This! This ... thing! It has potential to KILL me, because I´m constantly getting stuck on it, or I´m tripping over it ... especially in the morning before the first magical cup of coffee. When I can barely think. Or move. It has to remain in my small living room because I can´t place it somewhere else.
"Errr", you might say, "looks like climbing branches to me."
Yep. This death trap is mostly made out of climbing branches. Now why are these stupid things in my living room waiting patiently for the chance to end my life in a pretty absurd way?
My little garter snake Dante ...
... was acting strange. Barely active, mostly hiding. He was also looking pretty dull.
Might go into shed, I thought by myself.
Days, and days, and even more days passed by, but he just would not shed. So I took him to the vet. And my vet diagnosted Dante with flagellates. (Google for it, otherwise this story would become way too long.)
Now! We´ve dealt with flagellates a few years before. I never wrote about it here, but it for sure did happen. And what I´ve learned:
- never EVER underestimate the stubborness of a little garter snake
- my garter snake does not eat in a small quarantine enclosure
So this time I spent hours with covering many things in Dantes normal enclosure (L 240 cm H 60 cm W 60 cm) with kitchen tissues so he could stay inside to eat his food. He had to be feed 5 days in a row with only one or two pieces of f.is/h or m/ou.se, and in every piece I had to inject the medicine given by the vet.
These needles. Were just. So. Tiny.
I mean, look how tiny this is. Look at it. (It´s centimeter and millimeter.)
Luckily Dante did not care about the medicine, he just slammed down his food 5 days in a row.
And I began to search his enclosure for some poop, because of course the vet had to check if the flagellates were gone. Note: the sample has to be fresh. Fresh is the best. Within 24 hours would be OK, too.
On this point, Dante refused to work with me.
Things he pooped in/on instead of nice white kitchen tissue:
Other things he did with it:
- slithering right through it
- hiding it behind something so I would not see it right away
- pooping on Saturday (no matter when I fed him)
- pooping right after I checked upon it on a Friday morning
Somewhen I called my vet.
"Please! He´s not cooperating! Can we see you again?"
"Nope", said my vet. "To be absolutely sure if he´s fine or not, we need some poop. You have to wait for it."
"Dante", I said after ending the call, "you´re driving me crazy!"
He just gave me a "Nobody said keeping reptiles is easy" look and continued to chill on his favourite spot right above the heat lamp. So I waited ... and searched ... got frustrated ... and even more frustrated ...
2 days ago, I lost my patience. When I came home from work, Dante - who had eaten on Monday - was sleeping in a hide, and I just carefully took this hide, put it into the small enclosure he had been in for hibernation ...
... set up a quarantine enclosure ...
... carefully grabbed the small hibernation enclosure ... and ... maybe I screamed.
"DANTE! ARE YOU F*CKING KIDDING ME?!"
Maybe you would have screamed, too.
He had just pooped. A really big one. When I had just spent HOURS to set up a quarantine enclosure.
"You! Are! The! Freaking! Worst!", I told him after releasing him into the quarantine enclosure, because everything was ready to go, and there was no way I would build everything back right now AGAIN). "Thank you for pooping, though."
Sometimes driving to the vet feels sooooooo good!
And this is the reason why there´s a death trap in my living room made out of climbing branches. I´m waiting for the vet´s information whether Dante is healthy again and can go back into his normal enclosure, together with all the enrichment stuff I´m constantly tripping over, or getting stuck on it.
Before the first magical cup of coffee.
When I can barely think. Or move.