Help! Sick Beardie

Hi everyone,

I’m really hoping someone with more experience than me can provide any sort of advice, past experience, knowledge, etc.

I have two female bearded dragons, Thor and Luna. Thor has come down quite sick in the past two days (very quickly it seems). I’ve listed all of her symptoms below.

I took her to the reptile vet today (our first time), the details are also below.

I’m still concerned that there is something more going on. Has anyone had this happen before?
What was it?
What did you do?
Is it just the ear infection causing her to go in circles?
Could she possibly be egg bound (my fear) even though she hasn’t shown any signs of having eggs?
Is there anything else I can do to help my baby?

I’m just so scared it’s not going to get better and I feel so helpless

Dragon details:
-Female
-3 1/2 years
-have had her since 4 months old
-last laid eggs Boxing Day 2018 and then January 2019
-701g

Symptoms:
-head tilted to the left
-moves only in a circle to the left (counter clockwise)
-black beard (wasn’t last night)
-eyes half open now (we’re fully open last night)
-sometimes gasping (can’t tell if inhaling or having trouble breathing)
-moving almost like she’s drunk (out of balance)
-has pooped about 8 times in the last 2 days but all of them have been really tiny (both poo and urate)
-has puked 3 times in the last 2 days
-no appetite
-not really wanting to drink

Vet’s prescriptions today:
-possible ear infection
-fecal test has some parasites (pin worms, hook worms and one other type that I can’t pronounce)
-soak at least 1x daily in warm water
-she’s been put on 3 prescriptions:
1. Metronidazole 0.15cc 100mg/ml 1x every other day for 10 days.
2. Enrofloxacin 0.35cc 20mg/ml 1x daily for 15 days.
3. Panacur 0.30cc 5ml 1x daily for 3 days, stop for 2 weeks, then 1x daily for 3 more days.

House/lighting/temps:
-40 gal
-slate tile for substrate (sealed)
-white 100w basking spot 8-10” away from highest basking spot
-Reptisun 10.0 UVB tube 8-10” away from highest basking spot, 6 months old
-95-100* in basking spot
-73* on cool side
-25%ish humidity on cool side

Diet/supplements:
-daily salad rotating between arugula (most common because they actually eat it) endive, collards and dandelions
-super worms 2x per week about 10each time, more if we let her usually but has had no interest right now
-horn worms 1x every couple weeks, usually about 8 each time
-calcium and multivite on her worms 2x per week
-calcium on her salad every day
-gets other treats including raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, apple, red pepper a couple times per week

Other:
-she soaks at least 1x per week usually. Yesterday we did 3x for 15mins each time. Today we’ve soaked 2x for 20mins each time
-she very good natured, very snuggly and affectionate, never bit anyone but today she tried to bite me and the vet

Please let me know if I missed anything.

Any help is much appreciated!

Thank you,
Alli

Oh poor Thor, She's having such a hard time. Your care sounds good, nothing obvious that would cause these symptoms. The dragons are in separate tanks I imagine ? Not that there would be any correlation to her illness. Ear infection IS a possibility and from what I've heard that can be cleared up with antibiotix. There may also be a separate neurological disorder, I hope that's not the case. Drache613 [ one of the mods. ] may have some thoughts to add here. In the mean time I wish you + Thor the best !

AHBD":n35ofsw4 said:

Oh poor Thor, She's having such a hard time. Your care sounds good, nothing obvious that would cause these symptoms. The dragons are in separate tanks I imagine ? Not that there would be any correlation to her illness. Ear infection IS a possibility and from what I've heard that can be cleared up with antibiotix. There may also be a separate neurological disorder, I hope that's not the case. Drache613 [ one of the mods. ] may have some thoughts to add here. In the mean time I wish you + Thor the best !

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Thank you I really appreciate the response!

Yes, Thor and Luna are in separate tanks. They normally spend a lot of time out of the tanks together but we are very begin careful the past few days not to contaminate to Luna.

We went to the vet again today as I’m super concerned about Thor. We had an x-day done which shows a mass in her mid body, could be eggs or impaction or something else entirely. Couldn’t be clearly shown as eggs but this is what the vet is leaning towards as we also did bloodwork which showed high level of calcium.

The vet gave her some oxytocin to try to induce laying if it is eggs but so far nothing

She also gave her some more fluid injections, a calcium injection and a warm water enema which made her poop a bit.

Thor has almost stopped leaning and circling so perhaps the antibiotics are helping with the cause of that but she is still very uncomfortable, in pain and generally down and out :’(

She’s had 1 dose of the metronidazole last night and 1 dose of the enrofloxacin this morning.

We currently have her under her heat and uvb on the dirt pile in a fresh dig box to see if it’ll make her want to dig.

I’m posting everything in hopes that someone comes along with any more experience/advice! Fingers crossed and prayers for my baby <3

Well that's a little bit of good news, that her neurological symptoms seem less severe. I would not allow another enema, dragons can actually have ruptures if too much pressure is used and many beardies do very badly after ! Would there be any reason for her to be impacted , like is she on loose substrate or maybe eaten a foreign object ?

AHBD":2sei1dqo said:

Well that's a little bit of good news, that her neurological symptoms seem less severe. I would not allow another enema, dragons can actually have ruptures if too much pressure is used and many beardies do very badly after ! Would there be any reason for her to be impacted , like is she on loose substrate or maybe eaten a foreign object ?

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I was worried about the enema too, the vet recommended it and was very gentle so hopefully there won’t be any issues

I don’t believe there’d be any reason for her to be impacted, she’s on slate tile -has been almost her whole life except for paper towel when we first brought her home. No foreign objects that I possibly can think of, she hasn’t even been running around the floor at our apartment in a while