RIP Pewter

Came home to my worse nightmare. Went to feed the snakes to find my 1yr old female pewter dead in her tub.Some how she got her head out of the tub and lodged between the side of the rack and the top of her tub. Her jaw was unhinged and her head was kind of smushed in. She pretty much strangled herself. There is a small gap between where the top of my tubs(CB70) stop and the "ceiling" begins in my home made rack. At most 1/2 inch gap she managed to get her head through and it obviously wasnt wide enough to get it back out. Had to have happened beteen last night and now as she was chilling as usual when I checked on everyone last night. Not the story book ending I was hoping to have. When we got her she was 2months old and 65g. I dont think she had more than 2 meals in her before she arrived and never ate for 3 weeks... Figured I was about to have a 1600$ starved dead snake on my hands. Finally she took a live hopper and its been nothing but smooth sailing since. She was somewhere between 600-700g and on her way to breeding in 09... Nothing like burrying the best looking snake in your collection...

Couple pics of her when she arrived... tiny thing.

http://thumb8.webshots.net/t/60/460/1/62/5/2069162050051143048BlGwlQ_th.jpg (http://pets.webshots.com/photo/2069162050051143048BlGwlQ)


http://thumb8.webshots.net/t/68/168/9/95/35/2350995350051143048OAgqbF_th.jpg (http://pets.webshots.com/photo/2350995350051143048OAgqbF)

Wow, that is horrible. I am so sorry for your loss.

She was a very nice looking snake.

Very sorry for your loss Josh - I remember when you got her!

Man that's terrible news.... sorry to hear that, that really sucks

That's horrible - I'm so sorry! :(

What a bummer. To say the least. She was pretty too.

RIP

Man, very sorry to hear about that.

Sorry for your loss.

http://jetpythons.com/ohnosmiley.gifOh Man -- that truly sucks -- I am sooo sorry http://jetpythons.com/RIP.gif

That really sucks Man! Sorry to hear about that..

sorry for your lost

Damn hate to hear that brother...;(

yeah loosing animals is never easy sorry to hear that

dude,
that is such a drag, i have lost baby animals in similar freak self-strangulation situations, but the time you put into nurturing and getting to know that animal makes it even more painful, i'm sure.
really sorry to hear about your loss.
hang in there,
ck

That sucks!!!

My condolances, she was a lovely snake.

WOW. what a BUMMER. i am SO SORRY :(

Something happening like this... it would kill me.... poop.....

Man I hate reading threads like this. Makes my heart sink every time. I'm really feelin for ya. I can't imagine coming home to something like this , even if it was a normal male. I'd be devastated! I'm really sorry for your loss.

I have a rack that has a little gap as well. Looks Like I'm building a new one this weekend. Things like this suck , but thanks for posting it so hopefully us fellow herpers can learn from it.

Man thats really sucks =( So sorry to hear this =(

Wow what a drag. Sorry man!

Hate to hear that Josh...Sorry for your loss bro...

Sorry for this loss

Thank you everyone for your kind words... I'm a firm believer that everything happens for a reason and karma will always come back to bite you in the ass. Lord knows I've done some stupid crap in my day and this may be a portion of that catching up with me.

Hopefully others who see this learn from my mistake. I never thought when I was building my rack that "A little wiggle room incase we measure wrong" would end up costing me my best looking snake. Thanks again everyone... it'll be tough to swallow but only thing you can do in times like these is learn the hard way, and move on.

Sorry to hear that........

My condolences. The only thing you can do is try to learn from these incidents, as to make sure they never happen again, then just get back on the horse, so to speak. Again, sorry for your loss, and I wish you the best.

josh
i just re-read your post because i may have an idea for you, but i need to know, are you using a lidless system ?
ck

Yes my system is lidless, the "lid" is the shelf for the tub above. What I'm going to do this weekend is glue a paint mixing stick on the bottom of the tup in the middle to make sure the tub touches the shelf above. This way I dont have a repeat of last night. I still cant figure out how the hell she got her head in such a small space. The gap is so small I cant even get a finger between the tub and the shelf... I guess I have too much wiggle room.

thats just terrible. it always seems to be on of the ones you just dont wanna see go. not that any are expendable.

thats one of those things working with reptiles they always keep us guessing.

orry for the loss

Yes my system is lidless, the "lid" is the shelf for the tub above. What I'm going to do this weekend is glue a paint mixing stick on the bottom of the tup in the middle to make sure the tub touches the shelf above. This way I dont have a repeat of last night. I still cant figure out how the hell she got her head in such a small space. The gap is so small I cant even get a finger between the tub and the shelf... I guess I have too much wiggle room.

dude,
can you post a picture of your setup ?
ck

Really sorry about your loss and as mentioned whether it's a $20 snake or a $1000 snake it still hurts the same to lose an animal...

Honestly though... I think you will end up being blessed later on down the road with some rediculously stupid good odds on a highly anticipated clutch...

I know what you mean about things happening for a certain reason and honestly everytime I thought about something that had happened that wasn't exactly a positive experience one or more things would eventually arise from that situation that was positive and made me feel better.

I'm so sorry to hear about your loss.. :(

Sorry man that sucks. My question is what kind of rack was it? Was this a rack flaw or just something freak?

Daniel

Honestly though... I think you will end up being blessed later on down the road with some rediculously stupid good odds on a highly anticipated clutch...



One can only hope.. this is my first year breeding and I only have two females that will go... Not many clutches to get lucky on. If I get all the good eggs laid to hatch it'll be a successful year regardless of what comes out.

Thanks again everyone!:yourock:

Josh sorry to hear that bud! Its great that you posted this for others to learn from. I know it will not bring back the pewter but I should have some lessers for sale this spring and Im not trying to use this to make a sell . If all goes well with our lesser clutches I will sell you one for half price to lessen your loss of a $1600.00 smokin pewter. We have multiple females in our lesser project and should have some babies available in the spring. Sorry for your unfortunate situation !

Bryan

sorry to hear about your loss

Josh,
I had a female get caught up like that in one of the first racks i ever built(Luckily i was there to save her.).

The main problem that i had created in constructing mine was that the sides of the rack were to far apart.Which allowed her to push the tubs side outwards,which gave her more of a gap to squeeze through..However if she pulled back it closed the gap on her.Essentially making it into a chinese finger trap sort of situation.

That was very expensive lesson,but it's good to hear that you are viewing it that way...Sorry you lost her.