You scared the urates out of me!

[EasternGirl]

Had snake drama last night. A horrible scare with my girl...Cee Cee. First off, she is in shed mode...her eyes are very cloudy right now, so she is feeling particularly vulnerable. I was going to wait to feed until her eyes cleared up...but Sadie put the Jedi mind trick on me last night...and hypnotized me into giving her some worms...and then Cee Cee smelled them and decided she wanted some too. I took her out to feed her...but she started flipping out..not wanting to be handled because of shed mode. So...she was already worked up...but trying to eat anyway. She got a worm tangled and it went down her throat but looped around the bottom of her lip so that she was choking with her mouth forced shut by the worm looped around her lip. She started gasping for air...I was so terrified..she flailed when I tried to help her. I finally just grabbed her firmly and ripped the worm off and out of her throat. Poor thing went to the bathroom everywhere! I almost had a heart attack. Then...I put her back in her tank. Sadie decided she wanted to check on Cee Cee to make sure she was okay. Cee Cee...already upset...saw this as an attack, and they started fighting! I removed Sadie quickly and put her in a tub for a few hours. Cee Cee was breathing so hard...I thought she would die from the stress. She finally calmed down though...and after a few hours, I was able to put Sadie back in...and they made up and curled up together. Whew!!! What a night!

[-MARWOLAETH-]

Theirs never a dull moment keeping these scaly nutters.It's Good to hear it ended without heartache.

[EasternGirl]

Thanks. She actually started to regurgitate the worm when she realized she couldn't breathe...I suppose this is what she would have done had something like this happened in the wild. Cee Cee is my girl...I love her more than anything...scared me to death! And poor Sadie...she was so confused. She just wanted to consol Cee Cee and couldn't understand what was happening. I had to hold her for a little bit and give her some love and reassurance.

[ProXimuS]

Wow that sounds like quite a fiasco Glad everythig's calmed down now!

[snake man]

Well alls well that ends well

[guidofatherof5]

Sounds like you had a "Garter Smackdown" at your place.
When those worms loop like that the snake usually chews right through it or you can just break the loop with a pinch.
No need to remove the worm.

[kueluck]

ok, I am now cutting all the worms in bite size pieces from now on.

[EasternGirl]

Well the worm was down her throat with the...it's hard to explain....it was as if I had taken the worm, folded it in half, looped the middle around her lower jaw and then shoved the ends of the worm down her throat. She couldn't chew through it because it was under her jaw and because the rest was down her throat...it was pulling her mouth closed and choking her. She was definitely panicking...but she did start to regurgitate it when she realized she was in real trouble...by then I had gotten it off of her lower jaw...and she swallowed it back down.

Normally, Cee Cee and Sadie have no problem swallowing whole worms...but Cee Cee was in shed mode, remember, and she was flipping out because I was holding her...so she was quickly gobbling the worms down in big tangled blobs. It was my fault for trying to hold her and feed her while she was in shed mode...normally, she would be fine with whole worms. But this is an example of why I always supervise feeding.

[kueluck]

......and this is why I tweezer feed each girl, but I'm still gonna cut the worm into pieces.

[EasternGirl]

Right...and I normally feed Cee Cee with hemostats in her enclosure. I usually actually cut the worm into a couple of pieces too...as it prevents her from dragging it into the substrate. But since she didn't want to be held and Sadie was in the enclosure...I had to remove her and put the worms down in a tub and set her in the tub with the worms...I should have cut them into pieces but thought she would be fine as she has eaten them whole before...oh well...you live and you learn!