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rescued Spider: blind or capped eyes?

S

solstice

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Hi all. I'm new here and have not posted before (hope I'm in the right section!), but I figured someone would be able to advise me on this BP I rescued yesterday. I've been keeping BPs for a few years now but have never seen--and certainly have never owned--one in such terrible condition. He is young, very thin, and in shed and was in a tank with no substrate beyond a filthy paper towel, no hide, no water, no heat, etc. Just a crappy situation. My main question is about his eyes; I've seen capped eyes before but never like this...is this just severe capping or might his eyes be deformed somehow? Can really bad, long-term capping injure their eyes? (Sorry if the photo is disturbing, I didn't really know how to describe it.) I know little about Spiders, but he still has a great temperament despite being functionally blind. Thanks for any advice, and please ask any questions, I'll answer them as best I can but I know almost nothing about this snake's past or origins. Thanks so much!




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That is so sad....Kudos to you for taking him in and helping him.
Hopefully some humid baths and keeping him in fairly high humidity(65%/70%) for a few sheds will allow him to shed those eyecaps and see again :(
 
sam, please soak that snake in a small shoe box with air holes for a while and hope that shed comes off the body and eyes,, if not u will have some infection that will happen with the eye sockets and meds are very hard to reach that area by along shot,, turn on the heat and humidity and hope for the best bro,, that is not healthy for any reptile,, please take action now,,,, good luck....mark
 
Soaking would be the best thing for this poor guy. Its very sad but stuff like this doesn't surprise me anymore, people are so irresponsible and could care less about caring for their animals they way they should. I think some people just get snakes for the heck of it or to just say they have one, but then once the shiny new toy syndrome wears off, the animal is always the one who suffers. I glad you have him now Sam, good luck and do what you can for this poor guy.
 
wow, he does look in bad shape, I'm glad you were able to rescue him in time. You know the one plus to the eyes is that they don't look like they've collapsed so there may be a good chance at saving them. Although saddly long term capping can cause permanent blindness.
 
Hi Sam...kudos to you for the rescue and I really hope you can salvage this poor lil guy.

When you are soaking you may want to add some sphagnum moss so he has something to rub around on but that is gentle to the eyes. I hope it doesn't lead to blindness, but if it does he definitely sounds like he is in the right hands.
 
Poor baby.......I hope everything goes well with him. I cant believe there are so many people out there who treat there animals so bad :( I mean how can you look at that snake and "think" it looks healthy? I just did a rescue myself a couple days ago. 2009 female pastel ball python weighed in at only 300 GRAMS!!!!!!!!! The worst case of emaciation I have EVER seen. and she is not small as in foot wise so I know she is not younger than stated........she is close to 4ftish. I can literally SEE every bone in her body!
:( :( :( I really hope you are able to save his eyes and I hope the person you rescued him from has no more reptiles in his possession!

good luck!!!!
 
Thanks for all the kind responses! I am definitely glad to have him, I really hate to see people treat any animal like this, but especially one that's trapped in a cage with no way to take care of themselves. This definitely seems to be an "impulse bought an animal I don't know how to care for" situation.

I think I said he had no heat before but that was incorrect, he did have a hot lamp which was probably making the cage even drier (so this poor jungle snake was basically living in a desert!), I'm getting him a heat pad today and have him in a warm room in the meantime. I also gave him a humid hide made from a tupperware filled with damp sphagnum (which he stays in pretty often) and have been soaking him in warm water in the sink daily. I have his cage covered with plexi so the humidity can't get out, anything else I can do to boost humidity in the tank? Also, does anyone recommend the shed-aid spray? I've heard of it but never used it, and this guy is still very young to the point where his scales are very thin and he's sorta pink on the belly, I don't want to damage his skin or anything.

I offered him a pinky last night and he clearly could not see it, but as soon as his face touched it he snatched it up, he's too weak to constrict but he did eat it fine. When I offered him a second he seemed interested but would not eat, I thought maybe he had used up all his energy swallowing the first one but I dunno. Will offer him another today. He does not scent very much, nothing like my other BPs whose tongues are never still, but so far I haven't seen any evidence of the spider "wobble" so I'm hoping he doesn't have that. Thanks again for the help! :)
 
solstice said:
Also, does anyone recommend the shed-aid spray? I've heard of it but never used it, and this guy is still very young to the point where his scales are very thin and he's sorta pink on the belly, I don't want to damage his skin or anything.
Click to expand...

I think if it were me I'd stick with the old fashioned natural way. Especially since we are looking at his eyes being involved? I had 3 rescue boas it took me quite a while to get all the retained eye caps off last year and they actually were able to see fine afterwords. I handled it like you are describing with the daily soaks and plenty of humid 'choices' for them.

solstice said:
I offered him a pinky last night and he clearly could not see it, but as soon as his face touched it he snatched it up, he's too weak to constrict but he did eat it fine. When I offered him a second he seemed interested but would not eat, I thought maybe he had used up all his energy swallowing the first one but I dunno. Will offer him another today. He does not scent very much, nothing like my other BPs whose tongues are never still, but so far I haven't seen any evidence of the spider "wobble" so I'm hoping he doesn't have that. Thanks again for the help! :)
Click to expand...

Also I wouldn't worry about getting him to eat much....i mean offer on a regular basis but because he is malnourished (likely) and has been cared for poorly you may want to stick to small meals and maybe every 4-5 days for a few weeks til he's acting more normal. Too much of a gutload can be worse.

Just my 2 cents worth....oh and to increase the humidity, you could put the moss in each corner of his enclosure and really saturate it as well.....then just check it a few times a day for water retention and refill. Also water over the heated side will increase ambient humidity.


k...now I'm done with my 2 cents ...best of luck!
 
I've rescued numerous of balls in horrible conditions. One thing I do about stuck sheds and eye caps is after soaking for at least 30 mins in warm water, I take a soft paper towel get it wet with hot water, which by the time you get to the snake should be warm, squeeze the water til its damp but not all the water is wrung out. Then I take the paper towel and run it along the shedding, the shedding should come off easily, you can even use your fingers to slowly peel it off. It sounds like he should be hydrated enough to do that. As for eye caps, if they don't come off by rubbing the paper towel softly over his eyes, you can use scotch tape, same as teacher tape, apply it to the eye, rub it on then slowly and carefully pull the tape off. May take a try or two but the caps should come off. A local reptile vet that's very well respected taught me this years ago when I took him a snake I rescued that was in horrible condition. Good luck! Happy to know the snake is in good hands now. I won't even go on to rant about incompetent owners, ill be here all day! Lol.
 
Update! Caps off!

After a warm bath today, this little guy's eye caps finally came off! One came off about a week ago, but he still had a lot of shed on his head so I soaked him today. So now they're both off and I'm trying to decide if his eyes are ruined or if he can see now--he is definitely more interested in his surroundings and is 'sniffing' all the time like a snake should. He refused food last week, but I'm going to try again tomorrow. So yeah, just a little update for anyone curious. Here's some after-soak pics of his eyes/face:
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Wow, he looks so much better!!! Kudos for taking him in and giving him a better life!

Sounds like he can see pretty well, which is wonderful! (I figure, if he's blind, he'd have cloudy eyes or something like that.) I'm glad he's doing well! Rescues are rarely easy....
 
Whew! That made me happy seeing the new photos. Thank god, they look a lot better. I'm not sure if it's been stated, but when you soak him in water, put a rock in the middle. It will give him something to pull the skin and caps off.
 
Focal X said:
I'm not sure if it's been stated, but when you soak him in water, put a rock in the middle. It will give him something to pull the skin and caps off.
Click to expand...

When he's in the water he is just annoyed and trying to get out, lol, so I've just been rubbing him down with my fingers while he's in there. He does have a lot of stuff in his cage to rub on, though, and I'm still keeping it super humid so he shouldn't have any more problems shedding. Now to get some food into him.

Also, it just occurred to me that when I was taking these pics yesterday, he jumped at the flash, which means he must have at least some of his sight back! Woohoo!
 
Woot Woot!!! Congrats on a succesful rescue! Keep up the good work and keep us informed on his progress.
 
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