Panicking!!!!!-Skin Split!

Please look at these pics and tell me what to do.

I posted pics of Jewel a couple of days ago. Here is the history again

Started looking really dry. Shed the other day, but had trouble. I had to put her in a box with wet paper towels and help with head and tail skin. She had been soaking in the water bowl for a couple of weeks, I was misting the cage twice/day.

She still looked like she had to shed. I brought her in the main house and put her into a clean box with fresh aspen, a hide, water and heat kept at 78 degrees. She ate a small pinky the other day and I was about to feed her again today. She was doing a weird jumpy thing.

I took her out to look at her. She started spazzing out and like she was having a seizure (it was probably pain). She flipped out of my hand onto the counter and I saw this. Then she went back into the aspen and got that stuck all over the raw flesh. I put her into lukewarm water in a sterile container to clean her. I then put her into a sterilized box with paper towels only for substrate and a clean fresh water bowl.

Do I put bacitracin on this? What do I do?

The first pic is obviously NOW!

The other two are the ones I posted the other day.

I would be making a vet appt ASAP. That looks quite painful. I have never seen such a thing before!

The vet isn't open until Monday and the Emergency Vet here doesn't DO reptiles!!!

The only thing I can think of doing in the meantime, is keeping the tub clean and applying some neosporin or other antibiotic ointment on the raw parts. Hope someone else will jump in and give other advice.

Well, it looks like you can still see pattern, so it must not be all the way through all the thicknesses of the skin down to the meat...

I'm running up to Walgreens to get Neosporin Spray. It is definitely to the meat. There is no visible skin or pattern left, just the capillaries and moist pink skin.

I still think it's due to scale rot. The humidity was far too high.

Started looking really dry. Shed the other day, but had trouble. I had to put her in a box with wet paper towels and help with head and tail skin. She had been soaking in the water bowl for a couple of weeks, I was misting the cage twice/day.

Thats not a heat rock right? If it is it can cause burns, but other than that neosporin, papertowels, and a water bowl she can't soak in is a good idea.

Poor snake. I hope you can at least get her to the vet on monday. It's sooo weird it looks like she has almost been skinned.

To the vet asap. in the meantime, I think I'd keep it clean and moist by using a barely damp papertowel. I would think a dry paper towel would just wick away her body's hydration. Not sure about Neosporin. if you do decide to use it, be sure it is the kind with no pain-killer. I have read that the analgesic they use is toxic to herps.

If it is scale rot (I agree with Janine), you should keep her on paper towels, and no water dish in the cage, and keep it at a low humidity. If its too humid, it could get worse. Sounds like that if it is scale rot, should heal in a few weeks, but definitely still take her to a vet. Good luck!

Wow! I've never seen something like that before other than Lennycorn's Lenny. That's what it reminds me off. A burn of some kind. I think the Neosporin spray contains the pain killer in it so check that before you buy it. You don't want the pain killer.

I'm lost..... again!!
Wouldn't scale rot be more likely on the belly??
I never encountered it so far so I wouldn't know. Just seem odd it on the top. What's your heat source??

I would but it on dry paper towels and apply Neosporin.
More/better pictures would help too.
Poor thing, with the "jumping", it's in pain I would think.

I may be totally wrong, but I seem to remember an overhead bulb, as opposed to a UTH........

EDIT : Sorry, Shelley, I must be thinking about another thread.

Mindy, I agree, I've never seen anything like that except on Lenny's escaped and burned snake.

Just read the other post and you stated you misted daily?? but I'm not sure if that meant only during the shed cycle or not.
So ... any way I would treat as stated above til we can figure this out.

OK. I saturated her with the Neosporin and I barely dampened the paper towels. She has a very small water bowl that she can't fit in. I got the spray stuff because I thought that me dragging anything across her back to apply cream or ointment would be horrible.

Lennycorn asked if she was on a heat rock, no. I've never used one.

It DOES look like a burn though. I had a UVA/UVB light on her tank for a few weeks and there was a period where all of the lights in my snake house stayed on 24/7 for about 10 days due to the temps here in Seattle and while I tried to figure out how to properly heat them. This is when she was staying in her bowl. I'm wondering if she got a "sunburn" like people do who lie in the pool and forget about their back?

No one else is showing any ill effects, but they didn't have the UVA/UVB light on their cages.

I forgot to answer. The misting started when I noticed her going blue.

Another quick update. I had thawed out a couple of pinkies for her prior to this happening. Just to see if she would eat, I put the pinkies in with her. She ate them immediately. I coated one of them with a vitamin powder.

northwestcorns said:

It DOES look like a burn though. I had a UVA/UVB light on her tank for a few weeks and there was a period where all of the lights in my snake house stayed on 24/7 for about 10 days due to the temps here in Seattle and while I tried to figure out how to properly heat them. This is when she was staying in her bowl. I'm wondering if she got a "sunburn" like people do who lie in the pool and forget about their back?

No one else is showing any ill effects, but they didn't have the UVA/UVB light on their cages.

Click to expand...

Shelley, I'm not being critical or anything, but I think we have our answer here. What did not look right to you....was her skin between the initial injury of the light above her and the time it took it to completely die and slough off.
Corn snakes are secretive and have evolved to not need light, often living beneath bark, leaves, and soil.

Lenny had an escaped snake that had a similarly bad looking injury. He should be able to help you a lot.
If/when you take your snake to the vet, be sure to give him all the facts.

I know. I usually keep my lights on a timer and they usually aren't that kind. But I didn't have one for her tank and that was the last one available. Without it, the temps were in the 50s in the snake house. There aren't any windows so I have all of them on a timer now. I had a heater installed in the house and keep the temp at 75 degrees. The tanks all have an 80-85 degree side and an UTH. None of the other guys are showing any ill effects.

Lenny, your snake that got the burn, did he recover and does he shed normally now?

You should check the temps that the light can produce. Are you using anything to read them (temps) with??
You might want to switch to a UTH with the proper set up.
I tend to think it a burn now.
Mine ate throughout the healing process, heck he still healing. So your good there. Forget about damping the paper towel (bedding). Just spray Neosporin every other day on him and limit the handling for a WHILE.
After a month or so you might see flaking or....shedding of skin of the affected area, in between "normal" sheds. This is ...good.

He's going to get better..it's just going to take awhile.