Snake Fungal Disease Strikes Down Plain-Bellied Water Snake

The following story about a plain-bellied water snake was submitted by wildlife rehabilitator Meg Francoeur of South Carolina.

Snakes do not often require fish-based foods, but when I received a plain-bellied water snake (Nerodia erythrogaster) for rehabilitation I ordered some EmerAid IC Piscivore for him.

The snake was originally a call for relocation. The person who went to move the animal contacted me after finding lesions on the snake. South Carolina, as well as several other states, are seeing an upswing of a disease called snake fungal disease. It’s caused by the fungus Ophidiomyces ophidiicola. The fungus causes lesions, eye problems, and mouth problems generally leading to the animal’s inability to eat or find prey. Secondary infection also results from the lesions on the body. Treatment is difficult and often fails.

When I received the plain-bellied water snake, I immediately weighed the animal and set it up in a quarantine cage outdoors away from all other reptiles. This snake would not be quarantined within my home, because I have many reptiles that would be at risk.

I then contacted the Snake Fungal Project to get an update of treatments for the snake. This included antibiotics for secondary infections, soakings several times a week in betadine or chlorhexidine, treating the lesions with silver sulfadiazine cream, and antibiotic eye ointment twice a day. Antibiotics were injected every 72 hours for a total of three weeks. Treating the skin lesions and eyes was a twice-daily task along with the soakings. The animal was also given vitamin injections of B complex, D, and A to help with the immune system.

Since the animal was either unable or unwilling to eat, and was losing condition I used a mixture of EmerAid IC Piscivore and water and administered 10cc through a stomach tube every few days. This helped maintain his body weight throughout the treatment.

Sadly, I was unable to save this animal as the disease continued to spread despite everything. The vet took scale and skin samples and sent them to the University of Florida for DNA confirmation. It was confirmed to be SFD. While I lost the battle with this one, hopefully continuing efforts will help stop the spread of the disease through the wild populations of snakes.