My bearded dragon hasn't shed for a while. She's about a 13 months old now, but she hasn't had a full body shed since about July or august last year. Before then she would shed frequently, and I understand it's supposed to slow down but what I find strange is the only areas that have shed since July is her scar on her tail, the small burn scar on the top of her head and her tail and a portion of her beard. Everything else has since remained in a sort of limbo of shed. The colours would fade as if to shed, but then go back to normal. I'm sort of confused whether she has retained or stuck shed or if this is normal and she's just weird.
Can you post a pic of her? Is she growing at all? What are you using for UVB lighting in the tank ? Brand and bulb please- dragons grow at different rates and its odd shes only shedding on parts that are like scarred I guess we will use the term https://www.beardeddragon.org/useruploads/ click on XIMG at the top of the message box then click on the pic it should post
Karrie
This ones an old picture but it shows her head scar:
The darkened area of the tail is weird. My vet has told me it's probably a scar (it also sheds so it's not necrosed). It has changed as she's gotten older, but again, it still sheds (with a little bit of difficulty, it gets a little bit stuck sometimes). She doesn't like it being firmly touched, but the tail is still relativly flexible in that area (it's probably from a bit of decor falling on it a while back when it was a baby).
The head one was from when I handled her when I was taking her out of her enclosure and she wiggled, and when I reflexivly tried to catch her she got donked onto the heat lamp resulting in a blackened mark. It doesn't cause any discomfort, and it's kinda just there now.
I need AHBD to take a look and see what she thinks --- the Arcaida is a good UVB --- where do you have it placed? Top of tank or inside ? It needs to be in the tank if your screen is a fine mesh like a screen door -- 12-15 inches directly above the basking decor
Karrie
Hi there, a small scar almost always sheds slightly different than usual and is no problem. The only thing in all of the pictures that looks odd and concerning is the black spot. Has that spot grown ? You say it started when something fell on it , is that certain ? 0therwise I would want to get a skin scrape to determine if it's fungal. You could put some Lamisil or Monistat antifungal cream on it to see if it makes any difference. But her stomach + everything else is normal.
Yeah, it has grown a little bit. When I went to the vet he concluded that it was almost certainly a trauma injury, and I connected that with the fact a big prop in the enclosure fell on her tail. Is there a specific type of lamisil I should get? I'll take it to the vet soon as that could be the issue.
How long before i would see improvements for the mark? And when would be the best time to call the vet about it, considering long I think this may have been going on for.
I would call ASAP, since they don't and we don't yet know what it is . Once a skin scrape is done [ by a reptile specialist ] they can hopefully tell if it is a type of fungus.
I've managed to get a vet appointment for tuesday - they're short staffed or I would have been able to get one earlier. They're not a specialist reptile place per say but one of the vets has a good amount of experience dealing with reptiles, and has a good amount of knowledge of reptiles and he's been helpful in the past. I'll put the lamisile on in the meantime. The issue with getting a specialist reptile vet is that due to where I'm situated in scotland it's pretty far away and very expensive - it's also not viable to travel that far due to covid restrictions and stuff.
That's good, you're doing your best. A skin scrape should be able to reveal SOME thing to help figure out what the spot is and maybe what else to do for it. Maybe on some days dab some diluted betadine [ povidine iodine ] on it , let it dry + the apply the Lamisil.