Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey, have a beardie whos about a year and a half old. Over the last few months hes got either very lazy or sick. Sometimes he doesnt eat for a few days and doesnt move about very much. Is it normal for this to happen every now and then?

It is possible that this dragon is trying to brumate which, is a natural body response to change of season..winter. This can last from 4 weeks up and up to 12 weeks. It might still be a good idea to take him to the doctor and see if it is not something medical.

Tammy
Draggintails
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I Agree with tammy

although it may just be a change in season and a period of not eating for a few days at a time can be normal any longer than a week and i would take them to a specialist vet, they can be hard to find and sometimes expensive and out of the way but at the end of the day, it's the health of your beardie that is most important, i had a sick beardie who just appeared to be in winter shut down, ( all the usual signs, lethargic, not eating much) but she gradually eat less and less, so i took her to a regular vet who claimed to have beardie experience and she put it down to winter shut down/slight infection, so a course of antibiotics were administered and gizmo seemed to perk up and eat a little, but soon again she stopped eating and lost quite alot of weight, i had trouble finding a specialist herp vet in my area, but by the time i got gizmo to the specialist, he took one look at her and knew that she had lots of fluid retention (very protuding eyes, little or no bowel movement, extreme lethargy) he determined that she had infact had liver failure as well as a bowel obstruction, a necropsy later revealed that she had gall stones and liver failure, which lead to a severe sepsis(infection). it broke my heart to hear that he said "liver failure" because i knew right then that nothing else could be done.
some people may think that i'm scare mongering, but i myself would rather pay the vets fees weekly for the care of my beardie or save the life of another beardie from alerting the symptoms to another owner than have to suffer that heartache.

gizmo was put to sleep last tuesday at the age of 2 years.

i wish everybody who reads this the best of health for them and their beardie/Herp.

Spud

i know this may be a shot in the dark but i would be interested in a reply from you.
what was the diet of your beardie? i understand that a high fat diet (lots of pinkies and meaty stuff rather than veg n crickets) can cause liver problems. was it possibly due to diet or something else? did you use supplements (and if so what type) or beardie pellets?
i have a few beardies and like you say - sharing the knowledge can prevent things like this happening later for other people. good philosophy.
thanks.