Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Ok I usually am up on the milksnake forum but I am having a problem with my Eastern Kings soooo, I think this would be a more appropriate place. Here is the Scoop. First In the snake room I have the following species

Red Milks-Kansas
New York-Eastern Milks
Chesapeake, Montgomery and Rowan County Eastern Chains
Wild Miami-Corns

I put them down in the beginning of December. The two female Montgomery's had gone off feed almost a month before. Some of the others were getting picky so I stopped feeding for 3 weeks then shut down the heaters. For the first couple weeks I had a problem getting the Temp stable. It rose up to 70 on a couple of afternoons so I monitored it two to three times a day and kicked on the heater or opened the window to keep them between 50 and 60. Most of the time I was within 5 degrees of 55 after this strict monitoring.
Now today my wife said that there was a stink in the closet. So I sniffed around and found both of my Female Montgomery Eastern Chains dead. I also found two dead Red Milk Neonates that had not eaten at all since hatching. I was not surprised by the neonates but the Montgomery Females???? All others alive and well. All had fresh water that I checked regularly. These guys died within the last week since my last water checkup. I found small translucent blood trails coming from the one females mouth but that was the only sign of anything "funny". One of the females was bred last year by someone else successfully with 15 neonates hatching.

I have been working with Kings and milks for 2 and a half years now without brumating them. This was to be my first attempt and breeding project for this spring. Now I will only be breeding the Corns as all the others will not be old enough until next year.

Any Ideas on what I did wrong?????

Thanks,
Mike

From the info you provided, I did not read anything that would have killed them. Are you sure temps never dipped way down? It's hard to know without seeing the snakes and the set up. Did they have good weight before you cooled them? It is possible they had something else internally before you cooled them. There are so many factors it's a shot in the dark. The main things to watch are....Good weight, letting them empty their guts before cooling, keeping temps from getting too hot, or too cold, keeping clean water at all times, and making sure the snakes are healthy before they get cooled. I can't really think of anything else.
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King Snakes! Who can make a better mouse trap?
J Sierra

Thanks for the response.

I had the heater thermostat set at 50 so the lowest I read was 48F maybe on two occasions. Their weight was good and still looked good even after they died. From what I can tell they were in good health. They ate well, pooped clean and just looked great in general. It seems weird that they were both from the same locale and both were females. I don't know? Is it possible that the start of egg development weakened them? Again I really don't know.

Thanks again for the input.

Mike

Mouth Rot (Infectious or Ulcerative Stomatitis)
The blood coming from the female chain brings this to mind. The female chains may have both had this and the rigors of brumation tipped their survival into the failure zone. Don't know what could have killed the neonates; just not built up enough reserves to survive brumation, I guess.

Anyway, it might not hurt to very carefully examine the rest of the collection for mouth rot. In its early stages it is somewhat hard to see.

Sorry for your loss. What a bummer...
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Bob/Chris
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire

I also had a thought that there may be some toxic fumes in that closet maybe some strong perfume or anything that could make them sick. Moth rot is always a possibility, it's really all just guessing at this point. I know how something like this can haunt you till you figure it out cause you don't want to repeat the same thing again. How are the remainders doing?
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King Snakes! Who can make a better mouse trap?
J Sierra

Hi,

I agree, it does not sound like you did anything wrong. Easterns can take very cold temps, so, unles you literally froze them solid, they should be fine. Actually, I once froze some adult easterns nearly solid when I brumated them in a heated shed years ago. The touchy GFI outlet popped the circuit during the night and it got down into the teens outide (and in the shed). The water in my turtle pens had a good layer of ice on them, so it was well below freezing. I replaced the GFI outlet, warmed the shed back up to 50ish and hoped for the best. All kings were showing slow togue flicks a couple of hours later, so I just monitored them and continued brumation. Every animal recovered without incident and bred later in the spring.

The blood coming from the mouth makes me think of an undiagnosed rep. infection, rotten/undigested food in the gut, or a heavy load of parasites. All three of those can kill brumating kings as their immune systems can be sensitive because of the stress of brumation. I'd have a vet do a necropsy on the dead kings, just to rule out any problems that could spread to your remaining snakes.

With the exception of my NJ easterns, I no longer brumate my kings, as they don't seem to require it to reproduce. My snake building gets pretty cool at night (low 60s) and that seems to do the trick. Good luck.

Will

Yeah Will, I tend to agree fully on all you mentioned as well. Those temps alone should have been just fine for Eastern's and just about anything else for that matter too. I would want to get a necropsy done like you mentioned. Putrification in the gut or an R.I. is about all I can initially guess too, but since it was several weeks since he said they last ate, that doesn't make much sense either..(shrug). That's a pretty scary situation that makes you wonder what the heck actually happened to them.

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

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Hey Doug,

I concur, a necropsy is in order here. Normally I don't bother with them. After doing this for 30 years, I can usually figure out how I screwed up, but with those symptoms and the general scenario, I'd be a bit worried and want to get it checked out by a pro.

Will

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"a snake in the grass is a GOOD thing"

my website -serpentinespecialties.webs.com

Are you sure it didnt get too warm where they were brumating?

I keep my snakes that are cooling in a closet in my attic because while its cold as ever outside the closet will remain in the 40s. One year though it warmed up in the winter time and some containers had moisture in them which lead to respiratory problems for a snake or two.

I'm not saying a sudden warm day will kill snakes, the blood in the mouth made me think respiratory problem since that usually involves the snake coughing or gasping for air.

Sucks when you lose snakes for what seems to be no reason. Best thing to do is clean cages, pick up the pieces and restore your breeding group.
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Mike
KingPin Reptiles
www.kingpinreptiles.com

Is, if it happens that a snake is combating an infection, when you cool the enclosure you reduce that snake's ability to fight the infection.

If a snake does not have an infection, no problem.

It is often touted here that cooling is good for snakes. It may be for very healthy snakes, though it has not been proven one way or another. But cooling can be a bad thing for snakes with something wrong, especially if it is still warm enough for bacteria to thrive.

The obvious problem is that snakes do not always show signs of problems until later, so the keeper does not always know there is a problem right away.

I really think snakes benefit from cooling but have some heat during the day, at least for the first month of the brumation period. Then you can see which snake is using heat and which are avoiding it.
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Mark