bloodreddragon
Member
Hello all, so I got my blood red beardie about 5.5 years ago, unfortunately 2 months into getting him my land lord forced me to remove him from my apartment due to a no pet rule. I then gave him off to my parents to take care of for the past 5 years....big mistake. Though I gave them all the necessary tools ie. an arcadia t5 ho 12% uvb / a 5600k daylight tube for improved visible light, a 100 watt basking lamp, and natural stone tiles for flooring contained in a 40 gallon glass terrarium. Though I recommended a healthy diced collard greens and edive diet mixed with crickets or meal worms they pretty much fed him only meal worms which were rarely powdered with calcium. They did give him direct sun for about the past year in a custom built outdoor cage. I would regularly though not always check up on him and he recently came down with tons of scary bad symptoms:
- lethargic
- sunken in eyes
- nearly half of his stomache (the left side) is as hard as a rock almost
- a small hard lump towards his (right side) rear belly
- a dramatic loss of weight in a little over a weeks time
- he intermittently gasps for air
- has mucus build up in his mouth (no nostril popping when breathing)
- he won't eat, won't drink, won't bask for longer than a few hours daily
- sleeps pretty much all day
- intermittent head twitching/shaking post walking around much
I took him to the doctor immediately upon taking him back into my care and the doctor wasn't very helpful, didn't even mention the impacted tummy, just said he was dehydrated, had early stages of mbd and wouldn't live long...also offered me a $1,400 bill to keep him in their intensive care for 5 days.
She gave me the following meds to administer:
- orbax .2ml daily (for 21 days)
- calcium gluconate .1ml daily (for 14 days)
Since taking him in back under my care a week ago I've made a habitat of:
- 20 gallon long glass tank (36" long)
- 36" t5 ho arcadia 12% uvb tube 12" above (about 6 months old) along with a 5600k daylight tube for improved vision
- natural stone tiles for flooring that are regularly cleaned
- a 75w domed exo terra basking lamp 8" above (which according to the documentation equates to a 97d F basking spot)
- a small wooden house that he can use for shade if wanted
Diet wise my first few days up until 2 days ago I fed him:
MEDS:
- DAILY orbax .2ml daily
- DAILY calcium gluconate .1ml daily
- DAILY 8ml of pureed collard greens with equal parts puree of butternut squash dosed with a dash of pure calcium carbonate (human grade) and a dash of herpitive multivitamin
- DAILY 8ml of filtered water
With the above diet he threw up bi-daily, just couldn't hold down the food / fluids. I've been giving him daily warm water baths for about 30 minutes also.
So, far the past two days I've changed his diet to:
DAY 1
- all the meds
- 4ml of pedialyte diluted 1:1 with britta filtered water
DAY 2 (today)
- all the meds
- 4ml of pedialyte diluted 1:1 with britta filtered water
ADDED
- 4ml of pure organic (no additives) prune puree mixed with calcium carbonate and herpitive multi vite in hopes of helping him poop. He has only pooped 3 times total during the week (the first two stools were bloody, the last which was 3 days ago was large, round and deep brown)
He is still lethargic for the most part today but isn't gasping for air as much. Today I also took into account that this could mostly be due to impaction, especially considering half of his tummy is rock hard. So I started giving him a warm bath with 20 minutes of gentle tummy massaging with no poop yet. I'll attach pictures to show you how skinny he's gotten.
He is 18" long, has a tiny bit of tail rot and weighs 400 grams even. Any advice would be extremely appreciated, I really want to save this lil guy since I feel partially to blame for his current state.
- lethargic
- sunken in eyes
- nearly half of his stomache (the left side) is as hard as a rock almost
- a small hard lump towards his (right side) rear belly
- a dramatic loss of weight in a little over a weeks time
- he intermittently gasps for air
- has mucus build up in his mouth (no nostril popping when breathing)
- he won't eat, won't drink, won't bask for longer than a few hours daily
- sleeps pretty much all day
- intermittent head twitching/shaking post walking around much
I took him to the doctor immediately upon taking him back into my care and the doctor wasn't very helpful, didn't even mention the impacted tummy, just said he was dehydrated, had early stages of mbd and wouldn't live long...also offered me a $1,400 bill to keep him in their intensive care for 5 days.
She gave me the following meds to administer:
- orbax .2ml daily (for 21 days)
- calcium gluconate .1ml daily (for 14 days)
Since taking him in back under my care a week ago I've made a habitat of:
- 20 gallon long glass tank (36" long)
- 36" t5 ho arcadia 12% uvb tube 12" above (about 6 months old) along with a 5600k daylight tube for improved vision
- natural stone tiles for flooring that are regularly cleaned
- a 75w domed exo terra basking lamp 8" above (which according to the documentation equates to a 97d F basking spot)
- a small wooden house that he can use for shade if wanted
Diet wise my first few days up until 2 days ago I fed him:
MEDS:
- DAILY orbax .2ml daily
- DAILY calcium gluconate .1ml daily
- DAILY 8ml of pureed collard greens with equal parts puree of butternut squash dosed with a dash of pure calcium carbonate (human grade) and a dash of herpitive multivitamin
- DAILY 8ml of filtered water
With the above diet he threw up bi-daily, just couldn't hold down the food / fluids. I've been giving him daily warm water baths for about 30 minutes also.
So, far the past two days I've changed his diet to:
DAY 1
- all the meds
- 4ml of pedialyte diluted 1:1 with britta filtered water
DAY 2 (today)
- all the meds
- 4ml of pedialyte diluted 1:1 with britta filtered water
ADDED
- 4ml of pure organic (no additives) prune puree mixed with calcium carbonate and herpitive multi vite in hopes of helping him poop. He has only pooped 3 times total during the week (the first two stools were bloody, the last which was 3 days ago was large, round and deep brown)
He is still lethargic for the most part today but isn't gasping for air as much. Today I also took into account that this could mostly be due to impaction, especially considering half of his tummy is rock hard. So I started giving him a warm bath with 20 minutes of gentle tummy massaging with no poop yet. I'll attach pictures to show you how skinny he's gotten.
He is 18" long, has a tiny bit of tail rot and weighs 400 grams even. Any advice would be extremely appreciated, I really want to save this lil guy since I feel partially to blame for his current state.