My Baby Beardie Looks Sick, Please Help

Hi, I am fairly new to owning this baby bearded dragon and have been noticing that her eye gets sealed shut every once in a while (once every two days, usually in the mornings), but when I woke up this morning something a little alarming caught my eye. As I looked at her closer I could see her mouth slightly crooked and opened. The one side of her mouth almost looks normal, but the other won't close. She seems to be eating okay for now, but I've been giving her small crickets and wax worms because it looks like it hurts ?

I would speculate a broken jaw, but it's unlikely that she would be eating if that were the case. I would take her to a certified reptile veterinarian to get her checked out. You can find one near you at ARAV.org.

@HylianHealeys
I thought it might be a broken Jaw too so I've only been feeding soft insects. Someone told me it could be calcium deficiency, but I didn't think it would be showing this early on. I'm just worried that it's something serious and needs to be addressed right away ?

How long have you had her, and what supplements do you use? Also, did you feed her on any kind of pelleted food?

@HylianHealeys
I've only had her for about a month and a half. Bought her at a local pet store. She's been on small crickets dusted with calcium +D3 (dusted about once a week), and I recently bought the Gut Load of calcium for the crickets. Should I be giving her something else? The person working the pet store wasn't very informative

Employees at pet stores usually aren't.

Some more questions so I can narrow down what's going on with your beardie:
- What are your temps?
- What are you using to measure temps?
- What type of UVB are you using?
- What brand is the calcium supplement?
- What brand is the cricket food?
- Have you been offering any kind of vegetables?

@HylianHealeys
I've usually got it at about 109 degrees on the hot side of my tank and about 85 degrees on my cooler side. At night I have a heating pad under the hot side and it gets to about 95 degrees, but I do live in a basement. I'm using the Zoo med digital thermometer for temp readings. I'm also using the UVB 150 by exo terra, and the calcium is exo Terra as well. The cricket food is Zoo med, and yes, some lettuce and carrots about once a week

There are a lot of corrections that need to be made here if your bearded dragon is going to grow up healthy. I would recommend reading through this guide to bearded dragon care as soon as you can, and I'm really glad you're here on the forums!

109 is perfect basking temperature for a young bearded dragon, but 85 degrees is pretty warm on the cool side. Is there any way you can get it down to 80?

How cold does it get in in your room at night? Assuming that it gets below 75, I would recommend putting your heat pad on a thermostat ASAP. 95 is way too hot for a night temp. Thermostats control how hot a heat pad can get, which often saves reptile lives. The Jump Start thermostat is used by many reptile people, and only costs $35 on Amazon.

I had to look up the Exo Terra 150 UVB. Apparently they've changed the name of their Repti Glo bulb. The Repti Glo 10.0 fluorescent tube wasn't a bad product, but my primary concern here is the fact that the 150 UVB is a compact fluorescent. Compact fluorescents have a very narrow range of influence, so unless your beardie is basking directly underneath it, they won't get much (if any) UVB exposure. This can actually lead to MBD, especially in young bearded dragons, who are particularly susceptible. It would be a good idea to swap this out for a Zoo Med Reptisun T5 HO 10.0, which is a tube fluorescent. A 22" bulb goes for about $20. It also needs a special fixture to hold the bulb.

Zoo Med's cricket food isn't my favorite gutload, but not the worst. I prefer using Repashy Veggie Burger because it provides more complete nutrition and contains less fillers.

Although your baby beardie is going to be primarly interested in insects at this stage in life, a fresh salad should be provided daily, or at least every other day. Lettuce is, unfortunately, no good. It's basically just water in the shape of a vegetable. Bearded dragons need nutritious greens like collards, mustard greens, and dandelion greens (refer to the abovementioned care guide for a longer list).

@HylianHealeys
Thank you soo much! I'll be sure to make the changes as best as possible for now, but eventually I'll change my entire tank set up. I can't believe I didn't know these things, you think they'd know at the pet store ? Thank you again, you might have just saved my baby ?

Thanks for having a good attitude! Best of luck with your baby, and let us know if she doesn't improve.

Someone already gave you some really good corrective care information, particularly with the UV lighting, so I’ll just add:
1. Baby beardies need to be fed insects at least twice a day, as many as they can eat in a sitting. A growing baby can (and should be allowed to) consume 30-60 insects in a day, give or take the individual’s appetite.
2. Wax worms aren’t suitable staples. While beardies love them, they’re essentially the bug equivalent of ice cream. They have an extremely high fat content and too many of these on a regular basis can lead to fatty liver disease in reptiles. Others to avoid: Mealworms and superworms. These are not very nutritious insects and their hard exoskeleton makes them tough for beardies, particularly babies, to digest. Superworms can be given to adult beardies as occasional treats, but they’re like Big Macs—not something you want to make a habit of.
3. Beardie specific greens and veggies should be provided every single day. If it has the word lettuce in it, it’s essentially water, and therefore has no nutritional benefit. Dandelion greens, turnip greens, endive, collard greens, and mustard greens should be your staples. And butternut squash is a good staple veggie. Remember: your baby may initially snub her salad and that’s normal. But it should always be available. The more you encourage her to eat her veggies now, the easier the transition to adulthood will be when her diet needs shift and her protein intake lessens.