Urate colour in BHP in shed

[Mortevicar]

Hi all

My BHP is a year old...she arrived in early December and is going through a shed...the eyes were a cloudy blue this time last week and have now cleared, and this is her first shed with me being her owner...I assume the actual shed will happen over the next few days.

What I am concerned about is the colour of her urate; normally they have been a pure white but yesterday this is what happened:



I have read that this may be normal when a snake is in shed but I am concerned...any advice anyone can offer?

Thanks
Morris

 

[Pythoninfinite]

Just stained with a bit of bile - snakes produce a lot of bile, so it will happen from time to time. Nothing to worry about.

Jamie

 

[Mortevicar]

Just stained with a bit of bile - snakes produce a lot of bile, so it will happen from time to time. Nothing to worry about.

Jamie

Thanks for your reply Jamie, it reassures me a lot!

 

[thomasssss]

like jamie said just bile( although his the one who told me that in the first place ) ive seen the same thing in my womas (although in my case bile is attached to the side of a nice white urate yours kinda looks like a sloppy pile of bile )and another member on here recently posted similar pics of a urate that came from his bhp

some keepers might tell you to freak out but other keepers , like jamie and the people at snake ranch will tell you its just bile and not to overly worry ( i like to listen to the guys who have more years of experience at this than i have years on earth )

i noticed that it started to increase a bit in my guys so i switched their food permanently from rats to quail , i dont know what it is about quail but it is making a huge difference the amount of bile is decreasing dramatically and the colour has changed to a really light pale yellow almost clear
i wasnt ever over feeding either imo just an appropriate sized rat around 15-20% of body weight every 10 days or so but it was still happening , quail has made a huge difference though so now they will be on a quail only diet which from everything ive read is just as good as a rat only diet or a mixed diet

 

[SteveNT]

I picked up my Darwin carpet's fresh shed the the other day and there was a big poo in it lol! Made very easy disposal.

 

[Mortevicar]

like jamie said just bile( although his the one who told me that in the first place ) ive seen the same thing in my womas (although in my case bile is attached to the side of a nice white urate yours kinda looks like a sloppy pile of bile )and another member on here recently posted similar pics of a urate that came from his bhp

some keepers might tell you to freak out but other keepers , like jamie and the people at snake ranch will tell you its just bile and not to overly worry ( i like to listen to the guys who have more years of experience at this than i have years on earth )

i noticed that it started to increase a bit in my guys so i switched their food permanently from rats to quail , i dont know what it is about quail but it is making a huge difference the amount of bile is decreasing dramatically and the colour has changed to a really light pale yellow almost clear
i wasnt ever over feeding either imo just an appropriate sized rat around 15-20% of body weight every 10 days or so but it was still happening , quail has made a huge difference though so now they will be on a quail only diet which from everything ive read is just as good as a rat only diet or a mixed diet

Thanks - I am about to do the same - once she has shed she is going onto quails...apparently they are much better for them and lower in fat.

RE: shedding - the "cycle" has been strange from what I have read (considering this is my first experience with a shed). Last Tuesday, her eyes went blue and the top of her head a grey/brown, and she has stayed under her hide since. I lifted her hide yesterday, the eyes have virtually gone black (still a little blue) but the rest of her looks completely normal (i.e. no wrinkling of the skin etc.) - is this normal and should she be about to shed?

 

[thomasssss]

totally normal regarding the shed , they re absorb that blue oil stuff a few days before they shed what you have described is a normal snake having a normal shed and yes i would expect a shed in the coming days , mine normally go around 2-3 days after they re absorb the blue shedding oil but it can be longer or earlier and will still be normal , theres no set time so to say they will shed when their ready

 

[Mortevicar]

totally normal regarding the shed , they re absorb that blue oil stuff a few days before they shed what you have described is a normal snake having a normal shed and yes i would expect a shed in the coming days , mine normally go around 2-3 days after they re absorb the blue shedding oil but it can be longer or earlier and will still be normal , theres no set time so to say they will shed when their ready

Thanks thomasssss - once again very reassuring - and boy was she not happy when I lifted her hide! Normally she is a docile girl but I had visions of something out of National Geographic yesterday!

 

[thomasssss]

yea that comes with the individual , my male woma gets aggressive if i lift his hide and his in shed , its a quick indicator for me that he is in shed without checking his eyes , my female on the other hand ive pulled out of her enclosure only to notice shes in full shed with blue eyes the lot she just couldn't care less

 

[Pythoninfinite]

Try not to be too prescriptive about the diet you feed your snakes - there's no evidence that quail are better than rats are better than mice, other than the sizes being more appropriate for snakes of various sizes. The notions that people develop and spread about various snake foods are generally based on doubtful or ignorant assumptions with no basis in science. Snakes have extremely meagre energy needs, unlike atheletic animals such as our domestic dogs, horses etc (which need fuel every 2-3 hours), so an extreme diet may actually do more harm than good.

If the urates are white or greenish or brownish from time-to-time, it is of no consequence. As far as the watery stool is concerned, our captives have constant access to water , but in the wild they frequently need to go for months without a drink between rains in dry areas, so our captives ahve the luxury of actually passing a lot of water out with their stools, along with their concentrated urine.

Jamie

 

[Mortevicar]

Well I got home last night and look what I found, thankfully she did a full shed:





Late in the night I tried to feed her a quail for the first time; she smelt it, looked at it puzzingly, then crawled underneath her hide. There is $3.80 I will never see again! Back to Dolittle rats by the looks of things...