Hello everyone. One of my bearded dragons is currently sick and I am not sure what to do from here. I apologize for the long post but I want to make sure I give all the details.
For some background, I have two bearded dragons, one female (Reptar) and one male (Lucky). Both are 16 months old and housed separately in 40 gallon tanks with a 160w Mega-Ray MVB bulb at the basking spot and a 24 inch Reptisun T5. These bulbs are all approximately 4 months old and will be replaced again in March. Their lights are on a timer and are on from 8am-730pm. The humidity ranges from 20-25% and the basking spot stays around 102-103 in each cage, and they are on reptile carpet. Up until a year old, they were offered a variety of bugs every day (crickets, hornworms, dubia roaches, soldier fly larva, superworms, mealworms, waxworms) that were coated in calcium each feeding and vitamins 1-2x/week. I've always offered a variety of greens but both of them will only eat kale, so they get fresh kale and calcium often. In February 2021, they were both taken for their first vet visit as their appetites drastically decreased. They had coccidia and pinworms, and were mildly overweight, but were otherwise in good health according to the vet. She recommended offering greens daily and bugs only 2-3x/week. The parasites were treated with medications. During the time when they were being treated, I fed a half-dose worth of Repti-Boost and some probiotics every couple of days to help them recover from the parasites and medications. After they recovered, I cut the bug feedings down to a couple times a week. I had also read on the internet to let them eat as many bugs as they want in their feeding period. Both would over-indulge, but especially Lucky. There were times he would eat over 200 bugs (mostly BSFL, which are small, but that is still way too many), so I also limited how many bugs they got in each feeding session. Both dragons have seemed healthy since. They poop regularly, had good appetites, and were very active. With the new diet, Reptar grew to a normal size and weight, but Lucky still appeared obese, even though I greatly cut his food intake down as he grew.
In early November, as the weather was getting colder, both dragons became pretty sluggish and stopped eating. I attributed this to brumation and left them alone. Reptar would wake up to eat every so often, but Lucky wouldn't. One day when I was soaking Lucky, he closed his eyes, froze up, and started twitching. I thought he may be low on calcium and this was the beginning of MBD from not eating/brumating, so I started to give him small amounts of repti-boost daily and scheduled a vet appointment. I was very concerned for him and thought he may have parasites or MBD. I had to wait over a month for the appointment. During that time, Reptar came out of brumation and had been her normal self, but Lucky was still sluggish and refusing to eat, but was "awake" all day. I kept giving Lucky supportive care, but he was not acting himself.
I took both dragons in with stool samples. The vet weighed Reptar and checked her stool sample but Lucky was the main focus of the visit. Reptar was 480 grams and had a negative stool sample. Lucky had a negative stool sample and weighed a whopping 685 grams. Based on what I described, the vet was also concerned for MBD, so she took an x-ray. On the x-ray, he had fluid in his abdomen that was also pushing on his lungs. Per her recommendation, she did a needle aspiration of the fluid and bloodwork. She removed 13cc of clear yellow fluid from his abdomen and sent everything to a lab. He had a normal calcium level (12.5), no signs of MBD on the x-ray or bloodwork, normal kidney and liver function, and everything else was normal. She suspects that it was the beginning of an infection or fatty liver disease, so she prescribed 7 days of Baytril and recommended a feeding schedule of bugs once per week and fresh greens offered daily to bring his weight down. She said that he is not obese, he just looks like a very large dragon, and over her last 20 years as an exotic vet, she has noticed that they seem to be breeding them to be larger and larger, and the larger ones have more health issues. She said no more repti-boost or supplements, just let him eat if and when he wants, and hopefully he will slowly lose weight and fluid will stop accumulating. The vet visit was on January 4th. After the visit, Lucky has been more active and mostly acts like his normal self. I am not sure if this can be attributed to the aspiration or the antibiotic. However, he is hardly eating. Since the visit, he has eaten a total of 8 superworms, 3 dubia roaches, and a few pieces of kale. I am not offering any more worms as I know they are full of fat. I am concerned again because I think I might feel more fluid in his abdomen, and I'm worried that this is decreasing his appetite, or going to lead to breathing troubles. I'm at a loss here. I am a fourth year medical student, so I have seen heart failure, liver failure, renal failure, and fluid issues in humans plenty of times. I have an understanding of the physiology and pathology behind these diseases, but that is in humans and not reptiles, so this is probably worsening my fears. I get worried when he doesn't eat for long periods of time because I don't want him nutritionally deficient or to develop MBD, but I also don't want food to be making the fluid worse. I don't want to lose him, but I also don't want him suffering. The vet wants me to talk with her at the end of the month to see how he's doing, and may want to see him for another visit, and warned that if he isn't eating, he may need to be hospitalized. I will be bringing everything I've said here up with the vet but if he would need a bunch more lab testing or hospitalization, I simply can't afford it. Has anyone here dealt with something similar? Is there something the vet may be missing? Is there anything else I can do to help him? What are the next steps in treatment, and what is his prognosis?
For some background, I have two bearded dragons, one female (Reptar) and one male (Lucky). Both are 16 months old and housed separately in 40 gallon tanks with a 160w Mega-Ray MVB bulb at the basking spot and a 24 inch Reptisun T5. These bulbs are all approximately 4 months old and will be replaced again in March. Their lights are on a timer and are on from 8am-730pm. The humidity ranges from 20-25% and the basking spot stays around 102-103 in each cage, and they are on reptile carpet. Up until a year old, they were offered a variety of bugs every day (crickets, hornworms, dubia roaches, soldier fly larva, superworms, mealworms, waxworms) that were coated in calcium each feeding and vitamins 1-2x/week. I've always offered a variety of greens but both of them will only eat kale, so they get fresh kale and calcium often. In February 2021, they were both taken for their first vet visit as their appetites drastically decreased. They had coccidia and pinworms, and were mildly overweight, but were otherwise in good health according to the vet. She recommended offering greens daily and bugs only 2-3x/week. The parasites were treated with medications. During the time when they were being treated, I fed a half-dose worth of Repti-Boost and some probiotics every couple of days to help them recover from the parasites and medications. After they recovered, I cut the bug feedings down to a couple times a week. I had also read on the internet to let them eat as many bugs as they want in their feeding period. Both would over-indulge, but especially Lucky. There were times he would eat over 200 bugs (mostly BSFL, which are small, but that is still way too many), so I also limited how many bugs they got in each feeding session. Both dragons have seemed healthy since. They poop regularly, had good appetites, and were very active. With the new diet, Reptar grew to a normal size and weight, but Lucky still appeared obese, even though I greatly cut his food intake down as he grew.
In early November, as the weather was getting colder, both dragons became pretty sluggish and stopped eating. I attributed this to brumation and left them alone. Reptar would wake up to eat every so often, but Lucky wouldn't. One day when I was soaking Lucky, he closed his eyes, froze up, and started twitching. I thought he may be low on calcium and this was the beginning of MBD from not eating/brumating, so I started to give him small amounts of repti-boost daily and scheduled a vet appointment. I was very concerned for him and thought he may have parasites or MBD. I had to wait over a month for the appointment. During that time, Reptar came out of brumation and had been her normal self, but Lucky was still sluggish and refusing to eat, but was "awake" all day. I kept giving Lucky supportive care, but he was not acting himself.
I took both dragons in with stool samples. The vet weighed Reptar and checked her stool sample but Lucky was the main focus of the visit. Reptar was 480 grams and had a negative stool sample. Lucky had a negative stool sample and weighed a whopping 685 grams. Based on what I described, the vet was also concerned for MBD, so she took an x-ray. On the x-ray, he had fluid in his abdomen that was also pushing on his lungs. Per her recommendation, she did a needle aspiration of the fluid and bloodwork. She removed 13cc of clear yellow fluid from his abdomen and sent everything to a lab. He had a normal calcium level (12.5), no signs of MBD on the x-ray or bloodwork, normal kidney and liver function, and everything else was normal. She suspects that it was the beginning of an infection or fatty liver disease, so she prescribed 7 days of Baytril and recommended a feeding schedule of bugs once per week and fresh greens offered daily to bring his weight down. She said that he is not obese, he just looks like a very large dragon, and over her last 20 years as an exotic vet, she has noticed that they seem to be breeding them to be larger and larger, and the larger ones have more health issues. She said no more repti-boost or supplements, just let him eat if and when he wants, and hopefully he will slowly lose weight and fluid will stop accumulating. The vet visit was on January 4th. After the visit, Lucky has been more active and mostly acts like his normal self. I am not sure if this can be attributed to the aspiration or the antibiotic. However, he is hardly eating. Since the visit, he has eaten a total of 8 superworms, 3 dubia roaches, and a few pieces of kale. I am not offering any more worms as I know they are full of fat. I am concerned again because I think I might feel more fluid in his abdomen, and I'm worried that this is decreasing his appetite, or going to lead to breathing troubles. I'm at a loss here. I am a fourth year medical student, so I have seen heart failure, liver failure, renal failure, and fluid issues in humans plenty of times. I have an understanding of the physiology and pathology behind these diseases, but that is in humans and not reptiles, so this is probably worsening my fears. I get worried when he doesn't eat for long periods of time because I don't want him nutritionally deficient or to develop MBD, but I also don't want food to be making the fluid worse. I don't want to lose him, but I also don't want him suffering. The vet wants me to talk with her at the end of the month to see how he's doing, and may want to see him for another visit, and warned that if he isn't eating, he may need to be hospitalized. I will be bringing everything I've said here up with the vet but if he would need a bunch more lab testing or hospitalization, I simply can't afford it. Has anyone here dealt with something similar? Is there something the vet may be missing? Is there anything else I can do to help him? What are the next steps in treatment, and what is his prognosis?