Our new baby Issy behaving strangely...can anyone help?

[sweetiepie9]

Our baby dragon Isabella or Issy for short is about 7-8 wks old. We found her in a pet shop. She was huddled in the bottom of her cage and she had only 2" of tail left. We persuaded the manager to let us take her home and take care of her. We already have 2 dragons, Sweetie, who's 2 1/2 & Lonzo who's 4 1/2. We've had Sweetie since she was 5 mo old and we adopted Lonzo about 3 mo ago. We've had Issy for 12 days and she was doing really well until today. Over the last 2 days she did a complete body shed. She had grown in the few days we had her. She ate 18 2 wk old crickets yesterday in 2 feedings, drank some water when she was in her small bath and went to sleep at her usual time, 7p, after my husband had cleaned out the few remaining crickets from her last feeding. This morning I noticed that she was jerking her head from left to right quite quickly, then she stopped. She repeated this a few times, then stopped. She had 2 large spasms, then was ok. I gave her another bath, soaked her in lukewarm water for 10 min, dried her carefully and put her back in her tank. She was ok for about an hour, then the head shaking started again. She had 2 more spasms, but by this time the vet was closed. I'm going to call 1st thing in the morning. Finally my husband turned her lights off and took out anything she could climb, put a soft towel on the bottom and left only a small piece of wood and a soft folded up facecloth. All the spasming and shaking of her head stopped. She's fast asleep now and breathing well and just sleeping, no spasms at all. Does anyone have any idea what this was caused by. We've been using a Repti-glo 5, but we're getting a Reptisun 10 tomor. We've been waiting for a Power Sun, but the orders been delayed. We were going tomorrow to get the 10.0 so we'll do that anyway. The vet opens @ 9a tomor, so I'll call to make an appt. I'll see how Issy is tomorrow. Here are some pics of her since we got her.

Her favourite hide

Having a bath

On her basking spot; she had just finished a complete body shed and her colour changed to dark brown and tan, instead of dark grey, light grey and white.

Climbing her hide before bedtime

She's still sleeping soundly and breathing fine. I'll keep you posted tomor am.

Deborah

 

[sweetiepie9]

Issy is much better this am, we've kept out anything she can fall off of. She's hardly jerking her head anymore and she hasn't spasmed today at all. She ate 6 crickets and had a few licks of babyfood turkey and sweet potato; just to supplement her for awhile. We've kept her in her tank, but stroke her alot and reassure her. So far so good. We're taking a fecal sample to the vet on Monday, we'll see if there's anything there. I think, after reading through a few similar threads, that she's having trouble with her inner ear. When I gave her her bath 2 days ago, I thought I was holding her tightly, but she rolled over in the water and may have gotten some water in her ear. So no baths just misting and giving her water, which she's drank a couple of times already today. She also pooped and it looked normal. Either way, we'll get a new sample Monday & get that off. I wanted to take her in today, but the vet that works on Sat doesn't know anything about reptiles, so I'll wait for our regular vet, she's very good.

 

[Jiffy]

I am glad that Issy seems to be doing better today.
That must have been really scary watching her.

 

[sweetiepie9]

Her head is still going side to side but with less force. So I'm keeping an eye on her for the weekend. We'll see on Monday how she's doing. she's just dark all the time right now. Yesterday was really tough on her, so I'm glad she got a good sleep last night. We're keeping her tank very simple right now, everything soft in case she falls. Thanks for your kind words, I'm hoping she'll be ok now.

 

[sunkist]

Have you looked around her ears to see if there is a piece of skin maybe. Like she might be trying to shake it off since you said she went through a full shed?? Maybe something's itching her?

 

[Ethelia]

Hi there,
Glad to hear your dragons doing a bit better.

About the baths, yours actually looked quite deep for your little one. If you just fill the water up to her tummy and pour a little water onto her back she will still gain all the benefits, but it will be hard if not imposible for her to slip over and 'dunk' herself.

 

[sweetiepie9]

Ethelia, I realized the same thing and have stopped putting so much water in her little dish, as you said just a bit and pour some over her back. I've been giving her drops of water on my fingertip as well, so she's drinking. The biggest thing, is we got a Power Sun 100w to replace the Reptiglo 5.0 and she's already about 70% better, hardly any head wagging and only 1 spasm, so looks like she's on the mend. We're still going to take a fecal to the vet to make sure she's got no parasites. Thanks everyone for your responses. We're still leaving anything with any height out of her tank and left the small towel at the bottom. She ate 3x today, crickets 2x & abit of turkey babyfood. I think my husband has been feeding her vitamins too often, so that's been reduced to 2x/wk. So again, thanks for listening.

 

[Ethelia]

Wonderful!
Glad she's on the mend x

 

[sweetiepie9]

I think the Power Sun is really making her better. Her colour was her usual bright tan, choclolate brown, in stead of black & grey, so I know she's feeling better. Thank goodness, she's got such a good personality and really likes to snuggle and she's only 7 weeks old!

 

[sweetiepie9]

GOOD NEWS, Issy is completely better. The power sun did the job, she stopped shaking her head and any spasms Thursday and now it's Saturday and she's been chasing crickets every time we put them in her viv. There are never any left now, which is a great sign and she's already grown a great deal. So the moral of the story is MVB's are better for babies than any other type of UVB light. Thanks everyone for listening. Issy says "hi, do you have any crickets for me?"