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Half blind? Slow in the head?

keljo

keljo

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My 2 and a half year old female kahl albino boa is worrying me. She is a very tame snake but has a usually aggressive feeding response but lately she has been aiming her strikes in the wrong direction, at least a foot to the right or left, then, every time, when i try again she will stare at the rat forever, then turn away, I redirect and she finally focuses again. Her head ticks from left to right when she's focusing. I was thinking it could be that I use f/t and it is hard to know where to strike when she doesn't sense heat, or maybe she is striking where she senses the heat, like towards me. But the head twitch I don't understand. I also know there are prominent health problems in albinos such as blindness or one eyes and I was wondering how I could find out if she is half blind or maybe slow in the head.:(
Also her feces has been brown and wet like dog feces lately and I have always known it to be chalky white and yellow in boas. What does this mean?:shrug01:

P.S. In case of any relevance to the problems to be solved; She isn't pregnant as she isn't old enough to breed and hasn't been around a male or any other snake that could carry disease, I feed her, medium rats frozen/thawed, and clean her cage, once a week.
 
I'm not a vet, but it sounds like it could be showing signs of IBD. I would take it to a vet and have it checked out. In the mean time, I would get it away from any other snakes you may have. Good luck.
 
Inclusion body disease. It effects the central nervouse system and is fatal there is no cure at present for it. Sometimes it is called stargazers because they are in upright position always looking at the stars. sounds like she has a gut flora problem she could have got a bad rat bring to vet and get a stool sample looked at. Wish you the best of luck.

Craig
 
To note, as far as her feces go, you should have been seeing both the urates(white and yellow) and the regular brown feces. Was she only passing urates and no regular brown feces prior to this point?
 
yes she never passed the brown til recently, my first boa never passed brown though so i thought thats how it was supposed to be
 
It may be a good idea to check out the care guides Here as it has everything from the basics on up. Best to know as much as possible as it makes it that much easier to know when something is wrong.
 
How big of a meal and how often between, would be a regular feeding schedule for you? If you are feeding it small meals, and at an infrequent rate, it's not unheard of for their turds to be rather far apart, with many urates in between.

IBD testing is expensive if you want definitive results. It requires several biopsy of organs and skin to completely rule it out. There is a sticky on the top page of this forum with a lot of info on the subject. I can show you pathology results, and vet bills to show you just how much it can run. LOL

With that out of the way, I wouldn't have spit that out first myself. I think it's suggested way too often. Not to say it isn't a big problem in the industry, it's just that a singular sign, especially one that may not be an actual sign, does not IBD suggest. Even if it was a neuro sign, many household chemicals can cause neuro problems. IMHO

I think you were on the right path with the sight or targeting issue. You mentioned the rat not being warm. Warm it up. Just put it in hot water for 5 minutes after it's thawed, sorta squeegee off the excess water with your fingers or pat with a towel or something, and it will be warm when you present it.

If it continues to be a problem, then I'd agree, go see a vet. But try that first, it's a lot cheaper.
 
Thank you very much Canis. She eats medium rats once a week and she is 6ft. I will warm the rat up from now on, I just didn't think it would be detectable like body heat. I really don't have that kind of money anyway, but if necessary I will take her to the vet, but I will try everything else first.
 
dark brown runny would usually be an indication of a gut flora problem a white stool are urates if its dark and hard that is a normal stool, and as far as IBD i was not saying bring to vet to check for that but to check for flagelets in the stool which is fairly cheap to do. good luck
 
keljo said:
Thank you very much Canis. She eats medium rats once a week and she is 6ft. I will warm the rat up from now on, I just didn't think it would be detectable like body heat. I really don't have that kind of money anyway, but if necessary I will take her to the vet, but I will try everything else first.
Click to expand...

Well, that rules out the idea I was having. Although a 6 ft Boa around here would be getting Lg to Jumbo rats, a medium rat once a week should have generated an actual defecation, not just urates.

There is some stuff called Nutribac DF. It's Pro-Biotics, essentially gut flora in a powdered form. It's totally harmless, but will help a whole slew intestinal track problems. I use it as maintainence every few months. It might help with the defecation issue. http://www.reptileuv.com/nutribac-df-probiotic-for-reptiles.php

keljo said:
Sorry, thank you Richard, thought Canis under your user name was your name lol
Click to expand...

I been called a lot worse. LOL

gsrept said:
dark brown runny would usually be an indication of a gut flora problem a white stool are urates if its dark and hard that is a normal stool, and as far as IBD i was not saying bring to vet to check for that but to check for flagelets in the stool which is fairly cheap to do. good luck
Click to expand...


It's possible I may have misread your initial post, although I was being generalistic, and not really pointing a finger at any one person.
 
How long have you had this boa And how do you have her set up cage size, hot spot, etc This info could maybe shed a little light on the situation
 
I have had her since April. She is in a 4' long x 2' high x 3' deep custom wood cage. Her hot spot is set at 90 and the rest of the cage is at about 85 degrees. I'm pretty sure she does not have IBD. I've been looking further into it and she doesn't show the right signs, I watched some videos and she doesn't act like that, it's just the intense staring and slight head tick from side to side when I'm trying to feed her. Tomorrow is her feeding day, I will try warming the rat in hot water and let you guys know.
 
I just fed her guys! I soaked the rat in hot water and towel dried it. No problems at all, went straight for it, took less than a minute. She still does that weird tick thing from side to side, but only at feeding time, so I'm not worried about that, it's just different. Thanks for everyone's help! As for the feces, I've been researching some more and I'm pretty sure it's normal. This is only my second boa, and sadly, my mind was set on researching the hell out of morphs and genetics mainly before I got her and not much on health but I learned my lesson from this scare. She is fine!:)
 
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