Bearded Dragon Health Concern

[CKelly976]

Okay, so almost two years ago I bought my then boyfriend(now husband) a bearded dragon for christmas. I generally leave the 26yr old man in charge of his own pet, since I have brought three needy little furballs:p into the house.

However I noticed today that Balinor has been sitting in the same corner of his tank, and is looking a little off. I cleaned the tank sand, and found two live crickets in there, as soon as they stirred he was after them! heres the concerning part.

he couldn't keep them in his mouth, couldn't catch them with his toungue and I noticed the tip of his tongue has turned white and looks dry. so I picked him up to examine him, since I am more aware of things than my husband, and I noticed his tail is deflated looking, he's barely resposive to me, he doesn't respond when I touch any of his feet, this is great, so I flipped him over, all around his poop area is a very strange color, I can clearly see the little fold where is poop would come out and there were dried bits in it I took some pictures and am going to embark on a bearded dragon research binge here in a few minutes but if anyone knows whats going on, I'd like to have an idea before I bring him in to a vet office completly ignorant to his problem.

[CKelly976]

here are links to the pics:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v512/Synester_Shadows/DSCN0234.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v512/Synester_Shadows/DSCN0235.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v512/Synester_Shadows/DSCN0236.jpg

as you can see his jaw/mouth looks weird too, any ideas would be nice!

[That_girl]

To be honest, your dragon does not look good and I would be surprised if it makes it until the vet tomorrow.

What have you been feeding it? How often? It looks like he's dehydrated for one, probably not been fed a proper diet and it also looks like MBD - metabolic bone disease which is a major hurdle for any reptile to overcome once they get it. It's caused by lack of proper nutrition, mostly by not receiving enough calcium and other important vitamins and minerals.

Good luck with the vet tomorrow. I hope they can do something for him, but be prepared that it doesn't look good.

[CKelly976]

I have my husband feed him the same things the petstore had us feed him when I bought him, I have calcium dust for the crickets he eats, and this is a problem that just showed up. he has the required lights and is fed romaine lettuce and occasionally dragon yummies.

as far as I've been able to find, thats what people feed them, romaine lettuce, and crickets with the calci-dust to make sure he gets the proper calcium and he has his daylight bulb and basking bulb.


unfortunately from my research its more likely that it's a result of my husband buying crickets that were too large and the results are no better. Metabolic bone disease just didn't seem to fit..
Metabolic Bone Disease (MBD)
This is the weakening of the bone caused by an imbalance in vitamin D3, calcium and phosphorus. Foods that are high in oxalates and phosphorus, too much or too little vitamin D3, and too little access to UVB light are all causes of this disease. Signs include hard lumps in the long bones of the legs, bumps along the vertebral column of the back and tail, and softening or hard swelling of the lower jaw.

there are no hard lumps visible on the dragons bones bumps on his vertebral column and his jaw has not softened or swelled.

he's fed his lettuce daily, and crickets are typically monthly, and he's normally a little lethargic and hides in his cave for a while after a cricket feeding so I'm incredibly uncertain.

[CKelly976]

as a little update, i posted on a beardie forum and they had me go get him some squash and chicken baby food and hand feed it to him, I gave him a bath and he seems 20x better than he was this morning.

the petstore/breeders I bought him from aparently gave me the wrong information and diet for our lizard and I'm not sure what my husband has been doing for balinor but it seems like he may be alright with some tedious care-giving.

and thank you for responding so quickly krystal.

[Wiztherewoz]

Oh, CKelly, that's the poorliest looking dragon I've ever seen. :( He looks dreadful. Bless his heart.

How's he doing now?

I'll keep my fingers crossed that you can pull him through this, poor little guy. I really hope that he makes a full recovery. Best of luck. Has he seen a vet?

[CKelly976]

The problem with the situation is the instructions we've been following with our lizard were incorrect. so for the past two years we've been raising him, and from day 1 of his existence the little guy wasn't being given the right food.

I bought him from a small pet store that had at the time recently opened, they bred the beardies themselves and told me to feed them romaine lettuce and sometimes carrots, feeding crickets for a little while, but to know that they grow out of crickets as they become adults.

I aparently was a little nieve in assuming a breeder would know what he was talking about because despite the fact that he loves his romaine, he isn't supposed to have lettuce in any form at all.

so the only nutrients he's been getting is from the calci-dusted crickets, his entire life. I was so upset and really only had myself to be upset at for not deeply furthering my research into his care.

the good news is that since we didn't actually starve the little guy, and he was eating lettuce and crickets he's having no issues with his recovery and fattening up quite nicely :) he looks 100x better after only three days of baby food and we have started to try and convince him that he wants to eat collard greens, although he glares at them, glares at us, and then runs to the other side of his tank and won't touch them.

I also have to change his lighting set up at some point, because even though its the same the pet store had, they(the dragon board) advised me against it and I've really lost all respect for that petstore.

[That_girl]

I am so sorry that you've had to go through this. I don't know if this is comforting or not, but this happens with a lot of reptiles. Many pet stores get them to sell and make money, but never fully research their care themselves. And then they pass on bad care information to owners. Thankfully the internet has saved a lot of first time reptile owners.

Your poor baby, but at least this story will have a happy ending. Is this pet store still in business? If it was, I would write them a nasty letter explaining your experience.

[CKelly976]

It is still in business, I had qualms with their rent-out party monkey who spent all his time in a cage, and their strange lists of animals ranging from giant milipedes to possums, I guess now that I look at it I was rather ignorant to accept the mans advice, I pitty all the baby beardies he sells, but the people are nice people who do love animals, so I think I'd rather stop in and check up on it than go forth with a nasty letter I have pictures as proof of what happened so it may be better to show the man, than write it in words.

that could just be my humanist side making its extremely rare appearance too though :P

[Wiztherewoz]

It's not your fault. People rely on these "experts" to know what they're talking about.

I just hope that Balinor can be brought back to full health.

Good luck with the pet store guys. I hope that you're right about them, so maybe you can actually put some sense into their heads and save many more of their animals from needless suffering.