RIP Sweet Pogo; Welcome Home Happy Go LUCKY

Has anyone used/had problems with the magic mushroom basking ledge? It attaches to the cage with magnets and can be used as a platform for basking.

There is something wrong with my beardie. I have ruled out just about everything, so now I am checking particular cage furniture. Pogo goes back to the vet on Tuesday (and I am surprised I have been able to keep her alive this long). She has serious eating problems and now she has eye problems too. No signs of respiratory infection, though - like no mouth opening, weird breathing, crusties, mucous, etc. (I use a Reptisun 10.0 T8 Tube - not coil, so that should not be the problem.) I actually turned off the UVB today to see if it would help her eyes - it seemed to help at first, but now tonight, they seem worse again. Her temps are right. I have had two reptile vets (and people here) tell me that my husbandry is fine, but I am taking her back to the vet on Tuesday with multiple stool samples to see if maybe parasites just aren't showing up in every poop, but are there. And now the eye problem, which I thought was just shedding at first but seems to be getting worse . . .

 

[PogoLover]

I checked the weather - they are calling for 85 tomorrow and 87 on Sunday, so that should be perfect for taking her out. YAY! (She ate like a pig at lunch - right after the medicine - didn't have to sit in there waiting - she just took the food, but did the run across the floor, then take some, run again, then take some thing . . . I guess that's her new thing.) I am so lucky - I have a room that has two glass doors right off of my living room/kitchen - her cage is in there, so she can see us and we can see her, but she can't hear all the loud kid noises, because somehow that room has really good noise insulation. (Yes, she basically has her own room . . . with my son's guinea pig on the other side -she can't see the guinea pig. It's going to be great when she is bigger - she will be able to free roam in there.)

On the bugs, usually keep about three dubia and two phoenix worms in a non-escapable bowl in there just in case she finally decides she wants real food.

 

[sweetiepie9]

Sounds like she's doing really well, keep up the good work! She's so full of personality!

 

[PogoLover]

She is still doing OK. Eating . . . more curious by the hour. We are outside today . . .

Her outdoor play pen:

Other than being freaked out by the crows (and the rooster that one of our neighbors has), she seems to like it out here

 

[sweetiepie9]

Wow, what a special outdoor playground for her, even a sofa to sit on!

I'm glad she's doing well, sounds like the meds are doing the trick as she's so active. Glad she's eating, too. Way to go Pogo :love5:

 

[PogoLover]

This is an evil roller coaster.

So yesterday we went outside again and she seemed to like it. She had a good breakfast beforehand.

After we came back in (we were out for about an hour), she went into her drinking bowl and took a nap in it. She looked kind of "off". (She had a water dish outside as well). She came out after about 20 minutes, and then her eyes started to look bad again. She wouldn't eat anything else (after breakfast) yesterday.

This morning she took a long time to "wake up" - she was just staying in a shaded part of her cage looking like she was asleep. After about two hours after lights on she went up to her basking spot. I waited for another hour to feed her, so that she would be warmed up first. She ate more than she has eaten from the dropper before, so I was excited. She also was running and jumping around the room. In the afternoon right when I picked her up to give her her meds, she was trembling. She wasn't doing it in the viv, only when I picked her up - and she stopped after a few seconds. She has done that a couple of times before - a few weeks ago - a few seconds of trembling right after being picked up. I know that is a sign of MBD, but the vet said she did not look like she had MBD or have any symptoms of it (she doesn't do the leg/tail tremor thing - it's more like a whole body shiver and it rarely happens, and only for a few seconds when it does). Maybe the opposite? Too much calcium/vitamins since she has been out in the sun a lot and I use the repcal calcium with D3? That might explain why she was staying away from her UVB this morning and was off after being outside yesterday?

In any case, after the trembling stopped, we gave her her meds. Then she started to eat from the dropper, but too much got on her snout, so she tried to shake it off (almost like a dog), and it went in her eye! So now we are back to eye problems again and she wouldn't eat anything after that and was lethargic and yucky for the rest of the day.

ARGHHHHH! I feel like it is two steps forward and one step back. At least she isn't losing weight any more, and her eyes were OK for a little while.

 

[sweetiepie9]

It's going to be like this the whole time she's on meds. She's getting alot of medication for such a wee dragon, so you're going to have to be patient with her.

So for the calcium, should be a pinch in her carnivore are 5x a week and a pinch of vit/min powder 2x a week and only 1 meal of it. She's so small just a bare pinch in enough. It's hard to tell about MBD at her age, so don't worry about that. She's never been without food and as Carnivore Care is a meal replacement, she's getting lots of food.

The meds will bug her tummy (even though that's what it's trying to heal). Don't forget meds work on dragons just like humans, they kill all the good bacteria as well as the bad. So you're giving her breakfast first, then the meds? I think that's a good idea, because at least she'll get a good meal. Give her benebac right after the carnivore care, before the meds, then more benebac 6 hours after the meds. That will help her tummy out, but expect 2 steps back for every 1 forward. Large dragons have issues with meds, so babies have even more.

Why don't you get some turtle eye drops, they're very gentle on eyes and I know a few people who have used them on dragons with eye issues with good effect. Her eyes might just be drying out a bit, those drops don't hurt and they can help.

How much longer does she need to take the meds?

And being out in the sun daily is great, as long as she can get into shade, as an hour in the sun can be very dehydrating, that might be what's bringing on the shakes. So is there a way to shade the water dish so when she's soaking she's not in the sun? That's what I'd do, find a cover for that part of the box she's in. Then you can see if that makes a difference. She's still getting UVB even if she's in the shade.

I can't think of anything else that you can do that you're not doing. Did you get her some bee pollen to add to the carnivore care mix? You can get it at any health food shop, if it comes in capsules, put 1/4 capsule in the carnivore care mix. I know it adds a sweetness that helps them eat more of it, plus it's great as an immune booster.

 

[PogoLover]

Still hanging on. We are more than halfway through the antibiotics. Pogo has eaten more today than she has since I have had her (other than the first day or two when she was still eating bugs and salad). She is still lethargic a good part of the day, but not all day. She jumps and runs around at times when she is out of the cage. Her eyes are clear, but she is still keeping them closed a lot. We are up to 7" and 11g, which is dreadful for her age, but growth for her!

 

[sweetiepie9]

It's all positive, especially being 1/2 way through the meds. Just keep at it. When I had Titan (he was 1 1/2 yrs old when he passed away, Yellow Fungus), in the summer that year (2013) I had to give him Baytril for parasites and he refused to eat for 10 days. Luckily he'd grown and was 500g but wouldn't eat Carnivore Care either. So it's great to see how much she'd eating and that she's gaining bits of weight. It's alot for her to take in, meds mess with them so much. You're both doing great! I can hear improvement.

 

[onceblue]

It's so great that she's eating and putting on some weight, even if she's still a tiny thing. That's so great - go Pogo!

 

[sweetiepie9]

Once the meds are done and she's infection free, her appetite will start being better and before you know it you'll have a big beardie on your hands. I'm so looking forward to that day

 

[PogoLover]

I was literally crying this morning - I think we might have turned a corner. ::knock on wood::

Last night Pogo and I had a fight - I tried to make her eat a phoenix worm. She gave me what I think was the first real black bearding I have seen from her and made a noise (but it didn't sound like a hiss). Never again will I try to force her to do anything. I was really upset with myself and thought she would hate me forever. But later she fell asleep on her blanky on my chest, so I was hoping that she had forgotten about earlier.

In any case, to make my long story even longer - the good news: this morning she ate really well and then I put her in her bath because we skipped bath time last night after I upset her. She started opening her mouth a little (water wasn't over 95, so I don't think it was from being too hot) - so I decided to take her food eyedropper and fill it with water. She started drinking and her head got lower and lower until she was drinking the bath water like there was no tomorrow. That is how she used to drink before the anorexia started - she would dunk her head in the bath and just stay there drinking for a while- she used to do that with her water bowl too. Right after she took that huge drink, I got a little nervous, because that was a lot to take in suddenly. She started to make the motions like she might vomit - but instead she decided to ask to be taken out of the bath (scratching at the sides), and promptly made this nice poop on my hand:

The urate doesn't have any of the blood streaks in it any more - all white, no pink. YAY!

I realized then that she has probably been dehydrated for a while (which might be the cause of her eye problems too -not enough fluid to keep the eyes clean). After I dried her off, I held her under my out-of-the-cage basking light - I have never seen her colors so bright - she has this orange and light yellow on her side spikes that looks like fire, and it was beautiful. She did explody eye while I was holding her (I have never gotten to see explody eye up-close like that - pretty cool stuff). I held her under the light for about 40 minutes to make sure that she was hot enough to digest all the food/water in her belly.

She is back in her viv now with her belly (she was skin and bones a few weeks ago):

She is up to 13 grams!!!!

 

[sweetiepie9]

OMG that is just the most wonderful news That is one great looking poop and urate, too (more happy poopy dance)

I am so thrilled to hear all this great news. She's coming into her own and has gained 2 more grams! I'm so happy for both of you! Drinking all that water is a wonderful sign. If you feel she's too dehydrated you can make up your own pedialyte and put it in her bath, too, she can drink it if she wants. The original recipe is 1 qt water, 2 tbsp sugar, 1/4 tsp salt, so I multiply it by 4; 4 quarts hot water, 8 tbsp sugar, 2 tsp salt, put that in the bath with cold water until it's warm and soak her. I use that for adults beardies, so you might want to start with the original in a small bath for her. She can drink it, it gives her back electrolytes that she might be missing. So there an alternative you can use in her bath anytime.

I am so glad she's feeling better, she looks better and her colours look better, too, always a great sign of a beardie feeling better. Just the fact that she put her foot down on not wanting to eat a bug yet, shows she's got a mind of her own, Won't be long until she's eating out of her dish again, like normal. Just hang in there :love5:

 

[onceblue]

Wonderful news!!! I'm so glad

 

[PogoLover]

So, Pogo is continuing to eat more, be more active, and open both of her eyes. She has two days of antibiotics left and then one more dose of Panacur the following week. I am going to be so happy when we get to stop forcing meds down her throat! Still no interest in dubia, phoenix worms or any other kind of non-eyedropper food. She is still 13 grams - maybe a little more (my scale does grams - but not tenths of grams). I am just glad she is not losing weight. Her colors are brighter and her stress marks were almost completely invisible (almost all pure white throat and belly) at one point today - I have never seen her with an almost pure white belly - she has had at least faint stress marks since we got her (now over 6 week ago). But today she was basking in my hand after breakfast and all of the little gray/black lines disappeared, until I could just see a few light grey scales here and there.

 

[sweetiepie9]

Oh your news just gets better and better. Hopefully she'll feel well enough to eat regular bugs again soon! And meds are almost over, what a wonderful thing!

She keeps gaining on the mix, so that's great, too. She'll start to really catch up when she's feeling really better, probably a few days after the meds are finished. You've been so patient and good to her, so glad you're seeing positive results. Yeah for a great vet!

It's great to hear that she's active and that her stress marks are finally going away, means she's a happy girl I look forward to hearing about her!

Here's to eating more and filling out in her own time :love5: