Glad to hear that everything worked out for you.
I'm still trying to find my way around this new operating system. My list of questions for my tech-savvy husband is growing, but will probably have to wait for the weekend. : :? :roll:
I've learned not to be too surprised by anything that comes out of a bearded dragon's rear end, in terms of consistency or color, unless it's obviously parasites or blood or something like that. If Broly's doing "logs", then at least it's something solid. I've heard it said that they will often put out liquid with their poops, especially if they're well
hydrated -- that probably helps lubricate it and make it easier for them to push it out. Puff's poops usually include a puddle of clear liquid (when he doesn't do it in the water, in which case you can't tell). We also went through the thing with the red color when we first got him. There would usually be some white or yellow urate, then this red stuff in between, and then the poop would come out last. It was a weird shade of red that didn't look exactly like blood (too bright, almost orange), and I finally managed to get a good enough sample for the vet to look at under a microscope, and she said it was crystalline, not cellular, so not blood. She told me that "porphyrins" (some kind of metabolic by-product, I think) can sometimes cause a red color, and it's fairly normal and nothing to worry about. It's also possible that he may have previously been kept on brightly colored sand and may have ingested some of it. We still see the reddish color in his poops but it's not as bright as it used to be, and nowadays we just figure that it's normal for him.
I think bearded dragons tend to have a fair amount of loose skin -- that enables them to puff up their bodies and their beards when they want to show a potential predator or competitor how "big and bad" they are, or pancake out real wide when they want to soak up as much light and heat as they can get away with it. But that also tends to make them look skinnier than they really are when they're not doing any of that -- just one more way they have to worry their human slaves. :wink:
Good luck with your eggs. We've never tried hatching any eggs, nor do we plan to. I don't think we could handle taking care of a bunch of little baby dragons or snakes. We wouldn't have the resources to keep them all, but I would have a heck of a time giving away my "grandchildren", so we decided against that a long time ago. I don't think that Puff and Squirmles are on board with that decision though, and just about every spring they let us know that their DNA still wants to replicate itself.
:roll:
It's always good to separate siblings as soon as possible, because it seems like one always manages to grow faster and bigger and stronger than the other(s), and then sooner or later, someone gets hurt, or at best fails to thrive. And you know, the Doctor never gets to keep any one of his companions for more than a season or two. :wink:
I don't blame you for being scared of wasps. I got stung by what I'm pretty sure was a yellow jacket out in the yard a few years ago and like you say, did that ever hurt like hell! :shock: Fortunately, we don't usually get a whole lot of them in this area. Alaska is famous for mosquitoes (lots of puddles from melting snow and ice for them to breed in during the spring, and then I think they have some kind of "antifreeze" in their eggs to get them through the winter), but I can live with them -- I barely feel it when they bite me, and then I itch for a few days, and after that we're done. If I had my choice, I'd rather get bitten by a few mosquitoes than stung by a single wasp any day. :mrgreen: