Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i have a wildcaught kingsnake that i rescued from the street where some kids were throwing stones at it. this was on the 30th of august this year.

it appeared in excellent health, approx. 33 inches in length. it refused to eat at first, but within 2 days the eyes clouded up and i knew a shed was coming. this explained the refusal to eat.

the snake shed its skin on the 7th and became much more active. it ate two small mice readily and was moving about very well and seemed fine. it passed both mice already (this was on the 9th) i scheduled a vet visit to have it checked out (this coming friday)

today when i handled the snake, it seemed to have muscle spasms and kept one part of it's body (about 1/3 of the way from the head to the tail) kinked up. fearing that it was seriously injured i put it back in the enclosure and it layed mostly still.

later it moved about and straightened out completely, so i know that the animal is not completely paralyzed. it will, however, still spasm if the upper part of its body moves. i can touch the lower portion and he continues to respond as usual... that being that the body smoothly undulates in response to touch.

the spasms still concern me. i am new to snakes, this is my first. i do have a uromastyx that i have kept for quite some time, so i am familiar with general reptile care. the enclosure is fine for temperatures and i have it on aspen shavings. i called the vet but the reptile doctor is actually out until this friday.

any ideas what i could be dealing with here and what i should do in the meantime?

Most Important thing is to put it in another room away from any other reptiles. Keep the temps at about 80-85, and have fresh clean water. There is not much else you can do until the vet visit. Let us know what happens. It sounds like some kind of injury, but it ate and passed the food, so I don't know. Good Luck, Derek

yeah, room always stays about 82-83. i bumped up the temperature a bit. he survived the night and appears to have moved during the evening. instead of taking one deep breath every 45 sec as usual, he is only taking a shallow one about every 8 seconds.

i am hoping that it is just a cramped muscle or something not so severe.

Are you SURE what you thought was a stool, was not a regurgitation?.......because you mentioned it ate two mice on the seventh,.....and passed the meal on the nineth?

Normally, it should take a few more days for this to occur.

Snakes that regurge, usually do so in two-three days, when it doesn't get digested properly for a number of reasons, and putrifies(rots).

In any case, it does need to see a vet,......hope it pulls through!

~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"

yeah, it was a stool. they were very small mice (just fuzzies) since it would not touch a hopper when i first got the snake. it was wildcaught and i figured it was not used to mice. therefor i went with something smaller.

i have a vet visit scheduled for 8am on friday assuming that the snake survives that long.

You DO however, have one big thing going in the snake's favor, and that is the fact that it ate voluntarily on it's own.
Not to say the snake's "out of the woods" by any means, but more often than not, snakes that aren't doing well, usually also refuse to eat.

best regards, ~Doug
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"Better to be silent and thought a fool, than to open mouth and remove any doubt!"