Here's the quick question, but you can read on for all the information:
My Hogg Island Boa is giving short squeaking/wheezing noises during heavy breaths and I'm worried it might be a respiratory infection. The vet isn't sure, so should I just give him the antibiotics anyway?
The long version:
I have had my Hogg Island Boa since he was about 6 months old, and he is now 2 years old. Around 3 months ago I noticed that he made a slight, quiet "sneezing" noise whenever he made a more heavy breath. It sounds similar to a squeak or an inhale from someone with a runny noise. When I searched online months ago, I couldn't find anything negative about "snakes sneezing" so I just wrote it off as nothing serious. He does it every once in a while (5-8 times) when I am holding him (for about an hour), but it has never affected his eating habits or behavior. He has never refused a meal in the year and a half I've had him.
Fast forward three months and I bought a female Hogg Island Boa (1 week ago) to share a large wooden and glass cage with him. I know snakes are very solitary, but I am considering breeding them in the future and the breeder I bought her from said she has had better luck when she keeps her Hoggs all together all the time. A few days after I introduced the two of them to their joint habitat and feed them each a large rat, I notice that she, too, is making the wheeze during heavy breaths. After another concerned search online I see that it might be RI. I take the male into the vet (who is too busy to see both of them apparently) and she inspects the Hogg for any other symptoms. Apart from being "too dry" she doesn't see any mucus or anything in the mouth or nostrils. The vet recommends raising the humidity and giving them both warm soaks for about 30 minutes a day and hope for improvement. If nothing improves, I can return and get the antibiotics, although she says it's hard to say for sure if it is RI.
Tonight was the third night of soaking them separately. The squeaks are still there, but definitely not as frequent. The male manages to poop an enormous amount while I am carrying him away from the bathtub (inches away from the carpet, it luckily drops on the wood floor). It all looks like normal. The female pooped in the tub and I notice that it is all white, there aren't any brown areas. I'm not sure if she was finished, so maybe everything wasn't out yet. I would leave her in for longer because it seems like I may have interrupted the process, but she has already started to climb out and it's difficult to push her back in the rubbermaid. I put her back in the cage and inspect the feces more to see that separated from the poop on the other side of the rubbermaid is a grouping of tiny segments resembling worms or larva. They did not have heads or tails or any partitions, just what looked like tiny, brown, transparent tubes about half the length of your pinky nail. They were not moving or anything like that. I read that they could be pinworms, but that I wouldn't be able to see them without a microscope. I've found a picture of what they most closely resemble, but it's not perfect as they were much shorter and didn't seem to have the dark heads in the pic. Like an idiot and without thinking about it, I flush it down the toilet, immediately regretting my actions. So a fecal sample is out of the question, unless I find that she finished tomorrow.
Here's some stats in case you are wondering:
Cage: 5' wide 2' deep, 3.5' tall
Temp: Cold bottom areas of 75, medium ambient of 82-85, basking of 92
Hum: 65%
Water: cleaned/replaced weekly
Anybody have advice or experience with any of this? Is it possible that the snakes don't have RI? Should I treat them for it anyway, even with only one symptom? Could she also have worms, or might this just be something from a bad frozen rat?
