Pre-shedding or something else?

My second post asking about the health of my dragon in a few days. I'm a worry wart lol.

I have a few more questions pertaining to my dragon, Phil. He's 15 months old and I just adopted him last month. 15 inches and 309 grams as of last Friday when we took him to the vet.
He does have parasites, coccidia and pinworms, and we will be treating him in the next few days when I receive my order of his meds (Toltrazuril and Panacur). He's still eating and he's pretty active for having parasites.
We use a reptisun 10.0 tube for UVB and he's on paper towel as his substrate. His temps seem to be well although the humidity has been slightly on the higher side (typically going between 40~60%). He typically eats dubia roaches, superworms, collard greens, dandelion greens, and blackberries. I also just started giving him a bit of bee pollen on his greens to make him eat them (spoiler alert: he still didn't eat most of them... but he did eat more than normal so it's a start.)
The purple/blue discoloration directly around his mouth is from him eating a blackberry today.


I noticed that for the last few days he's been rubbing his head on his basking rock and the underside of his beard has turned a bit yellow-ish, is this pre-shed behavior? His beard could have been that color before and I just never noticed it as well. But the head rubbing on his basking rock is definitely newer within the last few days or so.
This is my first time owning a reptile so I've never had to deal with one shedding before. I also noticed some discoloration around his vent but could that be shed as well? Or possibly a stain since his poop has been rather runny due to the parasites? Also, the vet couldn't confirm for me whether or not Phil is male or female. :? I'm very curious myself and he was sold to me as a "14 month old MALE bearded dragon" but it seems like it could go either way with him and I've been calling him a "him" thus far lol. Of course, my biggest worry is that this could be some sort of fungus on his beard but I don't think it is because there don't seem to be any open sores or anything around his body.
I wish I could've gotten better pics of his vent area but he's sleeping right now so I'd like to not disturb him.





Thanks for any input anyone might have to lessen my worry! :love5:

It probably is shed, my beardies all rub themselves on anything rough in their enclosure when they're shedding. He could be a female, as i cant see the two bulges that are normally on the sides but it also could just be the angle of the picture. Also make sure you dont feed too many superworms, they're not the best feeders.

Probably a female, but I can't tell for sure because the tail needs to be up a lot higher and arched over his back to be able to see for sure.

He's got a lot of rough looking skin, he definitely needs a good full-body shed, and his chin area looks sore. It's probably just stuck shed that he's rubbing on something inside his tank because it's itchy, but I would keep a very close eye on it and if you see it looking AT ALL like it's spread, even a little bit, you need to get him to an experienced reptile vet ASAP and request a Skin-Scraping test of that area in particular, as it also could be some type of fungal infection. I've seen a few bearded dragons with external fungal infections that look very similar to that, almost like a burn where the individual scales look almost swollen and red/raw. So if he doesn't shed the area soon or you notice that spreading at all, please get him to a reptile specialist and make sure that you request a Skin-Scraping test, and don't just let them put him on a prescription medication or just look at him and send him home. A skin-scraping test costs very little and is easy and quick to do, and it will not only diagnose an infection, it will also tell the vet exactly what medication will be effective against the type of infection he has.

I'm also leaning toward thinking it's a female but a better pic will be helpful. As for the beard, it's just a few different color shades, nothing there to worry about.

Yeah, and unfortunately I don't know a whole lot about his history other than what the guy who sold him to me said, being that "he was housed with another male and they were aggressive towards each other" and he was at the rescue for about a month before we got him. Now I'm not even sure what to believe if the rescue shop couldn't even get his gender correct. He's had dark stress marks since we've gotten him and he seems a bit small for his age in my opinion. He's also missing a couple of toes and a bit of the end of his tail. I've only noticed him scratching/rubbing the side of his face against the rock and not anything else and I didn't notice him do it today at all. I took some more pics since he was awake, but after looking a bit I think he's a female as well. Which makes me frustrated, but I'm fine with because all I want is for Phil to be healthy and happy, and that's the environment and care I want to give him.
He's active, is eating just fine, and seems to be doing okay given that we still haven't received the meds for treating the parasites... But they shipped today and should be here in a few days so we can finally start. Has a black beard sometimes but I figured he would given that he still has parasites. I change the substrate immediately as soon as I've noticed he's pooped so he's not sitting around it or anything for very long at all, and the feeder insects that are not eaten are taken out of the tank right after he's done eating.
Does it still look fungal to you? When we took him to the vet last Friday she said he looked rather healthy and that he was slightly dehydrated but that was probably because of the lack of eating at the time (he skipped a few days of eating last week) and runny poop. He did get two doses of .3cc 5% Albon last weekend before I stopped giving it to him and we ordered Toltrazuril per the recommendation of this forum.
Here are some more pics, please tell me what you think.
Like I put in the original post, the purple/red/blue stuff right around his mouth is from him eating a blackberry yesterday.


You can see the stick-on temp and humidity things but we don't use these anymore, we use a temp gun so that the readings are far more accurate. You can also see a bit of blackberry towards the left side but I planned on changing his substrate tomorrow after his bath.





Thank you.

He be a she. And the dark colors can be from stress and/or reacting to lighting etc. If she's eating well, that's a good thing. No sign of fungus at all. Don't worry too much.

Guess I'm going to have to get used to calling Phil a she/her now! Thank you!!

One more kinda off-topic question, but when I receive the toltrazuril and panacur should I be giving her both at the same time or should I split them up a bit between doses? Sorry if this is a dumb question I just want to be sure.

Some vets do but it might be best just to do one at a time to be sure she doesn't go off her food. The toltrazuril will only take 2-3 doses so you might start with that, wait a week, then the Panacur.

Alright. That works for me. Thank you so much!!

I'm off to go educate myself on egg laying because since I thought she was a male I didn't really research it.
Thank you again for your help!

You're welcome. Be sure she spends lots of time in her tank where it's nice and warm....looks like she got a little cold during her photo shoot.

Right now she's sleeping in her hide and I have the heat emitter on. She really likes to hang out on the cooler side of her tank to sleep and it stresses me out because I always think it's going to get too cold even though she has the heat emitter lol.