Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I recieved two baby borenos two months ago, male and female. The male was always very small but ate live mice without a problem. His last two meals he regurgitated. He got very skinny very quickly and almost seemed to have digestive issues. When holding him, I could feel what felt litterally like small marbles in his stomach to the tip of his tail. He had not had a stool since I recieved him. By softly working my fingers over the tip of his tail trying to figure out what these marble like items were he finally pushed one out, it was very, I say again very very hard, like a rock. I could feel several more of these inside of him but could not work them out. I felt that these items my be bone matter that he was having a hard time passing and that this was causing the regurgitation of the last two meals.
I then noticed two abraisions on his under jaw and side of his head were it appeared they may have been bites from mice that may have accured while he was wrapped around them after striking. Very very minor mouth rot may have begun to develop, but nothing bad.
He never showed signs of disorentation but did not appear that lively. I just two days ago mentioned to my wife that I have a feeling as though he was not going to make it and then this morning I found him dead.
Never having a snake die on me before I worry of disease spreading to my other boa's and pythons, $10k collection. Any thoughts and imput would be great, thanks for the replies....

Hey,
It's very likely that this poor guy might have been suffering from something other than IBD, as IBD, is not something that is commonly found in pythons. Not impossible for them to have, but not common. It's more commonly found in Boas and other species of the Boid group. Anaconda's etc. At any rate, it could very well be some kind of septicemia (bacterial infection of the blood) that killed it, with other internal organs being compromised like the liver, kidneys etc. In very acute bacterial infections like that, these organs are sometimes affected too, causing a shut down of the digestive processes. Sad but common.

If it had been bit more than once and it had been left untreated and was not detected till the last minute these infections on a small animal can become quite virulent depending on the strain of bacteria, and can cause a whole assortment of things to suddenly go wrong. If money is no object, which it is for most of us, you might want to get a post-mortem done on it, to determine the specific agent and cause of death. I had a large male black blood, die suddenly, and some of the symptoms given were found on him, albeit, we are talking about two very different animals here, but infection was found to be the cause of death with several secondary causes, one of them being hepatic and renal compromise. Alright enough, fancy talk for me. I think you might get some idea from this. Hope this helps a little bit. Good luck with the others.

Note: Clean thoroughly it's cage and discard any bedding that might have become contaminated. My feeling is that it is not IBD, but more likely parasitic or infectious bacteria.

-Angel
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"Until we lose our self, there is no way of finding our self."
-Henry Miller.