Yellow fungus treatment?

I've had my little girl Irving for a little over two weeks now. She had failure to thrive, and i have been force feeding her crix and collard greens. She's also eaten some local june bugs, she really enjoys them. She also willingly laps up baby food, so I have been feeding her carrots, green beans, sweet peas, turkey & gravy, chicken & gravy, chicken & gravy, squash, sometimes some sweet potatoes, and bananas. She has also eaten a 36 ct. container of wax worms (though we call them beemoths). She is putting on weight well. She is strong, exploratory, and very very alert and aware of detail. She shedded today. I gave her a lukewarm bath and scrubbed her with a washcloth, which she welcomed. I then began to help her rid herself of her tiny pieces of scales left on her lips, eyelids and head. She has yellow scales on her nose now, and in some places two or three layers of shed that had either never come off, or were protecting the fungal infection. I've read a heaping ton of things about beardies in the past month. I have her using an incorrect UVB bulb at the moment. It was meant for pythons and I used it for my corns because they liked it better than the other they had. She gets hours of daily sun exposure. She either sits on my windowsill, on the porch, or runs around in the grass. She spends the whole day with me, which has really given me quite the tan. Her tank is half sand, half aspen chips. She has a small hide-log in there that she suns on on the line between the substrates. She tends to stay on it or sleep in the aspen chips. When she shedded today, my heart dropped. She has yellow fungus. I give her a bath so often that I'm really kicking myself because I'm fairly certain it's spreading to her spikes that line her side. I'm planning on taking her to the vet as soon as possible. I panicked and put undecylenate 25% (athlete's foot ointment) on her affected areas. When I got her from the store, she had an odd missing scale on her head and a small piece of her tail was ready to drop. Her tail is healing fine, that fiasco is a story for another day. What can I do to help her heal? I've read in several places that a lot of the reptile's that get this don't make it for much more than a year or two. I want her to have a great life with me! I was going to spoil her rotten and make a new best friend! Please tell me there's some way I can save her.

I also should mention that I'm aware that sand is not good for her, and neither are the aspen chips. I only leave the chips in because she used likes to visit my corn snake (they get along quite well and all is supervised) and fall asleep in her substrate. she is handfed, including crix. I made sure all of the shaving are free of dust and small particles. As for the sand, I'm planning on removing it and replacing with reptile carpet or another type of substrate similar to dirt. Don't worry, I won't use walnut! Is rodent bedding safe? She really enjoys fabric. I could also fill it with old socks or a torn up shirt if that's okay.

smootheszechuan":p22rhzk4 said:

I also should mention that I'm aware that sand is not good for her, and neither are the aspen chips. I only leave the chips in because she used likes to visit my corn snake (they get along quite well and all is supervised) and fall asleep in her substrate. she is handfed, including crix. I made sure all of the shaving are free of dust and small particles. As for the sand, I'm planning on removing it and replacing with reptile carpet or another type of substrate similar to dirt. Don't worry, I won't use walnut! Is rodent bedding safe? She really enjoys fabric. I could also fill it with old socks or a torn up shirt if that's okay.

Click to expand...

Please keep the snake and your hatchling apart ....

They should never be together EVER.

Remove the particulate bedding and lay down kitchen paper toweling as the substrate : MUCH SAFER and very easy clean up and cheap.

The photos are not good enough to see much of anything .
How do you know it's Yellow Fungus , have you had a vet examine your beardie AT ALL , and take swabs ?

IF she has a fungal infection in her skin , bathing her is the WORSE thing you can do. There are ointments that a vet will prescribe to treat these.

If it is YF ,it's very infectious between reptiles - another reason apart from safety from being eaten to keep the snake and beardie apart !!

Since there appear to lots of issues going on , husbandry (feeding, feeders), etc , I think a thorough and DETAILED run down of everything you do and her viv setup is needed so we can help you and guide you.
Essentially need much more information and details on your beardie's setup and your husbandry otherwise we can't even hazard a guess.

Here's my Cheat Sheet :
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=234738&p=1806050#p1806050

If you work through it methodically , the chances are their are likely a lot of issues that need to be tweeked or changed and they will pop right out at you, if you can give very detailed answers we will then be in a position to offer help. Is impossible to help you if you don't provide thorough details .

It may prove necessary to involve a reptile vet if your bearded dragon has serious health issues. Are you in a position to afford to take him to a good reptile vet should this prove necessary ?

Hello,

Are you referring to the whitish scales on the top of his head? Can you try to get more pictures
of the area you are referring to on the side spikes?
Just based on the picture of the top of the head, it just looks like retained shed to me. How long
has it looked like this? As suggested, have the vet do a skin scraping to culture it just to be sure it is
a fungal issue.
Is her appetite doing well?

Tracie

Her appetite is decent, but her willingness to actually put the food in her mouth is not. I was using tweezers to just pull off some of the remaining scales atop her head, and this is what was under them. Yellow patches with black in the middle. It was wet when this patch came off, however the rest of the remaining scales had been dry, telling me they were safe to take off. I will try to get better pictures.

As for the snake, I will not be letting her visit anytime soon if YF is in question. However, the snake won't eat her, she can't fit more than the tiniest of pinkies in her mouth. Here are some (hopefully) better images. Here is the picture of her side spikes. . If you see the large white spot behind the bridges of her eyes in the following, that is the scale that has been missing since I got her three weeks ago. It had a minute black dot in the middle. I assumed the dot was a scale bud and that she'd been injured somehow and lost it. Now, she has more scales that are being overtaken by this black. She's gray, none of her scales are black, nor were they before she shed her skin.

It has looked like this since today when the scales covering it came off. Since then it has proven to be bothering her when I touch it, though she's also just been generally cranky all day. There is yellow surrounding wherever the scales have not turned black. Is this possibly just from the scales not being ready to come off? I will fix her husbandry soon, as well as get ointment and betadine. I will search for good probiotics and invest in a different bulb soon as well. The bulb will come last, as she gets so much natural sunlight. Her tank lacks a thermometer and humidity-scale thing. I just know that I live in Indiana, so it should be considerably dry in there compared to my room, which it is. I also know her basking spot should feel near the temp of a cozy shower to me, which it does. She knows how to move to a cooler spot if and when necessary. I will take her temp after asking tomorrow to make sure that she herself is keeping the right temp. Until I can get her to a vet, what do you suggest I do?

I missed posting an image I believe. This is her missing scale.

judging from what you've already said, I think a thorough rundown and analysis of her viv setup and your husbandry are a good idea.

I repeat : please try to give accurate detailed and thorough answers.
Need much more information and details on your beardie's setup and your husbandry otherwise we can't even hazard a guess, you are flying blind otherwise.

Here's my Cheat Sheet :
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=234738&p=1806050#p1806050

If you work through it methodically , the chances are their are likely a lot of issues that need to be tweeked or changed and they will pop right out at you, if you can give very detailed answers we will then be in a position to offer help. Is impossible to help you if you don't provide thorough details .

It may prove necessary to involve a reptile vet if your bearded dragon has serious health issues. Are you in a position to afford to take him to a good reptile vet should this prove necessary ?





She's very young, how long ago was her last shed ?
... at her age they can seem to be in shed constantly for the first 4 - 6 month .

... looks like she is about to / or in the process of shedding on the lips from what I can see.

But it is still hard to tell.

Hi there, first off I'll tell you the good news....that is not Y.F. It's natural yellow tint, I've owned beardies over 20 years + seen coloring just like it. There's some skin still going to shed, so it's an uneven [ perfectly normal ] shed. Do't put anymore meds. on it.

You're doing a good job keeping him well fed, so aside from changing his substrate and definitely !!! keeping him away from the snake you are doing a good job. What exact brand of lights are you using ? Very important, and also VERY important to NEVER pull the scales off ! That can cause a serious infection. Just a soak every now + then, a slight spritz of water while he's shedding and he'll shed in his own time. Here's a pic of one of mine from years ago with uneven shed, it's perfectly normal and no cause for concern. It comes off when it's ready :

https://www.beardeddragon.org/media/29897/full

But good news, that is not Y.F. ! No need for a skin scraping. By the way, who had him before you + why do they say she had failure to thrive ?

I got her from a pet store, she was about a month old. I knew she had failure to thrive because she wouldn't eat for two days unless I made her.

It's pretty common for dragons that are moved to a new home to refuse to eat for a couple of days. They may go through a period of relocation stress.

But anyway, your baby doesn't have Y.F. Give it some time to settle in and leave the shedding alone except for a light spritz in the tank 1-2X a day to help loosen it. Once she gets hungry enough she should eat on her own, she's just used to being hand fed.

Thank you! There were other layers on top of the patch that's now discolored. If this layer sheds and looks the same or worse, I'll take her to a vet. In the meantime, is there anything I might need to get Justin Case?

Update pics: