Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My yearling SD gopher just shed and usually there is no problem. However, this time the eye caps did not come off. There is very little loose skin to try to grab, (even with tweezers) and I do not want to risk eye damage. She is VERY opposed to that idea! *LOL* I if hydrate her will she expell them? Or will they even come off in the next shed? She is really regular with the sheds. So experts. . . What do I do?

This happened a few times to some snakes of mine. Here are two suggestions.

You could fill up a shoebox with water, perhaps an inch, and let the snake swim around for an hour or so and see if they come off.

Another idea is this.....what I did was grab them behind the neck, like they would say to grab a snake in the wild, and then submerge one side of the face with an eye under water in a waterdish, container, etc, while restraining the other section of its body with my other hand. Of course the snake will not be enjoying this. Submerge for a few minutes, then check for loose skin. Being EXTREMELY CAREFUL, see if you can move the loose skin off with the tip of your finger on the hand that you can keep steady the best. It is touchy, but has worked for me.

Hope this helps! Keep us posted!

Billy
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Genesis 1:1

if Billy's suggestion doesn't work take a piece of scotch tape and use the sticky side to attach to the cap so it pulls off. stick the tape to your hand first to take some of the stickiness away, this works everytime. Ron
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The Crawl Space

It would be soooo much eaiser just to let them come off with the next shed! Just kidding! Thanks for the suggestions. It is a good thing she is even tempered. I might lose a finger!

Retained eye caps are a relatively common problem. Often times, if a snake sheds in pieces or if the eye caps don't come off, the underlying cause is low humidity level in the snakes' enclosure.

I'd recommend one of two things....Either soak the animal in a lukewarm bath for approx 10-15 minutes twice a day, or soak a pillow case in lukewarm water and leave him in it overnight. I WOULD NOT recommend trying to take off the eye caps, as it is VERY easy to damage the snakes' eyes this way. I once had a ball python that lost an eye this way. More often than not, increasing the humidity will correct this problem with little else necessary on your end. Either the snake will drop them itself when the humidity is corrected, or it will simply shed 2 pair of eye caps on the next go round. In my experience, eye caps only become a real issue if they are retained repeatedly.

The most important thing is to correct the humidity. With a gopher snake, (a species that doesn't require special humidity requirements) this can easily be accomplished by placing the water bowl directly under the light in the cage (assuming that you have one). You'll have to fill up the water bowl more frequently, but the water evaporation will increase the overall humidity in the enclosure.

Another thing to consider is the snakes' age. It is my experience that younger snakes have more problem sheds. A solution to this is to lightly mist the snake down once or twice a day when he is "in blue"....this will also increase the humidity in the enclosure as well.

-Kris

....because people tried to manually remove a retained spectacle. Never try to use tweezers or any instrument like that unless you are very sure of what you are doing. Scotch tape can usually be used safely, but you still need to be careful. I saw one California Kingsnake missing an eye because the guy that had it was out of Scotch Tape, so he used duct tape to remove an eyecap. He was truly shocked to see the whole eyeball stuck to the tape when he was done.

One technique that is less stressful and has a high degree of success is this:

Get a plastic shoebox or sweaterbox and fill it with wadded up damp terrycloth washcloths or hand towels. Put the snake in there and leave him for 24 hours or more. Usually, the unshed eyecap will come off in the towels just from the snake crawling through them and the terrycloth sort of gently "teasing" the eyecap off after it has softened with moisture. This technique also works well for partial sheds. The good thing is that many times it requires no manual removal. If they eycap is still there after 24 hours in the damp towels, it will be softened and loosened enough that removal with tape or by gently "rubbing" it from the front edge back with one of the towels will easily remove it.
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We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children. Ralph Waldo Emerson