Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I feed my snake live rats.

Since ive joined on here ive decided to switch to frozen, but i havent found anyone as of yet to get them from so i havent begun. In the year ive had my boa shes fed on live rats fine ive never had a problem though ive read some horror stories about it....until last night.

I fed her last night and nothing unusuall happened but this morning i woke up and saw this open spot. her scaled are completely gone. I dont know how i could have missed it last night.

What should i do? should i take her to the vet imediatly? im so worried, i tried to look up snake first aid but of course i only found snake bites.

Please help

i would take her to the vet if infact the live rat had bitten her dont know much but sooner the better just incase of infection

Pour hydrogen peroxide over the wound untill you can get to the vet. Your gona get preached to over this.

Hi,

(I don't know about hydrogen peroxide as the other person said?I've just never heard that before, so not sure about it.)

I've had this happen (back in '98 before I found all the info on the 'net, I used to feed live). Is the wound bleeding or is it just missing scales and white skin? Is it swelling up?
I used some neosporin (not the kind with pain reducer in it! just regular old neosporin) on the wound and later some soaks in diluted betadine.

Going to the vet is always a good thing and I would recommend it! That way they can make sure there is no infection. That is what I did, it is good for peace of mind and if something else is wrong then you will be at the right place.

this link shows what can happen to an untreated rat bite
http://lbah.com/reptile/snakeskin.htm#rb
Please go to the vet, it's very important.

There are lots of places to find frozen rats, even try looking on craigslist. In the meantime, you can still use live, just kill them yourself.
http://www.anapsid.org/prekill.html

Here's a link for prey-sources, as well as the main page on kingsnake where you can find rodent breeders
http://www.anapsid.org/resources/preysources.html

Hope some of this helped, good luck.
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'There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness."' -Rainshadow

No need for preaching or panick attacks !
Just flush the wound with peroxide or bentadine solution and keep the wound covered in Neosporine/Triple A until its healed.
Keeping the cage extra clean will prevent any infections from gaining a foot in the wound.
Affording a Vet visit will only incure costs.
You'll likely have learned the lesson from this already.

Best of Luck from here on out
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TnK

I agree with that, it's just that if you say to much someone yells your not a vet, you can't do that. I use bag balm as my triple A. It's for cows. If the skin can be pulled closed you can glue or sew it in place. But then again I was raised on a farm, were the vet told you how to do it over the phone. And I'm really old.

LOL!!!
Some questionable things indeed need a Vets attention,but this is pretty well cut and dried.
Whats done is done and the corrective measures dont justify ripping someones ass from some lofty position of self perceived expertise.People do some really stupid stuff when it comes to animals,negatives generally prevent recurrence on a large percentage of cases.Granted general opinions always afford much stiffer punishment not limited to verbal chastisement.

I'll shut up now

>>I agree with that, it's just that if you say to much someone yells your not a vet, you can't do that. I use bag balm as my triple A. It's for cows. If the skin can be pulled closed you can glue or sew it in place. But then again I was raised on a farm, were the vet told you how to do it over the phone. And I'm really old.
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TnK

i waited about 2 minuted and then was dialing up the vet lol i got her in quick and the vet just clean it out (a little blood but just white with no scales) i got some antibiotic to give her just in case. Bill came to $100 but it was definatly worth it for the peice of ming like you said. Also i was so worried and scared for her ive definatly learned my lesson, shes never going near anything alive but me from now on.

GOOD E Nuff !

>>i waited about 2 minuted and then was dialing up the vet lol i got her in quick and the vet just clean it out (a little blood but just white with no scales) i got some antibiotic to give her just in case. Bill came to $100 but it was definatly worth it for the peice of ming like you said. Also i was so worried and scared for her ive definatly learned my lesson, shes never going near anything alive but me from now on.
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TnK

glad it worked out okay, peace of mind is worth a lot sometimes.

I've always found it's best to advise someone to go to the vet when also dispensing advise, if you only offer advise and the situation is worse than you are aware of in a forum post, the snake dies, they can blame you for not telling them to go to the vet.
I guess I look at it as trying to cover all bases.