ozzybabe77
Member
I've had my baby beardie, Ozzy, for a few months now, and since we got him he has almost consistently had stress marks and was doing this strange tilting action where he would constantly lean to his right and sometimes flip over and fall off things. This would happen for a day or so and then he would go back to being normal the next day. One day was particularly bad and he had not eaten much for a few day so I took him to our local vet, concerned about bone disease or a neurological condition. She concluded that my cage setup was perfect, so that was not the issue. However, she suggested feeding him in a separate area since the crickets had been hiding under objects, making it hard for him to catch them. She also gave me medicine to give him in case he had a parasite.
After we changed his eating habits, he got better after about a week. He seemed fine, ate well, pooped regularly, and has molted a couple times. He seemed completely back to normal! Except that the stress marks were still there and his beard had started getting extremely dark when I would enter the room. I figured he was just skittish, but then he started making these odd gasping noises. Again I took him to the vet (alert: I have extreme worrying capacity!). They said he was just trying to puff up his non-existent beard in order to seem bigger and dominant and that the noise was probably just the sound of the moistness of his mouth when he opened it (I had been worrying about a respiratory infection, but what they said made sense)
Just yesterday, my town was hit by hurricane Sandy, and knocked out our electricity completely, just after he had eaten. Today we have regained our power, but Ozzy is again doing the tilting, which he has not done for quite some time, and refusing to eat. He is still pooping regularly, so that leads me to believe it is not caused by impaction (my initial thought since the lack of heat may have caused him trouble digesting?) and the end of his tail, which i had noticed before but it has now gotten worse, is getting quite darker than the rest of him. I've read about tail rot and I sincerely hope this is not happening to my poor baby beardie! I know this is a lot of different symptoms to consider but I would like a second opinion on what might be the cause of these strange behaviors, especially since I would feel quite foolish if I was to bring him to the vet ONCE AGAIN and there not be a thing wrong with him!
Please help if you have any ideas at all about what I should do! Thank you!
After we changed his eating habits, he got better after about a week. He seemed fine, ate well, pooped regularly, and has molted a couple times. He seemed completely back to normal! Except that the stress marks were still there and his beard had started getting extremely dark when I would enter the room. I figured he was just skittish, but then he started making these odd gasping noises. Again I took him to the vet (alert: I have extreme worrying capacity!). They said he was just trying to puff up his non-existent beard in order to seem bigger and dominant and that the noise was probably just the sound of the moistness of his mouth when he opened it (I had been worrying about a respiratory infection, but what they said made sense)
Just yesterday, my town was hit by hurricane Sandy, and knocked out our electricity completely, just after he had eaten. Today we have regained our power, but Ozzy is again doing the tilting, which he has not done for quite some time, and refusing to eat. He is still pooping regularly, so that leads me to believe it is not caused by impaction (my initial thought since the lack of heat may have caused him trouble digesting?) and the end of his tail, which i had noticed before but it has now gotten worse, is getting quite darker than the rest of him. I've read about tail rot and I sincerely hope this is not happening to my poor baby beardie! I know this is a lot of different symptoms to consider but I would like a second opinion on what might be the cause of these strange behaviors, especially since I would feel quite foolish if I was to bring him to the vet ONCE AGAIN and there not be a thing wrong with him!
Please help if you have any ideas at all about what I should do! Thank you!
His tail has not had any damage, to my knowledge but I am sad to say that on the first week I had him, the silly thing jumped out of my hand onto the floor! 
i dust his crickets with calcium/vitamin D3 supplement every day (he is fed once a day and eats roughly ten crickets daily - except for today obviously, since the little punk doesnt seem to be hungry, though I've tried several times to get him to eat
