Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi- I am jsut looking for info to increase knowledge as teh snake is dead. was a friends snake. she got it about 3 months ago from a shelter and had very littel background on it. the snake had been doing well- eating adn wasting regularly, and was active. she caem home from work yesterday and it was dead. No blood/fluid from moyuth or anus and nothing abnormal looking in body ect. I searched through google using "sudden death in snakes" and well I am sure many of you can guess how wellthat went. anybody have any ideas on what may cause suddendeath? Snake was fine (or looked it anyway)as of Sun am. thanks,

Sue S

The abscense of presenting symptoms and a history for the snake inhibit us from helping you much. Sudden deaths in seemingly healthy snakes are admittedly often due to lack of the owner's ability to properly assess the snake; which was ill. I don't know the experience level of you or those involved, so cannot tell if this is the case.

Ideally, in such a mysterious death, the body can be refridgerated and taken to your veterinarian for a necropsy. An in-house gross necropsy usually isn't very expensive and the DVM can rule out obvious problems such as foriegn body, internal abscess or tumors, grossly problematic organs such as fatty liver or enlarged heart or kidneys. If you would like further answers, the DVM can send the body to a pathologist who will be able to look at the cellular level of the organs to determine the health and/or disfunction of that organ. ie, if this snake was in liver failure, or the intestinal mucosa was damaged ect. Pathologists also have a certain array of viral indicators to let you know if this is a likely cause of death.

I hope I have shed some light on your situation
Ian