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I have been keeping kings/milks for 13 years and have not experienced a regurged/vomited meal until now. As some of you may have seen my earlier post, I recently acquired a captive hatch, locality L.getula californiae (12/2011 hatch). It was cooled for about 2 months and warmed up. Refused first meals of live, brained, and ft mice. On 2/9/2012, it consumed a baby Scelop. lizard eagerly and with vigor. Digested quickly with zero problems. I decided on 2/12/2012 to attempt a scented pink, using the "bait and switch method" of teasing the snake with a lizard and tricking it to eat a scented live pink. The snake grabbed the lizard off the tongs and began constricting. I ran some cool water under the faucet over the snake's head and it released. It eventually took the scented live pink. However, the snake took a considerable amount of time consuming the pink (30 minutes). The meal looked large, but barely left a belly buldge.

I returned the snake from its feeding tub to its enclosure--5 gallon screen top tank with cypress mulch substrate, cork bark hides, moist sphagnum hide, water bowl. UTH heats warm side of tank at 80-83F. Room is always around 58-65F (kept cool due to pyros and zonata). He attempted to enter a cork hide via a small crack which he normally can enter. But due to the meal, he got stuck. I was able to gently and quickly get him out and he burrowed under the substrate.

I thought nothing of the feeding ordeal (stress of making him release the lizard, meal maybe being a tad large, getting stuck, etc) and let him be for two days. I was doing his water and moss today and noticed an "off" smell. Dug around the snake nolonger had a buldge, but rather, I found a half vomited (pretty much mostly digested) pink. I cleaned out the soiled area of the substrate and inspected the snake, seeing no real problem--active, tounge flicking, "darty". Attemped to give him a dead lizard in which he refused (i figured he would).

What did I do wrong? Did I wait too soon to offer a scented pink? I was told to give him some soaks in water with diluted Pedialyte (to boost electrolytes, etc) and try feeding in a week or two. Am I just being overly concerned---I know snakes can sometimes regurge a meal, but this was half digested.

Any tips? I'm kinda freaking out because i love this little guy and have never, ever had this happen in my snake keeping career before.

Thanks
-Zach

Definitely don't try to feed the snake again so soon after it regurgitates a meal. The snake is going to need it's stomach acids to build back up for proper digestion. Also after feeding the snake a lizard you probably should have waited at least a week before trying to feed the snake again, let it develop an appetite. Make sure your snake drinks plenty of water before you offer food again, try feeding it in it's tank and walking away, some snakes are shy and don't want you to watch them eat.
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www.kingpinreptiles.com

Because he managed to hang onto his meal for a couple of days, but could not finish the digestion process, I am thinking he needs a hotter spot to coil up on, like about 90F. Use an infrared gun to see that the actual spot he will nest in is that warm. I always wait until they defecate before feeding another meal, as well. Wait about 10 days after the regurge then feed him a small meal in his nest, so as to not stress him out any further.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

Like the others have mentioned, waiting 10 days is very good advice. My first gut instinct is similar to Bon's. I wonder if the temps didn't drop a bit too much maybe overnight? That's when I have experienced similar events, when we have drastic night drops which catch me off guard, and I feed the day before. I have heat lights in my snake room which work pretty well in keeping the temps around 83. However if we get an extreme temp drop like we had a couple nights ago the temps in that room can go below 80 as the heat lamps are not strong enough to counter the extreme drop.
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King Snakes! Who can make a better mouse trap?
Jorge Sierra

I also think the snake either didn't get to the warm side, or the temp dropped too far and it wasn't nearly warm enough for the snake to properly digest the large meal. The meal simply rotted inside the snake's gut, which in turn poisoned the snake's system with very nasty bacteria.

In my experience, whenever a snake flips around all over the place and constricts itself, it is on it's way out. This is what they do if they are poisoned

As the others mentioned, feeding the snake is the WORST thing you could possibly do, because the snake's gut has to have a good 10 to 12 days to replenish the acids, electrolytes, and other good bacteria to properly digest any future meals. So what this does is cause yet MORE regurges if it lives through it.

I would have it dosed with Flagyl (Metronidazole) at the rate of 50mg/per kg of body weight, then wait a good 10-12 days and feed it a VERY SMALL meal several times until you are convinsed it will hold these down. Then don't ever feed it giant meals with insufficient heat.

Hope the little guy does okay.....

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

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