Reptile & Amphibian Forums

He died so quickly, I never did figure out what was wrong. Over a 5 day period, he became totally dehydrated, weak and died...he had water but turned it down.

A few days before he died, I fed all 3 of my FWC's. The females had already digested their meal and expelled their waste but when the male died, he still had a lump in him.

He must have stopped drinking sooner and didn't show any signs of dehydration until the end....

I'll stop rambling now...it's just sad. Sorry.

Sybella,

Sorry for you loss...it's interesting that you say that there was still a lump in him after all the others had digested and excreted their meals. If he was stressed or sick, that might have halted digestion, leading to even more complications. Are you planning on getting a necropsy done, just to rule out any pathogens?

AP

No, I'm not having him looked at...I already disposed of him. It's been a hard month for me so I didn't even think about getting a necropsy done. RL can be a total .

I thought that the lump thing was interesting also...that's why I mentioned it here. I had never seen that happen before. Usually snakes that are sick refuse meals or take it and regurge. This guy acted "healthy" (except for looking dehydrated in his last few days) until the night before I found him dead.

My females were in the same tank with him and they both seem fine. I'm keeping a close eye on them though.

I wonder now...Could this have been Provent a Mite related?? Several months ago, someone gave me a free female burm, only when she got here I discovered she had mites. I thought I had done a good job confining the mites to her cage but recently discovered mites in 2 of the 6 tanks on my repile shelf. I treated every cage in that room about 2 weeks ago...about 12 days before the death of my male FWC. He was a 6 foot snake but was always a little thinner than the girls. I wonder if he didn't have the defenses to deal with the insecticide that he should have.

Sorry to hear about you losing your male. I would be hard up if mine died. But I don't think that it's a Provent-a-mite issue. I've been using it for years, and especially around the time when I was first introduced to it, I had a couple of snakes that were very week and emaciated from their mite conditions. I had no problems with them treating their enclosures with Provent-a-mite and them making full recoveries. I've also done so with rescued snakes that were in pretty sad condition when I got them and no adverse affects were noted.

The lump issue is strange. The only thing I can imagine is that some prior ailment led to the slower rate of digestion, and that possibly increased the level of any condition(s) that may have existed.

And just in case no-one has seen my male yet, here's a picture of him...again...and yes, he's the one that put me in the hospital after a 5 min. chewing due to a misjudgement of my own...lol

-----
Conrad
Too Fast Reptiles
www.toofastreptiles.bravehost.com

Thanks, Conrad.

This is an unrelated newbie question. First nice snake. Why are they called false water cobra's ? Is it because they resemble cobra's but aren't venomous? Are they venomous? Sorry if these are stupid ?'s I was just interested and I'm a novice with snakes.

They like water and they can hood like a cobra. Although they don't postrate themselves, they can still flair their neck pretty nicely.

And, yes they ARE venomous. However, the only way they can envenomate anything is by deep "chewing," as the venom comes through their back teeth, not front like real (lol) cobras. Small amounts of venom is present in their saliva so

For some people, the venom is quite toxic but for others, they have no reaction. I don't react but I've seen pictures of people with good size swellings from FWC bites. It's kind of like bee stings...you don't know how you'll react until you've been stung.

Thanks for the great info; sorry to hear about your loss.

Slight correction here. FWC's dont need to deep "chew". They can envenomate rather quickly with a fast hard bite.

(personal experience)

Frank
-----
"The luxury of not getting involved departed with the last lifeboat Skipper..."

In my experience, I haven't seen it though. Since the snake can control envenomation, I think it would be highly unlikely that a FWC would "waste" its venom on a person but you never know! LOL!! This is one of those situations where the snake and the keeper must "learn" eachother.

yeah learning was a good part of it. he's pretty tame now but aat the beginning those defensive reactions were on Hyper Drive!

I have a natural resistance to mild venoms (such as Bees, Wasps and some rearfangs...from which I have had many bites)but the chomp I got from my FWC was one of the most noticable. For a few minutes I had one nasty burn feeling on my hand. can't say how much he could have given me...but it was memorable.

Frank
-----
"The luxury of not getting involved departed with the last lifeboat Skipper..."

I'm allergic to bees. They give me silver dollar size welts that get hard as a rock and hurt terribly. But, I didn't have a reaction whatsoever to FWC bites. It's all different for different people.

I should point out that after 15 minutes all pain and the minimal swelling was gone. But boy those first five minutes....ouch!

Frank
-----
"The luxury of not getting involved departed with the last lifeboat Skipper..."

Just wait til another rear-fang nails me and I have a reaction to it...then you can laugh at me back. LOL!!