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46003
I'm a newb to the herpetology world, and have been excited ever since i got my beautiful 3mo. old baby red tail. When I got the snake as a gift, 4 months ago, I didn't know that some owners recommend a vet visit for a fecal and R.I. to find out if the snake carries any bacterial, viral, or neurological problems/defects..
The Rtb was kept in a 20 gallon aquarium with small brown bark (cedar?) bedding. Temperature was kept at ~90 daytime/Hot side of the aquarium, while the cooler side was kept at ~84. Humidity was Moderate/Temperate (60-70%)..
A couple of months ago, I fed my guy a larger fuzzy grey, he ate it with no problems and I observed a small bulge in his stomach. Two-three days later the bulge was gone. Two weeks later I fed him a white fuzzy mouse, which was about the same size as the grey. He regurgitated the mouse three days later. I waited one week for the next feeding. The next feeding was a very small fuzzy, right before the feeding I moved to a new house [the new location for the aquarium is in a room with no windows, and has a reptile light on 10hrs/day]. Again, he regurgitated the fuzzy one day later. I wasn't sure if humidity was a problem or if he was beginning the shedding process, so I forced him to swim in a bowl of luke warm water for 20-30 mins. He seemed very happy to be clean and looked very healthy for the next two days. . .
I came home from work at 4PM, and noticed Senor Cervantes was lying around like he normally would. I opened his screen and went to touch his back when all of a sudden he twitched very violently (which caused me to pull my hand away), thrusted his head straight up in the air with his mouth open, then immediately turned his head toward the ground and did a nose dive right into the bark. He then started, what I will describe as, seizuring. I thought at first he might have been choking, so I put on my leather gloves and forced his mouth open to make sure there was no bark in his mouth, I found one little piece (from when he nose-dived), and i removed it. I put him back in his cage, and it looked as if all the seizures had stopped for the time being. I checked on him again after one hour and noticed half of his body was in his water bowl, while his top part of the body was out of the water and overturned on to his back. The next couple of hours I observed him acting extremely skittish and wanting to hide underneath his tree-tent, and still shaking/twitching when I got close to him.
At 4AM, the little guy died. What, if anything, could I have done to prevent this, and does this sound like a neurological defect?
Any assistance would be appreciated.
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