New beardie with Metabolic Bone Disease

So my boyfriend is a mechanic and he was working at his job when a car came in for a brake job. He was looking in the trunk for the key to the wheel locks and there were two boxes. He kind of moved on and it started shaking. He opened in and there was one beardie in each (there were 2 boxes). He asked the dude what he was going to do with them and he said "Oh, no one wants them so I'm just going to let them go.." What a jerk!!

Sooo, now we have them both and the boy, Sammie, has bad metabolic bone disease and is missing his back foot. We have him under a UVB/UVA light to see if it helps and having him on a normal diet of greens and crickets. He has two broken ribs that stick out from his side and when you touch his back he closes his eyes and twitches which I assume means it hurts. He also never uses his back legs, he pretty much just drags himself from one side of the tank to another. And it doesn't seem to be because he's missing a foot. I'm not exactly sure why he does that. He also kind of goes crazy and will be fine one minute and the next minute he will be trying to attack your hands. He also tries to attack his own front feet.

The last three days from work I have come home and his is on his back under his log and can't move. And I have heard they can't breathe when they are on there back. Is this true?! I mean, I'm gone for like 4-6 hours so he must be able to breath somewhat because he isn't dead when I come home. If so, I need to figure out how the keep his tank safe as well as have the things he likes (i.e. his log and his hut).

If anyone has any information on MBD and ways to improve his condition, I would REALLY appreciate it!

Thanks, Kim and Austin (sorry this was such a long post)

Oh wow..way to go for rescuing these poor guys. Im honestly not sure how to "safe proof" his tank and im fairly inexperienced with MBD. Only thing I could say is to keep him on a normal diet and under the UVB light. At the least itll help. Untill someone with more experience gets on here thats all I can offer sorry :?

EDIT: I saw earlier that someone had used a small blanket to "pad" the basking spot when their dragon sprained thier wrist. Wouldnt hurt to try at least. From what Ive read he seems to be in really bad shape..poor lil guy.

Here's some pictures of what Sammie looks like.

His missing a foot.


His back has lumps and is pretty messed up.



His bumps on his legs are HUGE.


His broken rib is still sticking out of his stomach. (not out of the skin but it's obviously not normal.)




Let me know what you think.

Oh wow. Hes far worse than I thougt. Im sorry but theres not much I can do in this case. Hopefully a Mod or at least someone with more experience than I will see this soon.

Oh geez! I just can't figure out how some people can treat living creatures like that. You'll need to get that poor baby to a vet immediately. He's probably in a lot of pain. You both are wonderful for taking them in.

Hello Kim,

Oh my, that is so very sad!
Are they both in that bad of shape, or primarily Sammie?
The main reason why he tries to attack his own front feet is because of the lack of calcium intake & nutrient deficiencies he most likely has.
Which UVB light are you using on him? How close is it to him?
Are you using powdered calcium or liquid calcium?
As far as making the tank safer for him, you will need to make the basking spot on the bottom of the tank so he doesn't have to climb up on anything. That way he wont have as much of a tendency to flip himself over. They can't breathe very well on their backs, so it is not good for them to spend prolonged periods of time on their backs.
So, make everything flat in his tank right now, so there is no way he can climb up on something & roll off onto his back.
As far as the broken rib, I don't know how much they will be able to do for him other than try to set it & possibly wrap up his body to help support it. He might give him a pain killer, or a steroid to help alleviate pain & swelling such as prednisone.
There is also a product called Serrapeptase, which is dried silkworm enzyme which helps with pain, & swelling. You can get it from:
http://www.serrapeptase.org

Is he interested in food, at all?
The bumps on his inner thighs are called femoral pores which is normal. He is a mature male, & they are dark which means they are filed with a waxy, hormonal secretion that is hard. He is probably at least 2 years of age.

He looks very dehydrated as well. I would proceed very slowly with the feedings, especially with the protein. I would start with greens & veggies first, & you could make a slurry out of them to feed to him. You could add some pedialyte also. I would wait for a few days until he starts going to the bathroom on a regular basis before adding too much protein because since he is dehydrated it would be too hard on his kidneys. Also, monitor his urates to ensure that they are adequate enough for the fluid he will be taking in to make sure he is not having any kidney problems.

What temperatures are you keeping him at currently? I would also try to keep him around 75 but no warmer than 80 overnight, to help with his immune system. If you want to look for some bee pollen or royal jelly, & some brewer's yeast they are very good for the immune system as well.

Let us know how he is doing.
Tracie

Such a shame he's such a pretty dragon too.

Thanks for all you replys. This is Austin kims at work, Lulu is much better than sammie she is just missing half her tail.
SO sammies in a 55 gallon 160 powersun in corner about 10 inches from his log he lays on and i have a pad heater under the otherside. He eats vary well i dust the crickets every otherday eats about 20 to 50 a day. and he will eat greens if i hand feed him but that only last a little bit because he gets grumpy and will bite. As for the poo the first 20 minutes he was in his cage under the powersun he letgo!! i mean i have neveer seen a berdie poo like this it looked like a small dog sample. My guess was becasue of the propper heat geting to him. he loves water as well swims in the bath tub its cute because i feel he would rather swim than walk because its hard for him but when hes in that tub hes a new man. As for the pain levels I really think theres are old injurys and have just healded vary worng because he will let you touch him all day along with being rubbed on his head, he likes that alot. Hes on playsand also, and his poo looks normal and healty.

Hey and congratulations on your discovery!
Just to make you aware, the powersun recently put out what appears to be a bad batch. If your dragons stop basking or start closing thier eyes a lot during the day it should probably be turned off immediately and replaced. My boyfriend and I use the reptisun 10.0 with our dragons. There are a couple of others recommended, but I don't know much about them. You may have to get the reptisun from petmountain.com as many pet stores don't carry it. Here is a link to a thread about the powersun.
viewtopic.php?f=45&t=105630
Sara
Oh p.s. I dust with calcium 5x a week and a multivitamin 2x a week.

I have seen that post and the powersun i have is 5 mounths old so i think its safe none of our dragons close there eyes. I think there fine. Thanks tho.

Thanks for rescuing them! Are they in seperate tanks? Thats probably a factor in their injuries.

Yes hes in his own and just finished a nice swim in the bath tub also a nice poo. So far as i can tell his life is the best its been in awhile. Hes ganna do just fine with his new life.

Hello,


Ok, so how far is the PowerSun 160 watt from the male? The 160 watt is stronger than the 100 watt so you will need to move it to 16-18 inches for safety. What are the temperatures running right now?
How are things going today, have they both eaten pretty well today?
Keep us posted on them both. I am sure that they are very grateful to be out of that situation that they came from.

Tracie

Just wanted to say Hi ! and Welcome to our Family !
You folks have done the most wonderful thing adopting these two !
Just wanted to support you and help out any way I can !
Janie !

They both eat as well as our others and love the beardie food that comes in the containers from petco. None of our others will even look at it so that makes me think mabye their second owner (who we got them from) actually some what took care of them. (He only had them for 3 months which means the person before him REALLY messed them up.) Haha and its the 160 watt about 10 inches from his log.

Here are some more pictures:

Sammie's Setup


Here is some of LuLu (the girl we found with him.)