Lost Tip of Tail. BONE Exposed. (Vet appt Friday)

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hmwyer

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***WARNING GRAPHIC PICTURE***
Just as title says, she lost her tail tip. The bone is exposed and she does have an appointment with the vet for an RI so she will be looked at for the tail too. Anyways, should I just do betadine and water soaks with a little neosporin as I have been, leaving it uncovered until the vet appointment?
Here's what it looks like....











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Claudiusx

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Hi there,

Oh no how did that happen?

You can do that until the vet appointment. if you have raw unpasteurized honey you can leave that on the tip of the tail too. It will help keep it clean and keep it from getting infected.

-Brandon
 

hmwyer

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Original Poster
Sadly, I'm not sure how exactly, but I have a theory. She's been sick and she's not been wanting to move much of pick up her tail so she constantly was stepping on the end. At first I thought it got burnt from a vaporizer treatment I was doing then as it began dying and shriveling up more I saw it it was like almost 90° crooked. So, my new working theory was she stepped on it so much and got it all twisted that she basically broke it from jot picking it up. I did betadine soaks followed by neosporin the first week or two, then when it looked like it was close to falling off I just put a light coating of neosporin on it to keep it clean. It began to crack open around Saturday and fell off for good this evening. I feel bad this happened, at least now she can't trip over the end of her tail like she had been doing. I unfortunately don't have and can't get that kind of honey unless I ordered it online and it would probably arrive same day or day before appt, so it wouldn't do much good this time around. I will probably buy a small thing of manuka honey and other first aid supplies from beardeddragon.co to have on hand though.
Any idea if the skin will sort of scab over the bone, or do you think the bet will have to cut the bone out and sew/glue up the end? Idt she would be able to go under anesthesia being sick, so I really hope not.
 

Drache613

BD.org Sicko
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Hello,

Ouch, poor girl. So she did lose the tip of it.
The tip should just scab over & heal up without the vet having to sew anything up unless he
feels that infection could set in. You can just keep it clean with ointment or honey right now
& maybe at night, cover it with some gauge.
It should heal up pretty quickly though. This is a relatively common occurrence with them.
How is she doing today?

Tracie
 

AHBD

BD.org Sicko
Sorry to hear about your dragon's tail and then she has an R.I to boot poor girl. There's really no way that her stepping on it would break it, can you post pics of the tank set up to see if there's anyplace it might have gotten wedged by accident ? Another possibility is, strange as it sounds, some beardies bite their own tail at times. The other [ most likely ] is that there was a small band of retained shed that went unnoticed that cut off circulation . By the way, a partial tail amputation [ if necessary ] does not need anesthesia to be done, a very quick cut and then quickly stopping the bleeding will not be very painful so that she would need to be out.
 

hmwyer

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Original Poster
Oh good deal in the tail cutting! I called today and warned the vet about the tail so they knew what they were about to see. Idk if she passed the message on or not though. Well, her set up is different now as she has been wobbly since being sick and after flipping on her back twice she has zero hammocks, ledges or inclined hides. But at the time, though I have no picture, she probably could have easily caught it between her slanted hide and the side of tank. Or even the suction cups and hooks on one of her hammocks. My original theory on the injury was a steam burn from the mini vaporizer I was using for her RI treatments as it seemed to happen nearly overnight. I only changed my kind to a break by how horribly crooked a part of the dead tail looked and the fact that the tio kept getting caught under her body and feet and it just looked so uncomfortable. Also, didn't know it was a thing that they sometimes bite their tails. Hmm maybe it tickled her face and she bit at it? Idk. I did notice it looked as though the scales were coming off as the tail was dying, but once it fell off, the scales were still there so......maybe a shed issue? It did have an obvious gray line from the beginning and I knew that it was going to die right away up to that point at least and it did. I just feel bad either way. I was so proud she still had a fall tail at her age too! I jinxed it! ?
 

Claudiusx

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Staff member
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I'm pretty sure it's a burn from the nebulizer based on your other thread and how it looked as it was dying. That's what happens when the tail gets injured. The injury to the tip dies, and eventually it falls off. Once it falls off it leaves an open wound like that. It should heal over, but using honey on it will help make sure no nasties get into the tail and infect it.

-Brandon
 

AHBD

BD.org Sicko
Oh boy, I didn't see the other thread but after reading it sounds like that's what it was. Too bad that was such a dangerous procedure, hopefully it isn't what was affecting her eyes as well. How can the nebulizing be done without such danger ?
 

Drache613

BD.org Sicko
Staff member
Moderator
Hello,

How is her tail looking now? It happens but she will be fine without the tail tip. I'm sorry that
it happened though but it could be much worse & it isn't infected or anything which is always
good.
How are her respiratory issues right now, is she feeling any better?

Keep us posted on her.
Tracie
 

hmwyer

Member
Original Poster
Well, to be fair on the nebulizing thing, I wasn't using the same kind as most use with tubing, so that was on me to not think "Oh, yeah she could probably get too close to this!" But after her tail turned black, I put up the barrier seen in the pictures and watched her anytime I heard her move during treatment. Also, nah, the eye thing has been an issue for well over a year now and the dr said it looked fine and gave me eye drops just to appease me. Well, no, the right one looks 100% different than the left and the drops did nothing. I'm still not sure she can see out of it really. I'll post a full body picture in a second to show how far down and I'll also post the dead tail tip. Yes, I totally saved it. Mostly to take to the vet in case he wants to see it, but also I might still keep it just cause I feel bad throwing her tail away. :(
And breathing wise she's worse than ever. Used to she would cough and gasp. Now she has her tongue out, barely moving, and when she does move she is swallowing hard, shaking her head, and has some mucous coming out of her mouth. I am still using tylan to hopefully alleviate some discomfort until Friday and tipping her slightly to drain stuff out and wiping her mouth and keeping temps high. I feel bad for having to wait so long, but the only vet they could give me any sooner was the vet who told me she didn't need blood work, bearded dragons do not have vitamin B deficiencies and he's never heard of such a thing and, oh yeah, she looked fine to him too. And he kept telling me that I was looking for her calcium levels and I didn't need the bigger blood panel cause the smaller one showed that. I said, about 5 times, nope, I don't care about calcium I'm seeing about vitamin levels and literally everything else, I'm certain her calcium is fine. He said there was no test for vitamin levels either, which MAY be true, but you can test those levels in humans, so not a dr, butI would think you could in animals?? ?‍♀️?‍♀️
But anyways, rant aside, I trust only one Vet there, even though he said her eyes were fine, he is the only one who listens to me. To be fair, the eyes look fine in terms of not being buldged, cloudy, bloody, crusty, etc. The one eye just looks....idk....like blurry or almost like someone zoomed in on her eye and forgot to zoom out. So, it's off, but not like "omg, it's infected/dead!" Or something.
 

hmwyer

Member
Original Poster
94216-35731602.jpg
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Here is her tail when I first noticed it wasn't looking right.

94216-2647157684.jpg
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Here it is about a week ish later.

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Here is the dead part that fell off. It's about 1.5 inches. I'm not sure why it got sooo crooked as it died unless it just does that from shrinking up. But that major crooked-ness is why I wondered if it was broken and not due to a burn.

94216-5744554661.jpg
Here is her tail today. It looks to be healing up around the bone and shrinking compared to Monday. It's hard to see clearly and I'm sorry for that. My phone is dying so my flash wouldn't turn on, but I did my best to make it clear.

94216-7266978184.jpg
And here she is today in hr full length so you can kind of see how far up it went. It wasn't a lot of her tail, but certainly enough of it.
 

Claudiusx

BD.org Sicko
Staff member
Moderator
Thanks for compiling the pictures here. This thread is a good reference to anyone searching up tail issues!

Poor girl. How's she feeling tonight?

-Brandon
 

hmwyer

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Original Poster
And I know someone asked about to picture of the tank as it was set up when her tail began to turn. This is the closest picture I could find with the old setup. The pillow was taken out before her tail issue and the hammock was lowered a bit when she began to get really wobbly and running around and ton. Then I removed everything after she flipped over twice and scared the crap out of me. Now she has some left over flooring pieces we had from renovating and a tea towel with a little cat bed on the side without flooring. This way she can't get her nails caught on the carpet and no hammocks to raise her or angle her in an extreme way as she had been doing that was causing her to flip over. I will put those back when she is, hopefully, back to good health and I am sure she won't flip herself. She does have a heat light and an arcadia 12 t5 ho bulb as well. The uvb bulb spans across the whole front side of the tank, but I also move it diagonally if I'm in and out her cage a bunch as it just sit on top of the tank. No screens or anything to get in the way of the uvb. Temps on hot side are 105-108 in basking area and 76 on the furthest side with it being 84 in the middle of the tank. Right now I'm keeping nighttime temps around 80 in the whole room as this room can get cold now that it is getting cold out and she isn't feeling well so I don't want her to catch a chill. Oh, and humidity is 41 and under in her tank. I try to keep it low, but it's hard in general in the house. If you have any suggestions on how to keep it lower, let me know please.

** EDIT TO THE TEMP READINGS: In case anyone asks for over 2 years now I've been using a mini digital temp/humidity reader meant for indoor/outdoor use I found on amazon to read the hot and cool sides. And I also use a temp gun to measure directly in the tank for basking and midrange/all over temps. Idk if it hurts her, but I'll sometimes put it on her for 2 seconds to see how warm she is also. Let me know if that's a bad thing to do. I never put it anywhere near her eyes, only her body/back, and only do it if I think she may be too hot or cold.

94216-4855843754.jpg
 

hmwyer

Member
Original Poster
Oh, sorry I didn't see the reply! Must've been typing my novel! Lol! Oh, and thanks! I hope this does help someone! That's why I try to be very lengthy and thorough in my posts on here, so sorry they are so long, but I hate seeing vague posts on here. I even just today made an ALL Spyro album of videos and pictures on my phone so I can go to them with ease to show you all or the vet on Friday.
Anyways, she is lethargic and tongue was out so bad earlier whe. I got home from work I looked at my fiance and said as I rushed to the tank "omg, is she alive?!" She was fortunately, she just is having trouble breathing. I picked her up and tilted her down a bit a d tapped her back super gently, trying to loosen stuff up, but idk if it really helped. I've been in the room watching her everyday basically for months, but more so this week in here when I'm not at work or sleeping to make sure she's alright until the appt. Earlier she was licking her lips and I saw soooooo much mucous, and I realized she was trying to lick and swallow her mucous. Poor baby.....oh, and I type this she has opened her eyes and is moving around towards her bed. She hasn't had her tongue out since I came home, but her mouth is still slightly open at all times. If you listen you can hear popping and clicking noises as she is breathing and swallowing. She has zero interest in food at the moment and that's probably a good thing because I worry she would choke on it at the moment with the amount of mucous she has going on right now. :/

***Oh, and was far as her tail goes, she doesn't seem to notice or care at all about it. She doesn't act and has much acted as though it bothered her this whole time. Most she has done to show it bothered her is only when I touched it at the break off point she would just twitch it a bit, which is most she has ever moved her tail since being sick with the RI. Not the dead part or even higher up seems to bother her. And now that it's off, she only seemed annoyed when I put the neosporin on the end the first day and a half. Last night and today she didn't show much bother with me touching it. Idk if that's due to her feeling bad all over or just that it doesn't hurt anymore, but she didn't try to move away when I put it on her in her tank. Out of her tank though, she tries to run.
 
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