Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Well, I've been handling my boyfriend's female corn snake for about twenty minutes now and she just won't stop making a sneezing sound. There's nothing coming out of her nostrils, and I've held her head and tried to look in them but don't see anything wrong. She's never made this noise except every once in a while hence the thread.

Here's all the information I think you need.

Female
3-4 years old
5ft long
No mucus, bubbles, froth, no labored breathing, not breathing through mouth
Active
Shed last week
Fed earlier this week
Temp gauge says 80 C
hydrometer gauge: ~52-55%
Pine bedding

That should be it... Hopefully we just need to switch her back to Aspen bedding. Thanks in advance~

Yup, could very well be the bedding. I mainly buy the bales of pine or aspen bedding from one of the big chain stores. Neither my favorite as both pretty chunky. Still, relatively cheap. I notice the aspen is much less dusty than the pine. If you recently switched from aspen to pine, the sneezing could be the result of the extra dust from the pine bedding. This can lead to respiratory problems and I would suggest getting it off the new bedding on onto paper towels or newspaper til you get new bedding. Better safe than sorry!!

It could be the dust from the new bedding that doesn't agree with the snake.

I see you did notice it wasn't bubbling, or gaping at the mouth which is certainly good, but there is another possibility here as well, so I will address this to just in case. Snakes can also make a sneezing sound if they have, or are starting to developed an upper respiratory infection, and it might not be to the point of it gaping, or bubbling yet. Put the snake up to your ear in a quiet place, and carefully listen for a "ticking", or clicking noise as it breathes. If it does show these signs, you had better get it to a decent reptile vet fast so it can be given antibiotics after a culture sensitivity is done. This will tell the vet which type of antibiotic to give it for the best results. If it is an R.I. and you don't do anything, it can get MUCH worse, and the snake can easily die. So give this some serious thought. Sometimes too cool conditions, or wet substrate that has begun to mildew can cause this.

Hopefully it is just the dusty different type of bedding you started using though, and not an R.I.

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

Since you looked at the nostrils, and didn't see much, I doubt it is this, but look again just in case. You mentioned it shed a short while ago, and snakes sometimes make a sneezing sound when a small bit of shed is retained in/around the nostril(s), so they do that in an attempt to get rid of it. I just thought this was worth mentioning too.

~Doug
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

I'd switch the snake over to a newspaper substrate and see if it stops sneezing in a few days. This could serve to isolate if it's a respiratory infection or just irritation caused by dust.

I've had "sneezy" snakes stop wheezing after changing their particle based substrate to newspaper.

On the other hand, as Doug said, it could be the very early signs of an upper respiratory infection. Sometimes these can be cured simply by giving the snake some additional heat.

You mentioned 80 degrees. The snake should have a "hot spot" in the upper 80's - as well as a cooler area in the mid-70's.

Tim

Thanks for all the feedback. =) She's been in pine bedding for a couple of months now, sorry I didn't mention that. I'll get her a new light since the one that's in there now has been going for over a month (they usually die within a month for me) and switch her the spotlight so the heat comes straight down rather than spread out. See how that goes, and in the meantime, try to find a reasonably close herp vet near my home. Sucks living in a backwoods hole.. only vets are for dogs/cats.

Pine is a very bad bedding for snakes as its 'aroma' is an irritant, cedar is even worse. Switch back to aspen or even just paper towel or newsprint.

The noise could also be 'huffing' something corn snakes and other snakes do when they are not happy about something, such as being handled for too long. If the noise happens every time you have the snake out for more than 10 minutes, then it probably just wants to be left alone.
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PHLdyPayne

I agree with Tim, but I feel that before an accurate diagnosis can be made, we must first know what pattern this snake is. Agreed?

.
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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

Oh, come on. Am I really the only person who finds this to be in poor taste?

Okay.. I have no idea what the last two posts were about... but whatever.

She stopped sneezing and she didn't have any 'clicking' sounds when she breathed. Hence why I stopped checking on this thread. Thanks for all the help~