. We learned that from some of the other reputable breeders. We tried once to make the humidty higher and it only made the infection worse resulting in pnueomia(sp?). It took many round off antibiotics and vet visit to treat it. So now we lower the humidity which gives us great results.

No problem at all with a disagreement, and that is actually a positive and functional aspect of this forum. The main goal of the forum is the dissemination of information from as many people as possible to allow individuals to gain knowledge and/or make informed decisions on specific topics. The forum will not function to its potential without proper debate.

On the humidity topic, there is definitely debate among boid keepers as far as the proper humidity levels to maintain during RI treatment. From the information and discussions that I have had, most long term boid keepers think that slightly higher humidity levels, along with a slight temp increase, will aid in the recovery of RI in boids from humid tropical habitats. One basis I have for agreement is the fact that I have seen tropical pythons on numerous occasions, especially burmese and the blood python group, that have acquired RI’s simply due to extended periods of low humidity without an accompanying temperature drop. I have also seen specimens of the above not respond to increased temps until the humidity levels were raised. Some vets even recommend the use of nebulizers to administer antibiotics to tropical boids with RI.

I do not disagree with your findings, and would be interested in your standard humidity levels, and actually how low your humidity levels were dropped, and how they were actually lowered. Were you able to measure the actual percent relative humidity at the lowest level? This would be important information to have. Humidity levels that are too high can actually cause respiratory problems as well. My guess is that the increase in temps you described solved the problem and you lowered the humidity, but not below an unacceptable level. Additionally, if results were being seen within a few days as you stated, I would also tend to question the cause of the respiratory problems these retics were experiencing. True bacterial RI would never be completely resolved within a few days, even with antibiotic treatment. It could have been a mechanical respiratory problem, as opposed to a biological one, that was resolved by the lowered humidity and higher temps. It would be interesting to hear the experiences of others concerning humidity and RI treatments with respect to other boids, as well as retics. Good discussion topic.

Kelly

an increase in temperature will automatically increase the humidity... these are directly related.

i think if the humidity is such that water condenses on the glass then thats too much humidity for a sick snake...

i think it is pretty much impossible to drop the relative humidity in a cage to 0% - i think keeping the cage dry and raising the temps a little is good... usually ambient humidity is in the 50% range anyway... depending on where you live, which is on the lower end of the acceptable range for retics.

i think it could be close to impossible to make the air so dry as to kill a snake with a mild RI... if so then the snake wouldnt die from the RI... but die from complications due to the dry air.

That is only correct under perfect conditions. Under almost all conditions, because the amount of water vapor the air can hold increases rapidly with temperature, the relative humidity actually decreases with increasing temperature, unless the evaporation potential can be met. This means that unless the rate of evaporation can keep up with the demand for moisture brought on by the rising air temperature, there will be a net loss in relative humidity. This is why rainforests and deserts can have major differences in humidity when at the same air temperature. This can also be seen when keepers spray cages fairly frequently to maintain moderate humidity levels, as the warm cage interiors force out the water vapor into the exterior room. A water bowl has one of the slowest rates of evaporation of almost any setup, as the surface tension of the water inhibits rapid evaporation. Cages with temps in the 80’s range usually do not have big problems with humidity. However, when raising cage temps into the 90’s, the rate of evaporation from a water bowl alone will never reach anywhere near its potential, and the humidity could easily drop well below 50% within the cage. That is too low for a healthy tropical snake in most people’s opinion, let alone one that is compromised by an RI. Wick system substrates or evaporation dishes with cloth, paper towel, or wood shavings have more rapid evaporation potentials and will produce much higher humidity levels than even a large water bowl alone.
Overly dry air within a cage will not kill a tropical snake directly, but the drying out of healthy lung membranes will cause tissue damage, and increase the possibility of a bacterial infection. Typically, relative humidity in the 70% to 80% range is adequate for snakes being treated for RI.

Kelly

Well Ive raised the temps and dropped the humidity a little bit, Shes stopped acting all odd, and stopped the weird noise, still an occassional hiss but no a/c on anymore and finding a better place to put my snakes, Thanks guys.

Pat

first, glad to hear your snake is making a turn for the better.

second, i am glad to read that people are so into boid environmental husbandry.

kelly... you really broke it down man. to be honest i dont even own a hygrometer... and i only mist, like every other day. i use newspaper for substrate... i use a doggy water bowl, and have polymer caging... i have never had any of my retics experience upper RI's, they all shed perfect most of the time. i even use an air conditioner... which probably dries out the air a little.

in good order or you would have experienced some problems. Sounds like you have some great caging setups. As you have found, polymer or plastic cages are obviously the best for maintaining decent humidity levels regardless of substrate type. I use Neodesha cages with the smaller air vents and UTH. They also provide adequate humidity even with just water bowls and newspaper substrate. I do mist right before a shed however, which definitely helps. Thanks,

Kelly

I don't want this to escalate into a big tear down, drag out forum fight, but, respectively,.. I agree with Kelly on this one. If this is in fact an RI, and if it is in fact bacterial in nature (needs to be verified by a culture performed by a vet before ANY measures are taken) then the worst things one can do is lower the humidity. The reason for this is quite simple and fundamental. If the snakes lungs and trachea are filled with phlegm and/or fluid you don't want this to thicken due to evaporation due to low humidity. The snake must expell this fluid eventually in order to clear its lungs of it. It can't simply reabsorb them through its lung membranes. And if the fluid/phlegm thickens due to evaporation then it can and will clog the relatively narrow trachea and the snake will certainly die of asphyxiation.

Note to the snake owner:
If strong antibiotics must be used please consider administering them orally and mixed with lots of electrolytes or even pedialyte. Perhaps on a 100 to 1 mixture or greater. Consult your vet (a reptile specializing vet) for the best mixture that will best hydrate the snake from within.

Just my personal take on it.
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David Beauchemin
High End Herps.Inc
http://HighEndHerps.com

sorry it took so long to get back to this subject . no need to worry about a drag out arguement . I have had great success with lowwering my humidity and others havent no big deal , My animals do have a very good herp vet . and if this method does not show signs quick enough they go right in for a visit. To Kelly my normal humidity is 65% and I lowwer it between 45% and 50% btu it doesnt stay there it is only done for a few days at a time. but hey whatever works is all that matters for the animal....................... Grunt

i meant let the cage dry out a little... bacteria can travel in airborne water particles.