Reptile Forum, Reptile Classifieds - CaptiveBred

[gargoyle]

We had to make a very difficult decision today and basically we decided not to leave the egg in our female any longer. She had oxytocin, warm baths, calcium etc. So we decided to take Kathy Love's advice and massage the egg out with the aid of a well lubricated probe. It took two hours gently coaxing it out, but eventually it came out. She's now home in her viv, been drinking loads of water with electrolytes and had two small mice. HOWEVER she had a poo (which was firm) but it had watery blood around it. I suspect the newspaper makes it look worse but I just need some advice from anyone who has experienced this. any advice will greatly received or even just telling me to STOP PANICKING!!!!

[cass]

Not got any first hand experience with this but read a similar story in local newspaper bout local reptile vet who did this for a couples female corn , she had around 12 eggs stuck though , and 2 weeks later there was a update story and the snake was doing fine
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[Scott W]

difficult one to judge, there could be internal damage that caused the bleeding.

I did have a trans pecos rat that failed to lay the last 3 eggs, these were removed with similar methods you described. She did survive but I never risked breeding her again as I felt there would be too much internal scarring.

best of luck.
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[cornfan]

There is a thin membrane that surrounds the developing eggs inside of the female corn. As you can imagine, this membrane contains some very fine veins as a blood supply. I've disected two female snakes in my time who have died whilst gravid through dystocia (the first belonged to someone else and they simply wanted me to take a look to see what had happened and the second was my own rat snake who died before laying any of the eggs and I was attempting to retrieve the eggs to continue their incubation. Alas, none survived which was gutting) and this membrane is rather fragile. It is entirely possible that one of the veins in this membrane has become ruptured during the process and the act of the snake passing its waste may well have pushed this small amount of blood out with it. If this is the case then, indeed, the fluids that emerge with the waste will make it look as though there is more blood than has actually been passed through but it may actually be minimal.

Without being able to see the snake or even see what is going on inside, it will be absolutely impossible for any of us here to offer you any firm opinion. All any of us can offer is speculation about what may or may not have occured. If you really are seriously worried about her then the only course of action is to seek veterinary advice where they can actually examine the snake.

If, as I imagine (and so please do not take this as gospel), the blood amount is minimal then I would suggest keeping a very close eye on her. I would also recommend you examine her vent area to ensure that no visible damage has occured in that region. Should no further blood be passed and she remains alert, active, eating, drinking, defecating etc. in good fashion then great. If you notice any change in her behaviour whatsoever then I'd suggest veterinary treatment asap. I'm not overly keen on the use of probes to massage eggs out as this seems a little heavy-handed for such a delicate situation in my opinion but as i wasn't there to see how it was done then I can't really comment on that but the slight rupturing of the veins in the membrane seem, to me, to be the most probably cause.

I've got a couple of corns here who have happily survived dystocia issues. The first had an egg that was massaged out and the second required an operation as the last three eggs had stuck fast. Both of these occured years ago and they're still healthy, fit and wonderful snakes - one of whom insists on laying eggs each year regardless of whether I want her to or not! Niether of them have ever had another occurance but they have both given me heart failures in their time!
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Regards, Tanya

Reptile Lover

[gargoyle]

Just a quick update. She has since had a small mouse (about 10 minutes after typing the message) and a medium mouse yesterday. She is active, alert (lots of tongue flicking), drinking all as normal. I have kept the area clean just in case and she is in a quarantine tank. I won't be breeding her again, just don't want to risk it with her. I know I may not have much choice but I can at least not force it on her.
Thanks for the replies, I was in a panic and just needed a bit of reassurance. I have just read what I posted and it seemed I probably didn't explain the circumstances very clearly. She actually had a warm bath and gentle massaging for the most to get the egg out. The probe was used to relax her muscles and "open" her up. This was probably only done for about five minutes. Anyway, she seems ok now so thanks once again.

[cornfan]

Glad to hear that she's doing well for you. I'm sure she'll be fine from now
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Regards, Tanya

Reptile Lover