Hormonal component to shedding?

[d_virginiana]

I've been wondering about this since Harley's shed issue, and now my parents' rescued rat snake is making me wonder again. So, when Harley had her emergency sheds, ALL my other snakes shed very close to that. Having another 2 year old, a yearling, and a 13 year old, that was a bit of a strange coincidence since they all have very different shed schedules. And this happened twice during her whole skin ordeal.

I was talking to my mom tonight, and the ratsnake they rescued is going into an emergency shed (has been blue for a few days, so I believe the 'blue-belly' phase was probably about a week ago). Well, she said both their blacknecks (which share a tank) have gone blue and shed within the last week or so.

That leads to my question... Has anyone else noticed anything like this? I don't think it happens normally, but I was wondering if there's some sort of hormonal feedback going on during emergency sheds. I imagine the snakes would be producing a lot more of whatever chemicals signal shedding to induce an emergency shed, and maybe that's enough to trigger sheds in other snakes?
I was trying to figure out what good this would do in the wild, and the only thing I could come up with is that normally snakes aren't in close proximity, but if they are they are pretty much on top of each other. If one has an infection or something that triggers and emergency shed, it might be beneficial for the other snake to shed soon before any sort of infection had the chance to become advanced.

idk if this is just coincidence, but I'm definitely going to look for this if mine have emergency sheds in the future.

[guidofatherof5]

I've been wondering about this since Harley's shed issue, and now my parents' rescued rat snake is making me wonder again. So, when Harley had her emergency sheds, ALL my other snakes shed very close to that. Having another 2 year old, a yearling, and a 13 year old, that was a bit of a strange coincidence since they all have very different shed schedules. And this happened twice during her whole skin ordeal.

I was talking to my mom tonight, and the ratsnake they rescued is going into an emergency shed (has been blue for a few days, so I believe the 'blue-belly' phase was probably about a week ago). Well, she said both their blacknecks (which share a tank) have gone blue and shed within the last week or so.

That leads to my question... Has anyone else noticed anything like this? I don't think it happens normally, but I was wondering if there's some sort of hormonal feedback going on during emergency sheds. I imagine the snakes would be producing a lot more of whatever chemicals signal shedding to induce an emergency shed, and maybe that's enough to trigger sheds in other snakes?
I was trying to figure out what good this would do in the wild, and the only thing I could come up with is that normally snakes aren't in close proximity, but if they are they are pretty much on top of each other. If one has an infection or something that triggers and emergency shed, it might be beneficial for the other snake to shed soon before any sort of infection had the chance to become advanced.

idk if this is just coincidence, but I'm definitely going to look for this if mine have emergency sheds in the future.

What makes you think more of this chemical is produced in and emergency shed as compared to a normal shed? Just curious.

[d_virginiana]

idk. Maybe not 'more' necessarily, but maybe a different cocktail of hormones or something. Could be that the sheds occur on a normal schedule, but a spike in stress hormones or immune system function can cause an emergency shed? Kind of like how dogs shed normally, but under extreme stress the shedding rate dramatically increases (actually had that confirmed by a vet when we wondered why our hyper-nervous chihuahua started shedding so much when we took her to the vet lol. Seriously, it was enough that we wondered if she had something wrong with her).

Like I said, this could totally be coincidence, but I thought it was very intriguing that it happened twice with Harley, and then seems to have happened with my parents' rescue snake. Probably wouldn't have thought about it if I hadn't seen so many emergency sheds lately

[guidofatherof5]

I'll see if I can find some related studies or articles.

[jwolfe152]

im having a hard time finding anything at the moment

[chris-uk]

I've got nothing to back this up, but it's not unusual for me to have half a dozen snakes shed within a week of each other, then no sheds for a month before another batch. I've not had any emergency sheds, so if there is something going on it may happen during normal shedding cycles. I've also not looks at the dates to see whether there's any statistical significance to the convergence of shed dates. Whether there is a communal influence or not, it certainly doesn't affect all snakes equally because my infernalis are housed together and all three follow their own shed cycles which are about the same length between sheds and spaced apart by a couple of weeks.

But I do wonder if it is something hormonal, like the way womens' menstrual cycles often sync when a group of women live together.

[EasternGirl]

I don't know about emergency sheds, but I have definitely noticed a pattern with my snakes shedding around the same time. It seems like once one sheds, they all start shedding...especially those that are housed together. I can usually guarantee that if I have snakes together in an enclosure, if one sheds, the other is soon to follow.

And you know...in reference to what Chris said about women's menstrual cycles being in sync...I recently noticed that when Sadie passed a bunch of Jellies...Cee Cee started passing little jelly-like smears all over the substrate...it was odd.

[jwolfe152]

im sure there is something to it whether hormonal or whatever i googled few different times worded different every time and could not find out anything maybe steve will have better luck

[d_virginiana]

It just happened again. My two albino males (one yearling and one about 2 years) just shed within a couple hours of each other, even though it only really made sense for the yearling as it hasn't been that long since the 2-year-old shed last. He's eating normally and perfectly healthy. No skin issues, and still living up to his name (Stupid).

You know though... He's by FAR the most skittish and non-dominant snake I've got. I wonder if that's playing a part in this.

[chris-uk]

Curious. We might get to a point where we have enough examples of convergence in shedding that it will become statistically significant. We'd also need to be recording the number of occasions where sheds between the same animals do not happen at the same time. At the moment I think I have more non-synced sheds than synced sheds.