Urate plug!?!

[beardie parents]

Hi all. Zoom Zoom didn't poop all week. She pooped last Sunday and then today she pooped in the bath, this is after being given applesauce (yes, it's sugar free) yesterday and today she finally pooped. I decided to feel her urate, which was fairly long and thick, it was also very hard. Just what does a urate plug look like? I've read about them but never experienced one first hand. The part that came out first was almost solid with a shell like thing on it, the white top was hard also.
Could Zoom Zoom's urate been a plug? I'm sorry, I didn't get a pic of it, didn't think of it until now and it's already been disposed of. I would appreciate any info on this.

Also, what causes the urate plugs? If she did have one, how do you stop them from reappearing.

 

[pscaulkins]

It sounds like a urate plug. When Magick doesn't poop daily, her urates are ugly and chalky/hard. She will be 3 in April and we finally have her pooping daily in her tub. When she goes daily, her urates are nice and soft and bright white. It seems the longer she goes without pooping, the harder and larger the urate is and it is not nice and white. They say dehydration causes urates to be hard and chalky along with to much calcium but those reasons have not been the case with Magick. Jada had really hard urates when we first got her at about 3 months old. She was extremely dehydrated though. She is a bit like Magick in that if she doesn't go poop daily, her urates get chalky so we try to get her to go daily in her bathing tub. She is 8 months old. Now our male, never has chalky or hard urates. Could it be a female thing? lol

 

[beardie parents]

Thank you for that info. I thought that dehydration was a factor. We try to soak her several times a week. I won't say we soak her every day because we can't always soak her every day and she usually only gets soaked for 10 to 15 minutes at a time when my husband soaks her. When I do I try to make it for 20 minutes, today she was soaked for somewhere between 10 and 15 minutes.

By the way, the urate plug is something new. As I said earlier, she pooped last Sunday and then not again until this Sunday. We try to feed her a lot of greens but, as we think she's only about 9 or 9.5 months old I wasn't that worried about her lack of eating greens. Usually she does go every day or maybe ever 2nd day but she's never waited a whole week before.

 

[Freeie]

We had one of those with Chimera today too. I was away all weekend kids took care of the beardies he didnt get his bath like i do it everymorning hes bath trained to poo i gave him his bath today and his urate was longer than his poo and one end looked hard. After that he was alot more active.

 

[beardie parents]

Thankfully Zoom pooped fine yesterday. My husband said she pooped outside, which is normal for her. I guess she got a little dehydrated without us realizing it. Last week when she didn't poop all week after that Sunday we soaked her a little more than normal. Also, she ate 15 supers yesterday. Her appetite is increasing. I think the reptaid is helping her appetite, it just seems to be taking a little longer than normal.