Hey everyone. We have a bit of a story/question/looking for general input for you.
We’re somewhat experienced beardie owners, we’ve had 2 beardies before the one we have now, both were male. This is our first female bearded dragon (Calcifer), and she’s about 1 year old now.
For about 2 weeks now (since Sept 26th) Calcifer has been extremely restless. Lots of glass dancing, lots of running around her tank, lots of climbing and scratching. She was doing this sporadically before but at a more "normal" pace, this is more akin to "freaking out" because she's doing it constantly, all day, every day.
If she's in her tank she'll run around, attack her lights (which she’s never done before), glass dance, frantically try to get out, etc. We'll take her out, and she won't calm down. More running, jumping, wild eyes. We have another tank near the window she likes to sit in and look outside. If we put her in there she'll calm down briefly, but then it is back to freaking out after a few minutes. (See attached images for tank reference.)
She’s also taken to pooping on us when she’s out, and is pooping at least once if not twice a day. Her poop is small, there’s always a urate but the urate is kind of jelly-like, and the poop is formed, but a bit soft, not diarrhea, and there’s always quite a bit of “water” with the movement.
She’s not eating as much as she used to as well. Only picking at her salad here and there; only eating 1 or 2 roaches, instead of her usual 5 to 6. She seems to be drinking more though, we’ve been giving her a bath about 1-2 times per week, but offering her water daily and she usually drinks at least every other day.
She seems to be showing most of the signs of being ready to lay infertile eggs, but the only thing she doesn’t seem to be doing is digging. She might dig incidentally but nothing looks like deliberate, “I’m digging this out so I can lay eggs”-style digging. It might be, she doesn’t know what she’s supposed to do because she’s never laid eggs before…? Maybe we could be doing something better to help her be comfortable to lay her eggs if that’s what she’s doing?
She looks like she’s lost a little bit of weight but also we weighed her and she’s slightly heavier. Her tummy seems a little tender, at least based on how she reacts to being handled sometimes.
We gave her 3 different options for lay boxes:
Other than her “dig box areas” we only have her on paper towel, no other loose substrate.
We had her into the vet for a checkup at the end of July, where she had a fecal, and it was clear.
Wondering if anyone else has experienced anything similar? Or if anyone can recommend anything that might make her more comfortable?
At what point should we take her to the vet to be checked? Getting to our exotic specialist is a little bit of a challenge (and expensive), but we will 100% make the trip if there is a need to.
We’re somewhat experienced beardie owners, we’ve had 2 beardies before the one we have now, both were male. This is our first female bearded dragon (Calcifer), and she’s about 1 year old now.
For about 2 weeks now (since Sept 26th) Calcifer has been extremely restless. Lots of glass dancing, lots of running around her tank, lots of climbing and scratching. She was doing this sporadically before but at a more "normal" pace, this is more akin to "freaking out" because she's doing it constantly, all day, every day.
If she's in her tank she'll run around, attack her lights (which she’s never done before), glass dance, frantically try to get out, etc. We'll take her out, and she won't calm down. More running, jumping, wild eyes. We have another tank near the window she likes to sit in and look outside. If we put her in there she'll calm down briefly, but then it is back to freaking out after a few minutes. (See attached images for tank reference.)
She’s also taken to pooping on us when she’s out, and is pooping at least once if not twice a day. Her poop is small, there’s always a urate but the urate is kind of jelly-like, and the poop is formed, but a bit soft, not diarrhea, and there’s always quite a bit of “water” with the movement.
She’s not eating as much as she used to as well. Only picking at her salad here and there; only eating 1 or 2 roaches, instead of her usual 5 to 6. She seems to be drinking more though, we’ve been giving her a bath about 1-2 times per week, but offering her water daily and she usually drinks at least every other day.
She seems to be showing most of the signs of being ready to lay infertile eggs, but the only thing she doesn’t seem to be doing is digging. She might dig incidentally but nothing looks like deliberate, “I’m digging this out so I can lay eggs”-style digging. It might be, she doesn’t know what she’s supposed to do because she’s never laid eggs before…? Maybe we could be doing something better to help her be comfortable to lay her eggs if that’s what she’s doing?
She looks like she’s lost a little bit of weight but also we weighed her and she’s slightly heavier. Her tummy seems a little tender, at least based on how she reacts to being handled sometimes.
We gave her 3 different options for lay boxes:
- A small one inside her big tank by the window. A mixture of play sand, soil and reptile excavator sand that is moist, sand-castle consistency.
- We filled the bottom of her large 2 tiered tank with a straight dirt/moss mix, also moist.
- A large bin filled with a wetter mix of the play sand, soil and reptile excavator sand.
Other than her “dig box areas” we only have her on paper towel, no other loose substrate.
We had her into the vet for a checkup at the end of July, where she had a fecal, and it was clear.
Wondering if anyone else has experienced anything similar? Or if anyone can recommend anything that might make her more comfortable?
At what point should we take her to the vet to be checked? Getting to our exotic specialist is a little bit of a challenge (and expensive), but we will 100% make the trip if there is a need to.
It's already been 2 weeks since she started being crazy, how long could this last?
