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Missing Scale aftershed

A

Anazazia

New member
My little ghost shed last night, for her second time with me. I took out the shed to look at it and it ws perfect except for one scale spot on the head, but that's not an issue I figured, I'll take a 99% perfect shed. But then when I looked at her she had a teeny red spot and the scale was missing. It was fine and intact previous to the shed. What should I be doing for her? Does it need to be covered, and if so, how? What could have caused this, trying to get the little shed off? There's a log and a branch in the cage, the log is a little rough, but nothing that she or my other have been hurt on before and the branch is smooth. I'm going away for week on monday, should I have someone checking in on her, or is leaving her alone the best idea? I tried to get a picture of it, but she's a little squirmy, she won't really sit still, so the best I could do was this where you can see the while line arching across her head is broken.
missingscale.jpg
 
Anazazia said:
My little ghost shed last night, for her second time with me. I took out the shed to look at it and it ws perfect except for one scale spot on the head, but that's not an issue I figured, I'll take a 99% perfect shed. But then when I looked at her she had a teeny red spot and the scale was missing. It was fine and intact previous to the shed. What should I be doing for her? Does it need to be covered, and if so, how? What could have caused this, trying to get the little shed off? There's a log and a branch in the cage, the log is a little rough, but nothing that she or my other have been hurt on before and the branch is smooth. I'm going away for week on monday, should I have someone checking in on her, or is leaving her alone the best idea? I tried to get a picture of it, but she's a little squirmy, she won't really sit still, so the best I could do was this where you can see the while line arching across her head is broken.
missingscale.jpg
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Not really a big deal. I've had it happen before---it's always been shed related. You can put a 50/50 mixture of hydrogen peroxide and water on the wound. You can always switch over to paper towels if you wish, but I don't think it's necessary.

I did see something that's a bit concerning. You said that your other snake has never had a problem with that same branch. Are you housing two snakes together? If so, you might want to do a search on co-habitation and housing snakes together.
 
I had her on paper towels when I first got her, and she didn't seem to like it much, kept trying to bury deeper and was very jumpy. Once She was on aspen she calmed down and is happy as a clam burying so I'd rather not stress her out. As for the two snakes in one cage I'd prefer not to discuss it so as not to be attacked.
 
Not an attack in any way shape or form Anazazia. :) Just a kind bit of advice for the welfare of your snakes. If Joe intended on "attacking" you, trust me, he would have done it already lol :) Seriously, there is a reason that housing 2 snakes together can be bad, and I'm sure that if you read up on it, you will understand why.
 
I have read up on it, the number of posts, and I have also talked to any local breeder I could find, a vet, and any vender I could find at the reptile shows around. I don't think anyone needs this to turn into another debate about, where eventually the people who believe it's a bad idea make the person doing it feel stupid. This post was really about the missing scale, because while I know it will right itself next shed I was worried about how high the chance of infection was, and if I should be using anything on it, what I should be using.
 
Anazazia said:
I have read up on it, the number of posts, and I have also talked to any local breeder I could find, a vet, and any vender I could find at the reptile shows around. I don't think anyone needs this to turn into another debate about, where eventually the people who believe it's a bad idea make the person doing it feel stupid. This post was really about the missing scale, because while I know it will right itself next shed I was worried about how high the chance of infection was, and if I should be using anything on it, what I should be using.
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So you've read up on all the potential hazards and risks of cohabitation, yet you still do it? Yikes.

As far as the head scale, since it's not really an injury you don't really need to do anything about it as far as care other than what I said above, but even that is optional.
 
Thank you for your advice on the scale, and please, keep your opinions to yourself, because there people go again, trying to make someone feel like an idiot.
 
The reason I was concerned about the missing scale was that there was blood, that's what made me worry, as I know that scales are usually fixed in the shedding process.
 
If the wound is 'raw', to avoid any possible infection, I would separate the snake and put it in a container with just paper towels until it sheds. I had a similar problem with one of my snakes. I separated her and kept the wound doctored with neosporin(very small amount applied with Qtip).

Here's the thread about Cottonball's injury: Cottonball...YOU IDIOT!
 
Anazazia said:
Thank you for your advice on the scale, and please, keep your opinions to yourself, because there people go again, trying to make someone feel like an idiot.
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If you believe that I am trying to make you feel like an idiot then you are sadly mistaken.

I'm amazed how you've decided that the numerous threads here about cohabitation and even threads from Kathy Love about how it's a bad idea don't mean anything. If you choose to take a big risk with your snakes health, which is what you're doing by cohabitation, then fine by me.

However, when you include that part in other questions people here are going to say something.

And furthermore, if you don't want advice/opinions on all your husbandry aspects, why join a message board? I would really want to know if I was doing something that could result in the loss of one, or both snakes.
 
I believe that because I've asked you not to address it and you still are. You chose to ignore the other thousands of people that don't have a problem with it. I didn't ask about my husbandry, I asked about a possible health issue after a shed. Completely different subjects, so for the third time, I do not want to discuss it, stop bringing it up. As for the post about cottonball, it's good to see that she healed so well. I don't want to move her because I don't want to stress her out, I do have a "travel" steralite that I use to bring them places, but since I'm going away I don't want to move her and have her be stressed without me here. If something were to happen as a result of her being stressed I don't want to put someone else in the position of having to make decisions. I've only had her about two months and she just stopped hiding under the woodchips, so to start the process again I feel would be unecessary stress for her.
 
Anazazia said:
I believe that because I've asked you not to address it and you still are. You chose to ignore the other thousands of people that don't have a problem with it. I didn't ask about my husbandry, I asked about a possible health issue after a shed. Completely different subjects, so for the third time, I do not want to discuss it, stop bringing it up. As for the post about cottonball, it's good to see that she healed so well. I don't want to move her because I don't want to stress her out, I do have a "travel" steralite that I use to bring them places, but since I'm going away I don't want to move her and have her be stressed without me here. If something were to happen as a result of her being stressed I don't want to put someone else in the position of having to make decisions. I've only had her about two months and she just stopped hiding under the woodchips, so to start the process again I feel would be unecessary stress for her.
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Wood chips tend to be very dusty, I would worry more about infection than stress. My recommendation is still get her on paper towels. Better to be safe than sorry.
 
I choose to address it because I'm amazed that you're so concerned over a scale missing yet you know the risks of cohabitation and are still doing it.

To each their own, I suppose some people need to learn it the hard way when one of their snakes ends up eating the other.
 
Maybe you should be glad that I'm concerned about a problem with my snake, instead of harrassing me about something else.
 
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