Anyone heard of a beardie only defecating once a month? READ

[AlbiHolmes]

Hello everyone, I would like to thank you in advance for reading this! I greatly appreciate anyones advice or help. I may not post on here much and to be honest didnt have many responses to my last few posts but I am an avid reader of the discussion boards. Sorry for the length, I know how everyone prefers details.

I have a female (99% sure) bearded dragon named Albi Holmes, She is roughly 1 year old, 18 inches long and 518 grams (full belly). I purchased her Feb. 20, 2011 at a local Jacks Aquarium. She has been through quite a bit. She was diagnosed with pinworms at about 4-5 months due to being fed crickets and put on meds and also diagnosed with coccidia around 8-9 months and put on an Albon treatment. She has since recovered (stool was free of coccidia at last vet check 11/11), however she now only poops once a month usually. Her last 2 stools were November 29th, 2011 and December 30th, 2011.. We are anxietly waiting for her to go here soon. Since the day we bought her she never really went every day, it was more like once every 3-5 days, and I believe the albon did a number on her stomach. Since going through the pinworms and coccidia her stools gradually took longer for her to go. it went from 3-5 days, to a week, to a week and a half, and so on. But it has been pretty consistant for the last several months to be a monthly thing.


Also, she has become quite lethargic, some days she prefers to hide and not even move, I literally have to get her out of her hide for her to get active. Also, sometimes she will eat and then hide, I will have to get her out and put her on her basking side/spot.

Has anyone ever heard of such a lengthy stool period or preferrably delt with it?
Why doesnt she bask after eating? Isnt that like instinct to them?
Do females tend to be more lethargic than males?

If you would like more information, please ask, I will respond promptly. You can also search my old posts to find pictures of Albi along with the 20 gal set up that she was in from 1-3 months and also the 75 gal that we currently have her in. We care for our Albi very much and want nothing but the best life for her. I think it obvious from the pictures that we did our research, have the cage properly set up and provide her with a great home. I wouldnt know where else to look for information and get the advice if it wasnt for this website and the members. Please help someone who is in need of help.

 

[Drache613]

Hello,

That is too bad she has had some issues.
The medications can sometimes cause problems or complications with their digestive issues. Did you give probiotics during the medication round?
How bad were the pinworms when she had them, was it a heavy load? Sometimes heavy infestations of worms & or parasites can damage the GI tract a little bit too making digestive processes harder.
What type & brand of UVB light do you use & how old is it?
How often do you use calcium?
Has she ever laid any infertile eggs that you know of?

Tracie

 

[AlbiHolmes]

Thanks for the reply Tracie,

The pinworms were considered "somewhat severe" according to the "vet"... We have had bad experience with "vets" around here.

The coccidia was also a severe case. It really didnt make sense, we keep here tank extremely clean and when she poops it is cleaned up immediately, no more than 30 minutes after I'd say. She never crawls in it or comes into contact with it. She literally goes as far away from her poo as possible.

I used acidophilus + during and after the treatment. I still give her a few drops every few days, she seems to love it! She wont drink water out of a dropper, but if she sees the acidophilus dropper shes instantly ready to lick haha..

I use the exo terra light unit that has the end caps and allows for 2 any size tubes. I have a 36" reptisun 10.0 (Bought new 11/11) and a soft white in the other. (I have 2 Reptisun 10.0s, and had them both in there at once, but she seems to not like it? Is 2 36" Reptisuns in a 75gal (4x1.5x2)

I only dust her Dubia, I dust them every time I feed them to her. She normally will only eat 1-3 Med-Lg dubia a day at most, thats after she poops, then as time goes on without pooping she slows her eating down to maybe 1-2 dubia every other day. I give her greens daily (mustard, collards, kale, parsely), we havent had any luck with her eating fruits or veggies. We tried everything but literally forcing them down her mouth. Any ideas would be great tho on how to get her to eat fruits & vegs with her salads!

We thought she was egg bound, however it ended up being a constipated/slight impaction. We built her a huge tote lay/dig box with eco earth bricks and everything. She dug the hole exactly like i read on here, backed herself in at the end, but never laid eggs. I think she was just playing the whole time. We ended up going to the vet and the vet gave her an enema which revealed a huge hard white pee sack. We have had to take her to the vet 2 times to get enemas due to her not defectating for 3-4weeks each time. Both of those vet checks/enemas were over $300 all together! Rediculous. Anyways, her white "pee sack" was really big and kinda hard both times that the vet did the enema?? Any ideas on why? Like I said our vet doesnt seem to know a whole lot, unfortunately..

Here is my photobucket link http://s1121.photobucket.com/albums/l519/AlbiHolmes/ for Albi, It isnt quite up to date, but gives you a great idea of how well we take care of her. I will try to update it today for everyone. I have over 150 photos of her and her enclosures from when she was a baby to 14-15 inches. There are also pictures of her custom platforms that I made, pictures of her set up while we were treating her for coccidia, and 11 good videos of her waving when she was younger and interacting with another dragon.

Again, Sorry for it being so lengthy, I'd prefer to get alot of details in order to get accurate respones and to avoid posting answers to questins a milllion times haha Thanks so much for you help!

Thanks again! Please, anyone elses experience or knowledge is greatly appreciated!

Keith

8 Months:

 

[AllanonsWrath]

It really sounds like she may not be digesting her food well. What temps do you keep in the enclosure? I would keep giving the probiotics as well as that can help her digest. The temperatures are going to be a big issue though. Cool, Warm, and basking temps. I cant see the pictures as I am at work.

 

[AlbiHolmes]

Her cool side is 81.7 degrees ambient temp and hot side is 86ish degrees ambient temp. She has 4 different basking options on her right (hot) side. The basking areas range from 93-109degrees. I have the ambient temps a little higher due to her not basking and they reccomend warmer temps for the acidophiliz to work better. I have a pretty good heat gradient going in the tank. I use 2 zoo med thermometers that both have probes. I check her basking spots several times daily with a $60 laser temp gun which is really accurate.

Thanks, more responses please! I know theres a lot more members out there with 2 cents in their pockets

Keith

 

[AllanonsWrath]

The higher temps are good when administering a probiotic. Have you tried to get some bathwater to around 95* and get her to swim some yet? I use the tub on the adult we just picked up. Enough water for them to barely swim in and put a bridge or rock for them to rest on. Get the water nice and warm to around 95* or so. That should get her to swim around and be more active for a time. That will also help with digestion and maybe even relax her enough to poop. How often does she get bathed now?

 

[AlbiHolmes]

She gets a good 20-35 minute bath once a week. Maybe once every 2 weeks. We live in the country and have well water, so in order to give her a bath, we use store bought gallons of drinking water. Roughly 3 gallons per bath. We use a 4ft rubbermaid shallow tub for her to bath in. There is plenty of room for her to move about and swim. She is normally somewhat active in the bath. However, we never really had much luck with her defecating in her bath, other than 1 time. Her bath water ranges from 95-110 max measured with the digital laser gun.

We would bath her daily, but that would come up to $21 a week in water. Thats not ideal to me.

Does anyone know if it is safe to use well water to bath them in? She never drinks her bath water.

Thanks
Keith

 

[AllanonsWrath]

Well water shouldn't be a problem at all. If it concerns you, you can get a product called Reptisafe to balance the water and it works instantly. Just a few drops per gallon I believe. I would try bumping her bathing up to every other day for a bit and see if that helps with her defecating.

 

[Jasper's Mom]

My Bob only poops every few weeks. However, he is also not much of an eater. I've had him tested for everything under the sun and he is clean - he just doesn't poop very often. He is not impacted or anything - his body just seems to process food very slowly. He won't poop at all unless I put him in the bath, and even then it's not guaranteed. As it doesn't seem to be affecting his overall health, my vet and I have decided not to take any further action at this time. My vet is very knowledgeable about beardies and I trust his judgment. I know it's not a solution, but at least you know you're not alone!

 

[SpazticMagic]

I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one with dragon BM issues. My guy, I think, is in his brumation cycle. However, he's never been much of a waste-maker. At the moment he's not taking in much (just five adult male Dubia a week, he refuses to eat any salad at all) so I don't really expect much to come out from the other end. However, he's never produced much waste and it's even less now--his last bowel movement was over a week ago (unless he's eating them when I'm not home...which is highly unlikely because he never seems to move). He doesn't have any signs of an impaction. He's been screened for parasites/infections and he shows up super clean. He has started to drink from his baths now...which helps alleviate my concern over his hydration levels. But, overall he just doesn't seem to have high bowel traffic. Suggestions or thoughts? Here's some details that might help circumvent obvious questions:

UV bulbs are about 75% through their effective life expectancy.
His basking temp is around 95F (and before we panic, this has been settled by him...we tried raising the temps and he hated it to the point of flat-out avoiding his basking spot until it was reduced to a max of 95F. Even with this he's had times where he tries to shift out of direct basking position. He's the only hot and arid dwelling reptile I know that prefers cooler temps.)
Night time temps are around 65F-70F due to a ceramic heat emitter.
He's almost three years old.
He gets salad offered daily, but doesn't even seem to notice it's there. (That's ok, the roaches love leftovers.)