Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've raised a pair of gray banded kings for the last two years. They've never given me a problem, rarely ever missed a meal. They were between 2 and 3 feet long. I came home from work today to find not one, but both died! Both snakes were still warm. I've had healthy snakes die out of the blue before, but to have both of my gray banded's die at the exact same time is just mind blowing. The temps were perfect, they weren't impacted, there was no blood or regurge or anything else to be found in their cages. I am completely baffled on this one. I'm truly depressed after this.

I was so excited to breed them next year, my female was absolutely stunning!

Are you sure there wasn't a spike in temps while you were gone? My snakes are never warm to the touch, unless they happen to be digesting a meal on the warm spot.

Also, what's the chances that some sort of toxin was present? Do you have other snakes in the same room or rack?
-----
Diego

SWCHR

that really sucks .Sorry to hear that.When they did eat last and did they both eat at the same time?
Did you change anything in the last 3 days? Location, thermostat orclean the tanks/tubs?water?
-----
"Wake me when its April"

Doug L

The best guess i can come up with is some how bad food. They both ate two days prior to their death, but i also fed 2 sinaloans, 3 black rats, and two ball pythons fuzzies from the same bag of fuzzies. I guess it could just be coincidence they happened to get bad mice, but again, i've been feeding from that same bag of probably 100 mice for the last couple weeks. the mice were raised in my personal collection and weren't more than maybe 2 months in the freezer.
I keep my room at the same temp, so my cages are not heated individually and when i say the snakes were still warm, i mean, rigormortis hadn't set in and when i picked them up they were still very limp. i didn't lose power, and my high and low temps for the day were normal.

Thanks for all the input

If you raise your own mice I can believe it could be that.
Were they housed together and share the same water bowl ?If they were housed together then it has to be water food or temps.Unless they tryed to eat each other.
-----
"Wake me when its April"

Doug L

I've breed my own mice for about 4 years now. That's still the closest logical explanation though. The snakes were housed in different cages on opposite sides of the room.