Cuttlefishh
Juvie Member
- Beardie name(s)
- Charlie
Hello!! I've always browsed this website since i got my first bearded dragon, Oscar, as a baby. She was two weeks old when we got her (perhaps a little too young, seeing it in retrospect) but she grew up very healthy (shes had two vet checkups this year and she has been wormed, poo check etc- we had a lot of guidance from our reptile vet on how to care for her!)
One thing that we did encounter though is that she grew pretty quickly. She is only 10 months old and she had already long outgrown her old vivarium, so we went ahead and purchased a brand new one that would be more comfortable for her adult size.
In doing so, as we were visiting the reptile breeder we had purchased her from, we saw another spirited smaller beardie that we fell in love with! He was very cute and one of the last two beardies left. (The other one was a bit sick, though it was housed separately from this one- they both were housed alone when we arrived)
So we purchased him, figuring he could use Oscar's smaller vivarium until he were to grow older (which we would have to upgrade again, but thats not a big deal since the one we bought for Oscar is a wooden stackable one, so we would likely just purchase the same one for him as well in the future and simply stack them)
Something that bothered me a little bit though after the purchase was done, however, was that as we were leaving, an employee of the breeder said "ah that one was born in January"--- that would make him 9 months old... One month younger than our girl, but he's significantly smaller in size. He really looks comparable to Oscar when she was around 4 or 5 months old..
Upon further inspection, we noted some other possible small issues as well:
• His feet and toes look quite swollen and a little mis-shaped, this could be because of the shed...? He did have some very obvious shed on his extremities.
• He was biting at the rock accessory we placed in his vivarium, which is a behaviour that may indicate mineral deficiency from what I've read..?
• His eyes and face looked a little sunken in, but not too dramatically so; I assumed we could just bump up his feeds a little and ensure hes bathed every day and see how we go
His appetite was very good yesterday (the day we bought him), and today this morning. He ate many woodie roaches, cut up vegetables, all with calcium/d3 dusting and a small few cut blueberries for the salad garnish. He has also done a poo today and it looked normal.
However, over the course of his first day his behaviour changed a lot. Later in the afternoon he was not basking and even trying to hide.. He was very sleepy like, but responded to me by opening his eyes and looking at me if i went near the cage. Still, his decline in activity seemed pretty sudden, and he was looking a bit frail and just very tired.
I also noted this morning on his leg, some yellow patches on his shed, though it doesn't look too different from the rest of his coloration, its randomly placed enough to lead me to concern. Here are the photos:
More of Taro up close:
Picture from yesterday, immediately bathed when he got home as his legs looked a bit sheddy:
Some pictures of him today, in the afternoon when he became quite drowsy:
close-up of the area I'm concerned with:
A comparison, of Taro(left, 9 months old Male) and Oscar (right, 10 months old Female) --- (just a quick note, we have been diligent with hand washing between dragon handling and ensuring no contact is shared as a precaution before we even discovered the possible issue, so i am not worried for Oscar in particular having been infected unless its airbourne somehow. My husband was handling Taro on this picture, while I placed Oscar on the opposite side.)
The size thing did worry me a little bit but I know some beardies can just vary in size and genetics and its not usually something to be alarmed about. The one thing I am worried for though, is the drop in little Taro's behaviour and the little patch on his leg!! He's so precious and has such an incredible nature, I'd really really hate that something like YF could be happening... we plan on taking him to our vet sometime next week unless he shows any further signs of deterioration, but i just can't get it off my mind and was hoping I could get an opinion here so I know what I could be up against.
Thank you very much in advance for taking the time to read my long post!
One thing that we did encounter though is that she grew pretty quickly. She is only 10 months old and she had already long outgrown her old vivarium, so we went ahead and purchased a brand new one that would be more comfortable for her adult size.
In doing so, as we were visiting the reptile breeder we had purchased her from, we saw another spirited smaller beardie that we fell in love with! He was very cute and one of the last two beardies left. (The other one was a bit sick, though it was housed separately from this one- they both were housed alone when we arrived)
So we purchased him, figuring he could use Oscar's smaller vivarium until he were to grow older (which we would have to upgrade again, but thats not a big deal since the one we bought for Oscar is a wooden stackable one, so we would likely just purchase the same one for him as well in the future and simply stack them)
Something that bothered me a little bit though after the purchase was done, however, was that as we were leaving, an employee of the breeder said "ah that one was born in January"--- that would make him 9 months old... One month younger than our girl, but he's significantly smaller in size. He really looks comparable to Oscar when she was around 4 or 5 months old..
Upon further inspection, we noted some other possible small issues as well:
• His feet and toes look quite swollen and a little mis-shaped, this could be because of the shed...? He did have some very obvious shed on his extremities.
• He was biting at the rock accessory we placed in his vivarium, which is a behaviour that may indicate mineral deficiency from what I've read..?
• His eyes and face looked a little sunken in, but not too dramatically so; I assumed we could just bump up his feeds a little and ensure hes bathed every day and see how we go
His appetite was very good yesterday (the day we bought him), and today this morning. He ate many woodie roaches, cut up vegetables, all with calcium/d3 dusting and a small few cut blueberries for the salad garnish. He has also done a poo today and it looked normal.
However, over the course of his first day his behaviour changed a lot. Later in the afternoon he was not basking and even trying to hide.. He was very sleepy like, but responded to me by opening his eyes and looking at me if i went near the cage. Still, his decline in activity seemed pretty sudden, and he was looking a bit frail and just very tired.
I also noted this morning on his leg, some yellow patches on his shed, though it doesn't look too different from the rest of his coloration, its randomly placed enough to lead me to concern. Here are the photos:
More of Taro up close:
Picture from yesterday, immediately bathed when he got home as his legs looked a bit sheddy:
Some pictures of him today, in the afternoon when he became quite drowsy:
close-up of the area I'm concerned with:
A comparison, of Taro(left, 9 months old Male) and Oscar (right, 10 months old Female) --- (just a quick note, we have been diligent with hand washing between dragon handling and ensuring no contact is shared as a precaution before we even discovered the possible issue, so i am not worried for Oscar in particular having been infected unless its airbourne somehow. My husband was handling Taro on this picture, while I placed Oscar on the opposite side.)
The size thing did worry me a little bit but I know some beardies can just vary in size and genetics and its not usually something to be alarmed about. The one thing I am worried for though, is the drop in little Taro's behaviour and the little patch on his leg!! He's so precious and has such an incredible nature, I'd really really hate that something like YF could be happening... we plan on taking him to our vet sometime next week unless he shows any further signs of deterioration, but i just can't get it off my mind and was hoping I could get an opinion here so I know what I could be up against.
Thank you very much in advance for taking the time to read my long post!
