Hey all,
First time I think Tifa is really sick since I've got her and I'm having a hard time diagnosing what's going on with her poops. Pardon in advance for the gross imagery, but I was hoping someone could help me identify what she just passed for the second time in the last week.
I finally decided a vet was required and called all over town today, and the best appointment I could get was for next Thursday. I'm really hoping she is okay between now and then. Her behavior's been a tiny bit off the last week, but she's still eating, pooping, acting playful for parts of the day, and basking under her UVB and heat bulb plenty. The bulbs are new and I've double checked all my temps and distances and I'm pretty confident they aren't contributing to any digestion problems. She also isn't lacking in calcium or vitamins.
Anyways, here's a rough timeline (she's approx 6 months, 12 inches, healthy size):
1 week ago: I've usually been able to trust her with a dish full of BSFL but she started doing that thing where they inhale too many worms at once and she got a little backed up I guess and had a big movement where she passed some 40/50 of them whole, in the bathtub. I switched her to Dubias and Supers that night to make sure she was eating stuff she could chew, but even the next day she had more BSFL still in her belly she needed to pass.
In addition to the BSFL she was passing pieces of superworm shells, but not much, seemed to be digesting the roaches okay, and she also passed a weird piece of hard plastic-like substance that kind of looks like a worm. But as far as I know, they don't come out as hard as a rock like that..?..anyway I decided it must have been something I got stuck to the bottom of the rock I use in her bathtub and hoped it didn't happen again. She was not acting like a maniac who just had a really painful bowel movement and I took her behavior as a sign that hopefully her tummy problems had passed. Took a pic of it though:
(I took all the advice I could find here on my own and made sure the next time we did BSFL I fed them to her individually, and I also poked each one with a needle to try to help with digestion. This seems to have helped, but not 100%).
Over the course of the week I made sure she got a good mix of dubias, silkworms, and some supers, in addition to the BSFL, kind of noodling around to make try and see what she could digest easiest and, although her poops have seemed messier in general, I haven't been seeing whole bugs in there so I though she was getting better. The biggest difference was they were all really moist and I attributed that to the silkworms I adding into her diet, as I remember hornworms usually created these kinds of poos too. They kind of looked like this, on average:
I also noticed she was spending a lot more time kind of flattening out on the ground than I'm used to, which concerned me at first, but like I said she still seems to have no problems standing up tall, jumping from decor piece to decor piece, and has a healthy amount of energy. Doesn't seem to be freaking out. As for the poos, she's a little less frequent now (once every 1-2 days instead of a minimum once a day), but I attributed that to me having moved her from 3 meals a day down to 2 recently.
Anyways (sorry for the lengthiness, as always), a couple of her last poops had some bits of reddishness in them, and odd consistency. It didn't look like blood, not like I human am used to seeing blood at least, but almost more like chunks of something kinda dark orange. Couldn't account for it though. Unless it's carrot which she gets a few times a week in her salad. Today I found little pieces of that stuff again in a kind of disheveled looking sample she left me, unsure how helpful these photos from today are:
Anyways you can maybe see there was yet another one of those weird hard worm looking things. Also a couple whole BSFL that maybe I didn't stab good enough...Again, she's showing pretty normal behavior. Went back to chilling on her rock under her UVB right after. But I have the two items saved now and am a little freaked out at what they might be. I'd be pretty pissy if it were me passing these things!
So I don't necessarily have the $ for a potential emergency room visit right now. I'm hoping I have what the visit's ultimately gonna cost. And I'm a natural worrier about this stuff but I hope I'm doing okay taking cues from Tifa's behavior overall that she's not too distressed right now. Also I feel like she'd be declining in condition over the last week or so if her sickness was really getting bad..?..Based off the research I've done, it sounds like she's probably got some sort of parasite(s) that she'll need meds for. She even went through a shed over the last week while this all happened and she didn't seem any grumpier than she normally gets when trying to shake some skin off
If anyone has any opinions I'd love for a little reassurance or any info one might have. But I'm especially curious about these weird little hard things coming out of her, and if anyone knows what they are, because I haven't found anything that looks similar in my own searching around online.
So - thank you for bearing with me - and thanks in advance for any thoughts you experienced folks have
all the best
First time I think Tifa is really sick since I've got her and I'm having a hard time diagnosing what's going on with her poops. Pardon in advance for the gross imagery, but I was hoping someone could help me identify what she just passed for the second time in the last week.
I finally decided a vet was required and called all over town today, and the best appointment I could get was for next Thursday. I'm really hoping she is okay between now and then. Her behavior's been a tiny bit off the last week, but she's still eating, pooping, acting playful for parts of the day, and basking under her UVB and heat bulb plenty. The bulbs are new and I've double checked all my temps and distances and I'm pretty confident they aren't contributing to any digestion problems. She also isn't lacking in calcium or vitamins.
Anyways, here's a rough timeline (she's approx 6 months, 12 inches, healthy size):
1 week ago: I've usually been able to trust her with a dish full of BSFL but she started doing that thing where they inhale too many worms at once and she got a little backed up I guess and had a big movement where she passed some 40/50 of them whole, in the bathtub. I switched her to Dubias and Supers that night to make sure she was eating stuff she could chew, but even the next day she had more BSFL still in her belly she needed to pass.
In addition to the BSFL she was passing pieces of superworm shells, but not much, seemed to be digesting the roaches okay, and she also passed a weird piece of hard plastic-like substance that kind of looks like a worm. But as far as I know, they don't come out as hard as a rock like that..?..anyway I decided it must have been something I got stuck to the bottom of the rock I use in her bathtub and hoped it didn't happen again. She was not acting like a maniac who just had a really painful bowel movement and I took her behavior as a sign that hopefully her tummy problems had passed. Took a pic of it though:
(I took all the advice I could find here on my own and made sure the next time we did BSFL I fed them to her individually, and I also poked each one with a needle to try to help with digestion. This seems to have helped, but not 100%).
Over the course of the week I made sure she got a good mix of dubias, silkworms, and some supers, in addition to the BSFL, kind of noodling around to make try and see what she could digest easiest and, although her poops have seemed messier in general, I haven't been seeing whole bugs in there so I though she was getting better. The biggest difference was they were all really moist and I attributed that to the silkworms I adding into her diet, as I remember hornworms usually created these kinds of poos too. They kind of looked like this, on average:
I also noticed she was spending a lot more time kind of flattening out on the ground than I'm used to, which concerned me at first, but like I said she still seems to have no problems standing up tall, jumping from decor piece to decor piece, and has a healthy amount of energy. Doesn't seem to be freaking out. As for the poos, she's a little less frequent now (once every 1-2 days instead of a minimum once a day), but I attributed that to me having moved her from 3 meals a day down to 2 recently.
Anyways (sorry for the lengthiness, as always), a couple of her last poops had some bits of reddishness in them, and odd consistency. It didn't look like blood, not like I human am used to seeing blood at least, but almost more like chunks of something kinda dark orange. Couldn't account for it though. Unless it's carrot which she gets a few times a week in her salad. Today I found little pieces of that stuff again in a kind of disheveled looking sample she left me, unsure how helpful these photos from today are:
Anyways you can maybe see there was yet another one of those weird hard worm looking things. Also a couple whole BSFL that maybe I didn't stab good enough...Again, she's showing pretty normal behavior. Went back to chilling on her rock under her UVB right after. But I have the two items saved now and am a little freaked out at what they might be. I'd be pretty pissy if it were me passing these things!
So I don't necessarily have the $ for a potential emergency room visit right now. I'm hoping I have what the visit's ultimately gonna cost. And I'm a natural worrier about this stuff but I hope I'm doing okay taking cues from Tifa's behavior overall that she's not too distressed right now. Also I feel like she'd be declining in condition over the last week or so if her sickness was really getting bad..?..Based off the research I've done, it sounds like she's probably got some sort of parasite(s) that she'll need meds for. She even went through a shed over the last week while this all happened and she didn't seem any grumpier than she normally gets when trying to shake some skin off
If anyone has any opinions I'd love for a little reassurance or any info one might have. But I'm especially curious about these weird little hard things coming out of her, and if anyone knows what they are, because I haven't found anything that looks similar in my own searching around online.
So - thank you for bearing with me - and thanks in advance for any thoughts you experienced folks have
all the best