calcium/vitamin dosages and any tips for a newbie?

heyo. everything bolded is more or less the important stuff if you wanna skip around. i ramble a lot, sorry.

on wednesday, four days ago, my mother brought home a bearded dragon from her work. she works at a school and he was a classroom pet for the last five years, though she's only worked around him for about one year.

we weren't exactly equipped for him but we went out and bought a basking light and reptical and herpivite, as well as various veggies, some super worms, and dubias.

apparently, for all five years, he's never had a UVB light (we have the reptisun 10.0 being shipped sometime next week). nothing. im pretty sure he has metabolic bone disease, as his front, right arm completely turns in and is never straightened like his left. he's also missing most of his toes, which i think might be because of bad sheds? he was literally never bathed. ive bathed him every day so far and he's shedding like crazy.

ANYWAY currently he's been eating a mixture of collard and mustard greens with a rotation of yellow squash, zucchini, and he's had carrots once. the first two days, he had three super worms a day and ignored his salad, but the last two days he's had three dubias a day and is eating his salad. apparently he NEVER ate salad in the classroom.

because he's also never had UVB ive been giving him calcium powder with D3 the past four days we've had him but im actually not sure how much he should have? ive been putting it on his bugs and a bit on the salads. he's also had his vitamins once, which was on the bugs and salad as well.

im thinking of setting a schedule where he gets his vitamins on mondays and fridays and his calcium on tuesdays, thursdays, and saturdays once he has his UVB light. does this sound alright?

some other info:
he's about 16 inches long, his basking spot is usually at around 105F on the rocks, with the ambient temp at around 85-90, and the cool end stays at around 75-80. at night, the cool end is around 60-70, with the warm end staying in the 70s because of a UTH where he sleeps. (it's a very small one that isn't actually attached to the tank, just in the space between the table and the glass and he has a lot of padding between him and it). his humidity is anywhere between 30-45%.

Well, your schedule, depending on the source, seems to be just fine. I personally follow a website that suggest calcium 2-3 times a week and multivitamin 1-2 a week. Though, perhaps you could increase the calcium by a little bit for now since he is suffering from mbd. While not a guaranteed thing, you might consider giving him calciworms as a staple for a short while as it has the possibility of slightly reducing the effects of mbd.

Hello,

Poor guy, that is great you are taking him in!
Which Reptisun 10 did you purchase, the T8 or the T5 (high output) UVB?
Once you do receive the UVB light for him, you could give calcium 4-5 times per week since he
is having calcium issues. He will definitely need it.
It will be hard to get him to eat greens/veggies since he has never had any before!
Do you have any pictures of him & the tank setup we could see?

Tracie

I think in this case simply dusting the insects and greens & gut loading the insects is not going to be sufficient or give him his full daily calcium needs.

I would get hold of some digital glass topped kitchen scales and start weighing him weekly .
And based on his body mass (entire body including tail) I would give him a daily oral dose of CALCIVET solution - tastes very sweet and lizards I've treated with love it almost as much a manuka honey.

This way you can be sure he's getting is recommended dose of calcium every day and then add 16 hours per day of opportunities to bask under a very good UVB source (a T5HO 12%UVB tube in a reflector hood ON for no less than 14 hours per day and no more than 12 inches from his basking spot) will look after his vitD3 needs (which will be formed in his skin) .
Keep an eye on the colour of his urates , if he's getting too much calcium or has excess VitD3 in his bloodstream , the calcium will be precipitated in the urates.

Too bad it's winter where you like are and WAY TOO COLD to give him a daily dose of STRONG NATURAL sunlight.

I would continue doing this for at least 6 months.

I think a vet examination of him to get his current health status and assess his bone density and some baseline blood work will be of benefit to you in rehabilitating this dragon and improving his health.