What should you do if your hognose snake has stuck shed on its head?
Sometimes a hognose snake will finish shedding its body but still have old skin left on the head or eyes. This is normal and usually clears up on its own once the snake has access to a little extra humidity.
In the main image, you can see that the snake has some shed sticking up on its head. The rest of its body had already finished shedding cleanly. My friend said the only other spot that can sometimes hold onto shed is the very tip of the tail, but this snake just had it over the eyes and forehead area.
When a snake has a bit of stuck shed, my friend said he’ll just put some moist sphagnum moss under a hide in their enclosure. The snake can go in and out as it wants, and that extra humidity helps loosen the shed naturally. It’s not something you really need to worry about. Just make sure they have a humidity option so they can take care of it themselves.
In this image, you can see what the snake looked like about a week before shedding. The scales have a translucent, cloudy layer sitting on top of them, that’s the skin that’s about to come off. I took that photo with a macro lens because at around five months old, baby hognose snakes are still small enough that it’s hard to photograph them clearly with a normal phone or lens.
Corky Lorenz
November 2, 2025