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Bad Guy Siren Exotics AKA SirenSanJose - SICK ANIMALS

I know harald, I was just very frustrated because I put off posting this in the BOI for this exact reason. I'm aware that I should have taken her to the vet, but I'm being honest when I say that there are no vets in my area that have ANY idea about snakes. A culture was ran and showed positive for a bacterial infection, so to me it's quite obvious that an antibiotic is needed. I found a source that seemed incredibly knowledgeable about the subject after literally hours of research, and have been giving her injections of tylan. She appears to be improving.

I agree, I was getting mad at people for saying things that were true. I admit this. But the fact is, I don't think it's fair that the ONLY responses to the BOI thread about someone else blowing me off after selling me a sick snake are that "maybe you shouldn't have snakes" and "your quarantine system is obviously bad", statements that are very much NOT true in my opinion. Wouldn't that make anyone frustrated?
 
Part of the frustration too is that I was sold a sick snake by these people and haven't had a response back in two months. The whole situation is just very aggravating to me, so I apologize to the previous posters for getting defensive.
 
snakeman101172 said:
Lets take the first statement that you have done nothing wrong. You purchased and caged an animal that becomes solely dependent on you for its very survival with out having the means to provide basic vet care to the animals in your charge. You have other animals correct? How do they receive care when needed?

The next statement remedies itself. Since you are implying I may not know how RI works and you do and you seem to acknowledge it can pop up from no where and is a variety of the common cold. If that is true why would you make this purchase without being prepared for the responsibility of taking care of the common cold if it were to pop up?

To imply that you should have been EXPECTING a sick animal is asinine. To be prepared for POSSIBLE vet care is simply RESPONSIBLE. My assertions come from the wording of your initial post. Again, I will state I am sorry to hear of you having a sick snake, but I am more sorry to hear that the sick snake was not provided quick care when needed. I don't think you could reference any part of my post indicating that I supported them dodging you. For whats its worth you were far more tolerant of being blown off than I would have been.

I am not sure of what percentage of the viewing audience here is thinking in the back of their mind "Do not sell to, he is not responsible enough to think that vet care might come into play with an animal."

Just my opinion, but perhaps do not obtain any more living animals and re home what you have down to a number that you CAN AFFORD to CARE for.

The moment you bought that animal you agreed to care for its needs.
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MCMB-2 said:
Again Scott, I appreciate you doing your best to derail this thread. You still have not answered my question. Was it ok for them to sell me a sick snake and then ignore me for two months?

Are you saying that every time I buy a snake I should assume it is sick? Considering I have never had a sick snake before and take excellent care of them, I don't see any reason to have a ton of extra money set aside for when someone screws me over. Apparently you have a very different business model than I do because I only have healthy snakes.
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Feel free to read the post again that you are responding to. Comparing aids treatment to the "common cold" ? Be careful with Tylan and dosing. Also, Tylan is only effective against certain bacteria. If you do not even know if it is gram positive or negative what you are shooting it up with may be as useful as water. not all snake "common colds" are one in the same.

On a side note if you have children or plan to have them please do not provide health insurance or care of any type as your business model and mine are so different your children will probably never be sick. To be clear in closing again, It is a shame you received a sick snake and they seem to be blowing you off. Probably the over exaggeration in the start of all this made your complaint seem non credible. Just opinion btw.

the seller refunding or compensating you in some way is secondary to the animal receiving care the you signed up for to provide. I can sense the frustration in your responses. Take a moment or two to collect your thoughts. I am not trying to "derail" your thread in any form and I apologize if it sounds that way to you.
 
I genuinely don't follow your logic but I apologize for being defensive before. The snake is currently receiving treatment and seems to be improving dramatically. As I said previously if you read my post, there is no vet in my area that I know of that has any idea about snakes. We have been to two in town personally, not including those we have heard about from others, and they simply dont seem to be knowledgeable about ball pythons at all. As I stated, I literally did hours of research before administering any sort of antibiotic. I assure you that I'm doing everything in the best interest of the snake. You're more than welcome to your opinion, but I promise you every snake I have besides this one is 100% healthy. I just want the seller to take some amount of the responsibility.
 
Also Scott, although I appreciate your opinion, I would suggest that you take a few moments of your time to read Victoria's post. I feel that she succinctly and adequately described the situation, so if you could respond to her posts instead of those I made out of anger, I feel that this thread would be much more productive.
 
MCMB-2 said:
...there is no vet in my area that I know of that has any idea about snakes.
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Then please don't breed them until you find a qualified vet. A lot can go wrong that requires immediate emergency treatment once you start pairing these guys.
 
On a side note, my reptile vet of choice in town is Dr McCormack at Kreature Komforts. Not sure how good she is with snakes, but only place I'll take any of my lizards or geckos to in Reno.
 
Thank you for the heads up Karin, that's the first positive review I've heard anyone give a Reno vet in terms of reptiles. The last one I got was a vet who said "the snake probably got fed too big of a rat" when her reproductive organs were completely turned inside out from too rough of a male.
 
I'm glad the BP seems to be improving. I think it was nice of Siren to agree to either get you meds or pay of the meds or take the snake back. I've had a seemingly healthy snake (that I had for 5+ years) suddenly get an RI after getting to their new home as RIs can pop up from stress. However, their failure to take care of this or to even communicate with you is not good. If they agreed to something, they need to do it. However, are you asking for the meds to be covered, a full refund on the snake and to keep the snake? In my opinion, you should either get the payment for the meds OR return the snake and get a refund for the purchase price.
I hope they get in touch with you soon to remedy this.
 
April, the only thing I want is for this to not have cost me money out of my own pocket and for the snake to be healthy...i refuse to ship a snake that is already in poor health as I consider that a death sentence.

What I expect siren to do is cover the cost of the meds and refund the cost of the snake, whether they come and pick her up or pay for shipping once we've nursed her back to health is completely up to them. But no, I absolutely do not expect to keep the snake if they're willing to issue a full refund including return shipping. I am not asking anything unreasonable, simply that they take responsibility. Unfortunately I cant get them to respond to my messages.
 
It's especially frustrating because when I spoke with Diana at the norcal show she seemed perfectly ok with getting me the meds and taking care of the issue. Then I hear nothing from her. I hate to say it, but I cant help but feel that she just told me what I wanted to hear to get me out of her face in the hopes that it would just die out. I'd hate to think that's it but at this point I can't think of a more logical explanation.
 
Have you sent her a link to this thread? Even if she doesn't respond to the message, she may come here and offer an explanation.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Nick,
I do not feel that you have a home full of sick snakes nor would I mean to imply that. The comment about the Tylan was meant to show that if you are unsure of the bacteria strain that medicine may not be useful and potentially lethal. Tylan seems to work very well when applied to the proper diagnosis. Expect to see a significant drop in appetite after 5-6 injections. Also, Tylan leads to egg binding and difficulty with defecation. Keep your water bowl fresh and full when using Tylan. I would use this situation to get a Plan B and C together so to speak as you move forward. A solid reptile vet is a must have. They are lacking in many of areas of the country so I understand your pain there. No matter how careful and clean you are when you buy from a show you must be prepared for a worse case scenario. Not everyone will share your attention to detail and care. When you stated this animal was lost in a garage it is highly irresponsible for a seller with their apparent degree of knowledge in the this field to have offered that snake for sale to you or anyone else. If that statement is true it speaks volumes about the their credibility and care for their animals. I will send you a PM shortly if you wish to share it with everyone here you are welcome to, but I feel you should view it yourself first. Take care.
 
I didn't bother Melissa, she hasn't responded to me for two months. After I told her the snake would die if she didn't help (which as i said was just me being dramatic to try to elicit a response) I more or less gave up.
 
Scott I appreciate the info about the tylan, she's only 300 grams so no worries about egg binding, and we always keep our snakes' water clean and full. Like I said, the injections seem to be helping dramatically.

Victoria recently got into pharmacy school in Washington state so we'll be moving there in a couple weeks. I'm hoping that I'll be able to find a reliable vet there because I know I cant make every diagnosis myself. I'm not so irresponsible to think that, in this case it seemed very obvious what the issue was though.
 
I'm confused. Did they actually do a culture, or just stain a sample from swabbing the mouth? Those pictures are just stained direct cytology smears, not cultures. I guess it's possible you're still waiting for results.

Snakes naturally have a fair amount of bacteria in their mouths and the notes said 'oral swab.' You can expect to see gram-positive (mostly) bacteria in the mouths of healthy snakes. For a respiratory infection, they should really be getting a sterile sample from swabbing inside the glottis or, better yet, from a tracheal wash. An issue with picking random antibiotics that you can buy OTC is that Tylan doesn't work against many gram-negative bacteria, and those are behind most of the RIs in snakes.

On another note, it's perfectly believable that the snake could have had no symptoms when it was sold, and it really was a surprise to the seller. You had it almost a week before you noticed. In my opinion, it's not fair to ask the sellers to pay for the snake plus the meds, then get to keep the snake for free. Either return it and get reimbursed both costs, or keep it and ask for reimbursement for treatment.
 
April Homich said:
On another note, it's perfectly believable that the snake could have had no symptoms when it was sold, and it really was a surprise to the seller. You had it almost a week before you noticed. In my opinion, it's not fair to ask the sellers to pay for the snake plus the meds, then get to keep the snake for free. Either return it and get reimbursed both costs, or keep it and ask for reimbursement for treatment.
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If what Nick states is true, that they say the animal was lost in a garage for some time just before the sale. It is perfectly believable that the symptoms being displayed are a result of that. Any responsible seller would not have offered that animal for sale without a run through quarantine and a disclosure at the time of sale. Then Nick could have chosen to buy or not. I am not claiming to know for fact that the animal was indeed loose out in a garage. This is Nicks claim. I do agree with you in terms of the refund. It has to be one way or the other. And your statement regarding bacteria is spot on. It is possible that the snake displayed no symptoms on the day of sale but if what Nick has claimed is true they knew their lack of proper procedure when they recaptured the animal was more than likely the cause of this situation.
 
You're both absolutely correct. I was told by Diana when I spoke to her in person that the snake had been lost in their garage for an unknown period of time. Obviously I don't have proof of this as it was said in person, so you can choose to believe me or not. Regardless, the snake was sold to me sick without question.

April you could very well be correct, my fields are chemistry and physics so I have no idea how stains work. My understanding was the the shape and characteristics of the bacteria seen from the oral swab were indicative of bacteria related to respiratory infections.

You're also both right in saying I can't have it all. I absolutely do not expect to have them pay for everything AND I keep the snake. I simply want them to take responsibility. I expect them to pay for the meds, refund the cost of the snake, and pay for return shipping once she's healthy enough to send back. That or they can make the 6 hour drive and come personally pick her up. At this point I will settle for them even responding to me.
 
I just sent siren a link on facebook to this BOI thread and told them to feel free to comment. Even if they don't care about the animals, maybe they'll care enough about their reputation to come say something.
 
The facebook message I sent was seen at 10am PST, so about 6 hours ago. So maybe we'll hear something in terms of an explanation now? (And no, they didn't bother responding to my facebook message. Big surprise).
 
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