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We were supposed to pick up a boa last night- when we got to the lady's house- she was dead as a doornail. She was covered in mites was missing quite a few scales and was in a much much too large cage. now whats strange about that? the snake had a pretty good hold of its self. bit its self about 1/3 of the way down its body. What the heck would have posessed the poor thing to do that?!?!?!?!
Beth
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The rescue site: www.freewebs.com/okreptilerescue

I can’t answer your question but tell me; can't a person get fined or put in jail for animal cruelty when you find things like this? The description you gave of the snake sounds horrifying and that "Lady" should have done something about it.

Greg

We did call the spca. They said they would "look into it". unfortunatly- around here- the focus is more on dogs, cats, farm animals etc- We get quite a few animals from people that need immediate vet care which we pay for and get the proper medications to releve URIs, coccidia, calcium deficencies are the most common- costs us around 75 $ per animal for a vet visit and cal. shot. a lot of times, we can use calcium supp.s and UVB lights.
anyway- to answer your question- I think she should go to jail or at least get handed a pretty heafty fine. I was told to call the SPCA back this weekend to see what they found. I imagine the snake is still in the cage so they should have found something. I did sneak a picture with my phone- don't know if it'll be of any use- especially since i don't pay for the service to get the pics off my phone. I'll post an update on wether or not she gets a fine/jail time, etc- i very seriously doubt it though- there was a dog fighting ring across the street from us for quite a while that the spca and animal control broke up on a weekly basis- nobody ever went to jail- don't know if they got a fine or not....
Beth
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The rescue site: www.freewebs.com/okreptilerescue

Reptile laws are S***. basicly as long as you dont have anything banned and have it housed in a way that it cant escape or pose threat to the general public; you can do what ever the hell you want to it. It should be changed, but nobody in power cares about herps...
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- Mike Fourquet

Cloaca Herpetoculture
www.CloacaHerps.com

Horrible about the condition of the snake and that it died due to poor conditions... but there was an article in Reptiles magazine sometime last year about a snake (corn or king?) that tried to eat itself on a couple of occassions - just attacked its own tail and tried to eat itself. Fortunately the owners saw it in time and the snake let go of itself... not sure if this would be the same kind of weird behavior or not....
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Lauren Madar - OphidiaGems.com
1.0 Ball Python, 1.0 Hog Island Boa (RIP DeeDee), 1.1 Hypo BCI, 1.1 Surinam BCC, 0.1 Green Tree Python

He/she was pretty skinny there wasn't any poo in the cage (which was obviously dirty) so i imagine it hadn't eaten in a while. it was skinny but didnt really look emaciated- it still had some girth- not enough but some.
thanks
Beth
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The rescue site: www.freewebs.com/okreptilerescue

My bet is that it is a neurological thing....obviously the snake was on it's way out when it happened. Sometimes when dogs have seizures they will snap at the air and such, so perhaps something similar happened to the snake as it's brain was shutting down.
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Thanks,
Amy
www.myboids.4t.com
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1.14 Normal ball pythons
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