I took in a rescue!

Hey everyone,
So random opportunity knocked on my door today.

Just yesterday, my neighbors across the street found out I kept reptiles when I was outside with my chameleon. I mentioned I had bearded dragons as well.
Today, one of them knocked on my door and told me a friend of hers from the school district was looking to rehome her classroom pet of 5 years for free and asked if I was interested. Knowing nothing further, I agreed to take her in.

Thirty minutes later, I met Charli. It was obvious pretty immediately that she had some MBD, but it wasn't until I got her home that I realized the full extent.
I have renamed her Juste, a descendant of Simon in the Castlevania lore (though my girl Simon was far younger than this girl.)
She's in a full body shed that almost looks like pure neglect, like a dog with mange, has mobility issues, is constantly stuck in pancake mode, and has tremors and shakes. She's also clearly impacted as she struggled until she gave up trying to poop in her warm bath as soon as I got her home.

Her setup was a 40g, sliding top screen enclosure with a coil uvb bulb, basking bulb, and black light... her main diet has been large mealworms. Substrate, luckily, has been repticarpet.
I'm in the process of sanitizing all of her belongings, washing her repticarpet, and scrubbing her rocks, so she's on paper towel and a clean bath towel for the time being.

Her uvb is going to be replaced right away (it was flickering for minutes when I turned it on, who knows how old this bulb is?) and she will always keep a low to the ground basking site as she lacks mobility and cannot right herself (like a turtle)

17" and 550g
She otherwise looks to be in decent health and is a good size.
She is quarantined from my other two. She is at the opposite end of the house.

Looks are deceiving, she looks quite good, if not a bit overweight. They meant well + fed her a lot of fatty bugs but of course the nutritional imbalance has caused her condition. Some good supplements, time in the sun ad good uvb bulbs may help improve her condition but only time will tell how much.

She's in a good home now. Be sure to offer any or all of these to help her poo....applesauce, canned pumpkin [ no spices ] baby food squash, prunes or green beans with about 1/4 tsp. of raw honey or a bit less of veg. oil.

I was honestly concerned about her condition as I was making the drive. I had no photos or anything, all I knew I'd she was at least 5. Seeing her was pretty instant relief and it could be far worse. As soon as I lifted her it was like picking up a wooden board, and I realized she was essentially stuck in pancake mode. She seems to have little to no mobility in her mid section and kind of acts like a turtle. As soon as you start to tip her a bit she'll flail, but clearly lacks any control of righting herself.

I gave her a nice warm soak right away to help with her shed, and a lot of it came off in that soak. She also immediately began drinking, and apparently drank too fast and was coughing for a while. They had a giant bowl of water in her enclosure, like it took up 1/4 of the space.

She'll be getting outside for lots of sun when I can, and she had some floor time as well in the guest bedroom to test her mobility. It's there, but it's not perfect.
Right now she's basking at about 98f by her choosing. She was at 91 but scooted over into the higher heat.

I'll be picking some things up for her tomorrow after work and will be sure to get her some baby foods or pumpkin.

She's already very sweet, and seemed to understand I'm here to help her already. I helped break up as much shed as I could (never forcefully removed!) and she seemed immediately thankful.

They sent me home with 2 small laundry baskets of supplies for her, so you can tell they really meant well. I saw there was some calcium spray in there this morning, plenty of large rocks, a nice slab of granite to bask, extra blacklights I won't be using, and some beardie bites I also won't be using, as well as 2 small cups of prepared salads. There's also some "critter cleaner" but I have no idea of the ingredients - picture of a guinea pig is on the front.

The repti-carpets were nice and washed last night. I placed one over her paper towels and set up her basking area using 1 rock and the granite slab for her. Her previous setup used all of the large rocks, basically guaranteeing she was unable to move due to her mobility issues, so she was kind of stuck to bask. I left the towel in there on the cool side if she needed to move over and snuggle something.

I replaced the coil UVB with my old coil UVB. Neither are good, but mine doesn't flicker, so perhaps it's slightly better for now.

I was able to sneak a piece of collard green into her mouth while she was licking her lips this morning. She ate it ok, didn't want more, but I figure she's probably stressed out.
I did notice that around her tongue looks a little inflamed. I'm going to look into this more.

I gave her some scritches behind her head, and her head started to completely spazz out, like twitching around uncontrollably. There is a thick shed on the back of her neck, so I'm unsure if the scritches irritated the shed, or if she has something else going on.

Once she settles in a little more, I'll likely try and get her in to the vet for a wellness check

Ahhh, she's a cutie...A little snub-nosed and bulgy-eyed, but she's a sweetie. She reminds me exactly of Nix, the year old rescue I took in from an ill-advised but loving family. I got him about 3 months ago at 9-10 months old and he had never had any UVB, so he literally fell over as he tried walked in a straight line...But Nix was so skinny, he was fed only mealworms and kept on wood chips, and had not had a poop with anything but urates and a "spot of poop" as his previous owner told me, in 3 months!!! I didn't believe her until I saw what came out of him. It took 2 weeks of medicated laxative slurries and 3 massive poops in hot water full of nothing but blocks of shells and wood splinters to empty him, and by then he weighed hardly anything.

I know exactly what you mean by the dull, dead shed, I don't think Mix had shed since he was a very young baby. He was just a dull, monotone brown color with a 1/4 inch thick dead skin all over his body. No underbite (surprisingly) but he had no muscle strength at all. No twitches at all, but couldn't walk, couldn't climb, flipped over constantly, it was so sad
But they were a very loving family with 2 young kids that loved him, they all loved him dearly and they all cried when I took him. They didn't ask for a penny, and gave me tons of stuff for him, they just wanted him to get well, and they couldn't afford a vet or proper lighting. He's now 500% better, you'll be amazed how quickly she comes around. I'm glad she's on the heavy side, it's better than too thin, as Nix has had trouble putting weight on. I think a lot of his weakness is due to his skinniness. But we keep on truckin'...

Good luck, and thanks so much for helping her and giving her a loving home!

Thanks Ellen!
She definitely has that "special" look about her, but she's such a little sweetie.

She was soaked in shed ease today and a LOT of that shed is breaking up and coming off. She looks relieved.

I gave her some pumpkin and olive oil to help her poop. She's passing white urates which is great, but no poop yet, and she was struggling to push one out in the bath again today.

I'm proud of her. She's been pushing herself up in yoga pose to bask.
No sunshine today, maybe tomorrow?
You can see her limbs are looking a lot more colorful. They were all caked in shed just yesterday

She's already looking pretty good. I think she'll bounce right back after settling into a healthy routine under your care. I'm glad she found her way to you!

Thanks
I bought her a little toothbrush for scrubbing. She seemed to like it.

I'm a little concerned about the inside of her mouth. It seems a bit inflamed around her tongue, like her little teeth are kind of hard to see. I'm not sure if this has anything to do with some deformities or might be at all infected.

I'd keep an eye on that. Give her a few weeks under proper diet, lighting, etc and see how it goes. You may want to get some MaxiGuard gel to have on hand to dab on to help fight infection if the swelling doesn't subside on it's own.

CooperDragon":23f7lrz3 said:

I'd keep an eye on that. Give her a few weeks under proper diet, lighting, etc and see how it goes. You may want to get some MaxiGuard gel to have on hand to dab on to help fight infection if the swelling doesn't subside on it's own.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip - I'll have to pick some up.
I started looking up mouth rot right away, but it seems like mouth rot is more severe. Hers just looks puffy/inflamed, and when she chews it sounds like "gumming" something.

I've been able to sneak quite a few pieces of collard greens into her mouth in the mornings. She has that MBD underbite, not super bad, but she will leave her mouth cracked open a little bit and I've been able to slide the edge of greens into her mouth and she'll begin eating. She doesn't seem to mind it, she seems indifferent.

I did give her 1 superworm yesterday morning to see if she would eat it, and she was very interested and did eat it off her basking rock after a while of staring and following it with her head.
It'll be more pure pumpkin and olive oil when I get home. I do have raw honey I can try with her as well.

No poop yet, more urates.
Got a lot of pumpkin today! She seems to enjoy the pumpkin, but doesn't like the syringe. Had a little bit of olive oil after her meal.

She got about 30-45 mins out in the sun, then a nice soak, and a lot of shed is coming off.

I almost want to say there's no excuse to let her shed get this bad, but it's not like she was completely neglected, they just didn't go the extra step to assist her. Easy fix, her mobility is already getting better with the removal of shed. She doesn't feel like picking up a wooden plank anymore

Must be a big relief. Looks like she's wearing a superhero cape!

I was very surprised at the amount of dead skin on Nix and how easily and quickly it came off as well. It's amazing how much damage bad lighting, temps, and diet can do. Nix looked like a completely different beardie after his first big shed, just like she does, she's beautiful!

Has she pooped yet? This was Nix's biggest issue, it was actually an emergency by the time I picked him up on a late Saturday night. I drove him home 3+ hours, set up his enclosure, and started the baby food/raw pumpkin/Pedialyte slurries the next day, twice a day, plus a warmer-than-average bath once a day. He saw my certified reptile vet that Monday and when we looked at the x-ray the impaction was very evident, it was pressing on his spine causing paralysis in the back half of his body to the point that he could hardly strain to poop. His pelvis made this loud, clicking sound when he did try, and my vet gave him subcutaneous fluids that Monday morning. I gave him his laxative slurry that afternoon, and during his bath that evening he started straining like crazy, threw a black beard, and passed a massive pile of mealworm shells and wood chips. It was huge. So I was relieved, but unfortunately his behavior didn't change, he kept straining all the time, but I just couldn't believe that he was still impacted after the massive poop he passed...So I continued the same slurries but I added Psyllium Husk, and it wasn't until Friday that he passed a massively wide in diameter tube of normal looking poop that was almost 4 inches long...Black beard stayed for about 15 minutes after he passed it...I was suspicious so I cut the "poop" in half and was horrified to see that the "poop" part was only the very outer casing around a long, wide log of mealworm shells...It was just unbelievable...Then he still kept straining, I gave him another slurry with Psyllium Husk Saturday morning after talking with my vet, and sure enough he passed a third massive "log" of mealworm shells encased in a really thin layer of poop. After that everything got instantly better, his movement, his color, his eyes, his appetite, everything...But he literally lost more than half of his total body weight...And I was so worried about how skinny he was, I thought I would lose him just based on his weight. But he quickly filled out to what I would call a skinny-normal weight, which he maintains today...It was unreal. I wish I had photographed all 3 of those poops as a warning against feeding mealworms... Unbelievable.

That poor little guy... that's really rough. Glad he pulled through!

No poops from Juste yet, and I'm hoping it isn't as bad as Nix. She was on repticarpet, but her entire diet has been primarily mealworms. They told me they didn't like bugs and could only stand feeding the worms. They didn't tell me when her last poop was. They, of course, were fully unaware of the issues she currently has.

She had a lot of pure pumpkin yesterday, followed with some olive oil. She has strained to pass every bath since I got her home to no results. I'll be trying again today, and to loosen off that shed some more.

She is willingly taking and eating her greens in the morning like a good girl, and is currently out soaking up the real sun

No poop success.
Lots more pumpkin.

She had three whole hours of natural sun today, though.

Giving her some floor time and checking out her mobility. It's a lot less stiff than day 1!
https://youtu.be/8hWGCqAzn3U