THIS IS A QUESTION THAT HAS NEVER BEEN ASKED

[Helenthereef]

To the OP: What were the symptoms of the RI when you first noticed it? If she died of just the RI and not further complications, I would think you noticed the later-stage symptoms instead of the initial ones.

As for antibiotics and gravid females.... Snakes are different than mammals. Mammals are continually exchanging blood and other fluids with babies until they're born, which would mean antibiotics could easily affect the baby. But if a female ball python is gravid--especially late-term--the yolks are done forming and the shells are calcifying around them. Can the antibiotics actually affect the eggs? I can see how the stress the female is under could adversely affect the eggs, but what about medications? Do the antibiotics kill off good bacteria that is essential in egg formation? Would someone with a better knowledge of snake/reptile reproduction help me out here?

This seems to have got lost in the general melee, but I think it's a very intertesing point - does anyone have any ideas about it?

 

[JordanAng420]

To the OP: What were the symptoms of the RI when you first noticed it? If she died of just the RI and not further complications, I would think you noticed the later-stage symptoms instead of the initial ones.

As for antibiotics and gravid females.... Snakes are different than mammals. Mammals are continually exchanging blood and other fluids with babies until they're born, which would mean antibiotics could easily affect the baby. But if a female ball python is gravid--especially late-term--the yolks are done forming and the shells are calcifying around them. Can the antibiotics actually affect the eggs? I can see how the stress the female is under could adversely affect the eggs, but what about medications? Do the antibiotics kill off good bacteria that is essential in egg formation? Would someone with a better knowledge of snake/reptile reproduction help me out here?

This seems to have got lost in the general melee, but I think it's a very intertesing point - does anyone have any ideas about it?

Quoted from "Reptile Medicine and Surgery" by Doug Mader, DVM (Second Edition) Chapter 23 Page 387 in Reproductive Biology:

"Gestation is a critical time for both the female and the developing offspring. A great demand is placed on a pregnant female because pregnancy requires energy output but often times limits energy intake. The drastic imbalance between energy intake and energy demand is satisfied by energy reserves, including the breakdown of muscle mass.

In addition, pregnancy has an inhibitory effect on the immune system. The combined effect of the energy deficit and impaired immune function often leads to clinical disease during pregnancy.Persistant, low-grade infections often fulminate during pregnancy, jeopardizing both the female and the offspring. No reports have been found nor has the author observed any negative effects of antibiotics on pregnancy, neither as an abortifacient nor a teratogen."

 

[R. Eventide]

Quoted from "Reptile Medicine and Surgery" by Doug Mader, DVM (Second Edition) Chapter 23 Page 387 in Reproductive Biology:

"Gestation is a critical time for both the female and the developing offspring. A great demand is placed on a pregnant female because pregnancy requires energy output but often times limits energy intake. The drastic imbalance between energy intake and energy demand is satisfied by energy reserves, including the breakdown of muscle mass.

In addition, pregnancy has an inhibitory effect on the immune system. The combined effect of the energy deficit and impaired immune function often leads to clinical disease during pregnancy.Persistant, low-grade infections often fulminate during pregnancy, jeopardizing both the female and the offspring. No reports have been found nor has the author observed any negative effects of antibiotics on pregnancy, neither as an abortifacient nor a teratogen."

THANK YOU!!!! (I really need to pick up this and some of the other excellent reptile health books.)

Bolded part: Cool! Good to know!

Non-bolded [second] part: That might explain the suddenness of the symptoms and/or how quickly the female went downhill. I've seen that happen with cryptosporidium and leopard geckos. (I reneged on one of my own personal rules several years ago...and paid dearly for it.) The gecko had no signs of crypto until a stressor was introduced, and then BAM, her health skyrocketed downward. Granted, gravidity isn't a sudden stressor, but with a stressor such as that present, it wouldn't take much for the female to get very sick very quickly.

(BTW, I love your icon! )

 

[hussler1984]

Thank You

The two comments before this one are exactly what i was looking for.
to bad they dident come sooner. but better late then never.

With that said...@hhmoore She became sick much quicker because she was pregnant!