Reptile & Amphibian Forums

All,

As some of you may know I had a pretty rough summer with my collareds and what was a healthy 4 year old collection of 6 collareds is now down to just 1.

Dave is fine, he has had endless meds to ensure he stays that way and has not shown any signs of illness like the others did.

But what i am worried about is that their seems to be a real problem this year with the health of collareds in the UK.
If it wasn't for the fact that mine didn't sucessfully breed this year I would be worried it was due to something wrong with the babies I had bred.

I know that Stumpy had a resp infection which we never managed to get on top of in time she was also a very small collared so things were quite tricky with her, but the others seemed so different.

I also now know of at least 4-5 collareds since my ones that have died or on the verge of dying which all seem to be showing the same signs of illness.

many of these and also mine had fecals done on them, showed clear, had courses of different antibiotics and also wormers yet they seems to slowly melt away for no apparent reason and still the vets and specialists have picked up nothing.

This problem ranges from me to 100 miles north of me and also 100 miles south, Also affects newly imported wild caughts to captive bred UK born reps.

We are all starting to wonder what is going on as seems to many cases around to not be linked.

symptoms are:

Stop eating
Eyes often partially or full shut
Rapidly loosing weight,
Sometimes breathing difficulties,for me only 1 in 5 showed this
Even force feeding and hydrating didn't achieve improvement
2 types of antibiotics, no improvement
Wormed, no improvement
This seems to all happen within 2 weeks,

thats all i can think of at the min,

Any ideas anyone ?? as this one has really got my baffled and frustrated as i dont know what to do if it happens again.

I looks at humidity,, nothing changed in 4 years, but checked anyway,, no problems there,

anyway if you got any ideas would be really interested to see what you got as i am done pretty much.

Pic is of Dave giving his Mrs a quick Pec,,,

RIP Grumpy,,,

I have spoken with a few people who have lost collareds here in the UK, a friend of mine rescued three, all were emaciated, weak and on death's doorstep, and none survived, despite everything she did to support them. I have not said anything before on here but I have noticed that this season so many collareds have been lost, most under very similar circumstances, and looking back most of those from last season with the same symptoms made full recoveries. I dont think it is only in the UK, at a guess more than half of us have lost one or more, sadly some have lost all or close to it. More frustrating than anything is the lack of diagnosis with only the odd exception.

I'm very sorry for all the losses, I said to Andy this morning that they are all now running around in the big desert in the sky, it has no birds and no snakes, but lots and lots of big fat insects, and its always warm too, lol.

I hope that someone is able to shed some light on whats been happening, I really hope it is a coincidence but from here it doesnt seem that way.
-----
Kelly

There is a thin person inside of me trying to get out. I keep her quiet with chocolate

www.collaredlizards.co.uk

i can't help but wonder if something is going on in the collared world in general. almost no one hatched eggs this year at least on the forum, i think one person who did hatch eggs had most of the babies pass, and it seems like every week, someone is posting the death of a lizard.

i certainly feel your pain on losing everyone. mine have mostly presented different things:
swollen eye
lethargy
secondary infections
spots on chest and neck
tails falling off
enlarged kidneys
constant constipation for no reason
closing of eyes
coughing
loss of appetite
inability to digest food
dermatitis
loss of back leg movement

not all animals have had these, usually a combination. most of those are from walter

any possibility that our cricket suppliers are killing off our animals? seems far fetched but i am running out of ideas
-----
vonnie

***Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. Oscar Wilde ***

I am no body, but I have been doing lizards for 40 plus years but that doesn't mean anything, and while I can't support it, I once lost several horned lizards that I had had in captivity for 3 years in like a week, and I suspected that it may have been the crickets, because nothing changed, and a well known biologist in Californai that was actually studying them lost some of his at around the same time. I do use crickets but have used a bug napper for wild caught bugs and wax worms and even King mealworms sometimes are raised in horrible conditions and when we get them they look like the fit of health, There could easily be other issues here and probably are, it does seem to me that these symptoms are showing up in a clean fecal animal. I know that humidity can be a problem as well, but if anyone knows how humid it can get in the mid west where many of these lizards hail from I wouldn't be quick to pin it on them. Cetrinaly there is some issue here and well worth exploring.Cheers!!!
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Phrynosoma.org

______

signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]

I honestly never thought it could be something so simple, but I guess you might be right. If it were something like crickets it could simply be something that affects only collareds, and would be on a worldwide scale. Might sound silly but mine are all perfectly healthy but then again I dont feed them crickets anymore, they only really have locusts and waxies, everything else comes in from our bug catcher. I have never fed the mealworms or roaches either.. Maybe if not crickets, commercially used cricket fodder?
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Kelly

There is a thin person inside of me trying to get out. I keep her quiet with chocolate

www.collaredlizards.co.uk

Just to be arkward...

explain this one.

6 collareds, in 1 viv,,

Dave is the best condition he has ever been, all others died,,
same food, same everything.

Maybe Dave's immune system could handle it, like not everyone suffered with the plague, it was lethal to some and yet others it passed with minimal damage. Same with a lot of other modern bugs too. It could be something totally unrelated to the crickets, or it might be a pure coincidence but its certainly worth considering.
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Kelly

There is a thin person inside of me trying to get out. I keep her quiet with chocolate

www.collaredlizards.co.uk

My Houston has all of those identical symptoms. Went from healthy to all of that very rapidly. Check out my previous posts... and the insightful replies. Thinking resp infection, but vet seems to be a bit of a bonehead. You'll get the jist of it thru the msgs.
Best of luck, keep us informed..
~Tiff

>>All,
>>
>>As some of you may know I had a pretty rough summer with my collareds and what was a healthy 4 year old collection of 6 collareds is now down to just 1.
>>
>>Dave is fine, he has had endless meds to ensure he stays that way and has not shown any signs of illness like the others did.
>>
>>But what i am worried about is that their seems to be a real problem this year with the health of collareds in the UK.
>>If it wasn't for the fact that mine didn't sucessfully breed this year I would be worried it was due to something wrong with the babies I had bred.
>>
>>I know that Stumpy had a resp infection which we never managed to get on top of in time she was also a very small collared so things were quite tricky with her, but the others seemed so different.
>>
>>I also now know of at least 4-5 collareds since my ones that have died or on the verge of dying which all seem to be showing the same signs of illness.
>>
>>many of these and also mine had fecals done on them, showed clear, had courses of different antibiotics and also wormers yet they seems to slowly melt away for no apparent reason and still the vets and specialists have picked up nothing.
>>
>>This problem ranges from me to 100 miles north of me and also 100 miles south, Also affects newly imported wild caughts to captive bred UK born reps.
>>
>>We are all starting to wonder what is going on as seems to many cases around to not be linked.
>>
>>symptoms are:
>>
>>Stop eating
>>Eyes often partially or full shut
>>Rapidly loosing weight,
>>Sometimes breathing difficulties,for me only 1 in 5 showed this
>>Even force feeding and hydrating didn't achieve improvement
>>2 types of antibiotics, no improvement
>>Wormed, no improvement
>>This seems to all happen within 2 weeks,
>>
>>thats all i can think of at the min,
>>
>>Any ideas anyone ?? as this one has really got my baffled and frustrated as i dont know what to do if it happens again.
>>
>>I looks at humidity,, nothing changed in 4 years, but checked anyway,, no problems there,
>>
>>anyway if you got any ideas would be really interested to see what you got as i am done pretty much.
>>
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"Were the diver to think upon the jaws of the shark, he would never lay hands on the precious pearl."

Only an opinion, but I think it's just like humans, some seasons we get blasted with virus's get over one and get another, one guy in the family gets it, and passes it to 3 others, and then theres the one family member who very seldom ever gets sick at all.

Who knows why, just the way it is. I just had an upper resp thing myself for 3 weeks now, don't know where I got it, I usually never catch these things. And my husband still has not caught it from me.????????????????????? WEIRD but you get my point.

I think it's a viral thing wiping out some of the lizards this year. If they can not figure it out with humans yet, Colds and virus, then how the heck are we supposed to deal with it !
-----
PHEve / Eve

Contact PHEve

Yeah, I agree with Eve. Since it isn't responding to any medicine available, it may very well be viral. That has always been my suspicion. It isn't just this year, either. About eight years ago I lost every collared lizard I had to some mysterious ailment that wouldn't respond to anything--Baytril, Flagyl, Panacur . . . nothing. I tube and syringe fed them, I kept them hydrated and warm, and they still all died one by one. The main symptom was chronic wasting, even though many of them continued to eat right up until they died. I was convinced then, as I am now, that it must have been viral.

élan
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