Strange and disturbing mass death of babies

[Dracorex5]

Currently the warm side is 75 and the cool side is 70, and theyve never had issues with activity between the two, but someone suggest a bit ago to bump it up, so im going to try and find a way to make it a bit warmer tomorrow if needs be. It drops by about 2-3 degrees at night, but my room is pretty much set up to try and be a reptile safe zone

[guidofatherof5]

I'm at a loss to know what might be happening.
The first thing I would do is stop the supps. for awhile.
At this point it is just a shot in the dark if that is the possible problem.
Any chance you can get a Vet. involved.

[Dracorex5]

Was she malnourished while she was gravid?

No doubt in my mind that she was. It wasnt incredibly severe, but she took pinkies with incredible relish when i got her, and later slightly larger mice. She was quite healthy when she birthed, but she certainly didnt look gravid. It may have been an issue in development, but all the babies were born alive, no still-borns, and were all healthy but a single runt for three months. Its curious, but possible

[Stefan-A]

The thing is, snakes are capital breeders. They use the energy they have stored (capital) to produce the clutch and whatever they eat while gravid, is used to nourish the female only.

[d_virginiana]

I have no idea what this is... There may be nothing you can do.
Is there any way you can separate them all from each other? Put them into completely clean mini-enclosures? It wouldn't have to be big at all, maybe just a tupperware dish or something. Normally I wouldn't suggest that, but if they're going from completely healthy to dead in less than one day it might be a good idea. If you can get them away from the other potentially affected snakes and out of the environment they were in, it might at least give you some idea of what's causing this.

I mean, this doesn't sound like something that should be contagious, but it also doesn't sound like anything from the environment, and it's not like any genetic problem I've heard of either. I just think separating them might be a good idea since they seem to be going downhill so quickly.

[ConcinusMan]

Its eyes turned grey, like it was going to shed, and it began slithering on its back...It almost looked like his body was caving in, like he had starved.

That almost sounds like retained shed to me. Did the skin get a crinkly, dry look to it? (in cases of high humidity and/or moisture, it won't appear that way). As the skin begins strangling them, they will crawl "funny", look like they're having trouble breathing, flip upside down, and sometimes bite themselves. Another possibility is:

Sounds like a problem with either the food supply (salt poisoning....

That's what I was thinking. Sodium induced renal failure. This will literally suck all the water out of their cells and they will shrivel up and dessicate. That would account for the lateral folds you're seeing. If they were caused by malnutrition, they would take weeks of starvation to gradually form. The only way for them to form quickly, is dehydration.

The thing is, snakes are capital breeders. They use the energy they have stored (capital) to produce the clutch and whatever they eat while gravid, is used to nourish the female only.

Exactly. They don't "eat for two" while gravid. Anything eaten while gravid goes toward rebuilding mom's reserves. The babies are being nourished individually by yolks that mom already produced by converting her own body mass reserves before the eggs were even fertilized.

Did the babies look fairly normal but then shrivel up like that rather quickly? If so, it does sound like sodium poisoning but I don't know how you could be getting that from pinkies and worms. Strange. The only thing that I would suspect is that there's something wrong with the supplements or the water. I don't even use supplements. If they're eating plenty of pinky parts and/or a varied diet, it's totally unnecessary. Even trace amounts of some types of sodium will do this to a reptile. It wouldn't be dangerous to a mammal, and so if you're using tap water, there might be something in it. Some kind of sodium that is not a danger to us, but will kill a snake. Sodium phosphates, for example, which are sometimes used to treat municipal water supplies.

I quit using tap water. It rains so much around here, I just give them collected rain water or bottled spring water with nothing added.

[Dracorex5]

Ill try using straight bottled water instead of purified tap for a while and see if that helps. A stuck shed just wouldnt make sense, considering the more recent deaths have been turning green without the eye fog, and a stuck shed wouldnt cause instant death. If anything it sounds like salt poisening from what google is telling me, but ive checked the calcium i use, the worms, and the water purifyer. None have any trace of Na, and the purifyer is supposed to nutralize it! Maybe theyre getting it from someplace else? Im just not quite sure where.... To bottled water now we go

[kimbosaur]

It might also be a good idea to switch food sources (as in the stores/brands) for now just to see if that is the cause.

[chris-uk]

I'd guess at contamination in the water, food or supplements. Have you moved on to a new batch of supplement?
I'd change everything in your position - bottled water sounds like a plan; stop the supplements for now; and I'd get in a fresh batch of pinkies and nightcrawlers.
Sorry to hear that you're in this position, I hope some of the suggestions from the forum help you arrest this horrible run of deaths.

[ConcinusMan]

Ill try using straight bottled water instead of purified tap for a while and see if that helps. A stuck shed just wouldnt make sense, considering the more recent deaths have been turning green without the eye fog, and a stuck shed wouldnt cause instant death. If anything it sounds like salt poisening from what google is telling me, but ive checked the calcium i use, the worms, and the water purifyer. None have any trace of Na, and the purifyer is supposed to nutralize it! Maybe theyre getting it from someplace else? Im just not quite sure where.... To bottled water now we go

Watch out what bottled water you're using. Lots of it has sodium bicarbonate and/or sodium chloride added "for flavor". Use unadulterated spring water or if you don't live in an area with a lot of air pollution, collected rainwater is fine too.